//, /2 . i-j; LIBRARY OF THE THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY PRINCETON. N. J. Presented by '% DiM\froH..rQ.sD.rri "T Scction...).L^.L!J (P Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2010 with funding from Princeton Theological Seminary Library http://www.archive.org/details/genesisorfirstbo01lang COMMENTARY ON THE HOLT SCEIPTUEES: CRITICAL, DOCTRINAL, AND HOMILETICAL. WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO MINISTERS AND STUDENTS. BT JOKN peter' W OONNKCTION WITH A NOMBER OF EMINENT EUROPEAN DITima, ; LAJSTGE, D.D., TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN, AND EDITED, WITH ADDITIONS, BY PHILIP SCHAFF, D. D.. n OOHNICriON with AMERICAN SCHOLARS OF VARIODS EVANGELICAL DENOMINATIONS TOL (.OF THE OLD TESTAMENT: COXTAININC A GENERAL INTRODUCTION, AND THE HOOK OF GENESIS. NEW YORK: CHARLES SCRIP.NER'S SOXS, 1899 GENESIS, OR, THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES, TOGETHER WITH A GENERAL THEOLOGICAL AND HOMILETICAL INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. BY JOHN PETER LANGE, D.D., pmoraseoR in ordinart of theology in the dnivbrsitt of bohb. TRANSLATED FRUM THE GERMAN, WITH ADDITIONS, Pbof. TAYLER lewis, LL.D., 8C7HENECTAOT, N. Y., AKD A. GOSMAN, D.D., LAWEKNCEVILLE, N. J. NEW YORK: CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, 1899 EnTSRKD, according to Act of Congrtss, in the je»r 1808 3T CHARLES SCRIUNER &. CO.. Id tbe Clerk's OtBce of the District Court of tlie United States for the Southern District of New York. TBOW OIRECTORV PftlNTIM AND eOOKQmOlllQ COMPANY NCW YORK PREFACE OF THE GENERAL EDITOR. The favor with which the volnmes of the New-Testament division of Dr. Langk's " Bib •• work " have been received by the American public, has encouraged the editor and pablisberi tr midertake also the preparation of the Old-Testament division, on the same principles of enlargement and adaptation to tlie wants of the English reader. A good tlieological and homi- letical commentary on the Hebrew Scriptures is even more needed than on the Greek Testament. Of the German work, the following parts of the Old Testament have so far appeared, and have been assigned to cumpetent American scholars : Genesis; by Dr. Langk. 1864. Deuteronomy ; by W. J. Sciibodeb. 1866. Judges and Rdth ; by Prof. Paui.us Oassel. 1866. Tlie Pbovkbbs; by Dr. O. Zooki.eb. 1867. Besides these, The Books of Kings; by Dr. Bahb, The Psalms ; by Dr. Moll, Jkeemiah ; by Dr. Naoelsbaoh, E00LE8IA8TES and the Song of Solomon ; by Dr. Zookler, are in the hands of tlie printer, and will soon be pulilislied. The Commentary un Genesis, which is now presented to the English reader, involves a vast amount of labor both on the part of the author and on tiie part of the translators, and will, no doubt, command, in no oidinary degree, the respectful attention of biblicnl scholars. No otlier book of the Bible stands more in neeil of :in exhaustive commentary just at this time. No one is so much exposed to tlie attacks of modern science in its temporary conflict with revealed truth. We say, temporary conWict \ for there can he no es.iential or ultimate discord between science and religion, philosophy and theology. Tiie God of reason and the God of revelation is one and the same, and cannot contradict himself. The ilifBcnlty lies only in our imperfect knowledge and comprehension of the book of nature, or of the Bible, or of both.* The mighty problems which the interpretai ion of Genesis involves, are here discussed in a manly and earnest spirit; and I venture to assert that no single commentary on this book pre- sents 80 much original thought and research as the combined labors of the author and the translators of this volume. Professor Tatlkb Lbwis prepared the Special Introduction and the Commentary on Oh. i.-xi., and Oh. xxxvii.-l. Dr. Gosman translated the General Introduction and the Commentary on Ch. xiL-xxrvi. The original work numbers Ixxxii and 460, in all 542 pages. The English edition has 665 pages, or fully one fourth more; the English pages being a little larger than the • *' The abnegation of reason ia not the evidence of faith, but the confession of despair. Reason and reverence ar« natural allies, though untoward circumstances may sometimes interpose and divorce them." — J. B. Liqhtfoot, D. D,, 91 Pauft EpittU to Oit Oalatians, 2d ed., London and Cambridge, 18G6. Preface, p, xi. PREFACE OF THE GENERAL EDITOR. German. Both translators have embodied the results of their independent study and extract! fi^>ni works not noticed by Dr. Lange. Prof. Tatler Lewis, so long and well known as one of the ablest and most learned classical and biblical scholars of America, has scattered through this volume the fruits of long-continued Btudy, with a freshness and vigor of thought and style that is truly surprising in one whose feeble health has made such a work peculiarly difficult and laborious. For the convenience of the reader I present a list of his principal additions, which touch upon the most interesting and must difficult questions in the interpretation of Gbnbsis : Special Introduction to the First Chapter, consisting of five parts: I. Essential Ideas of Creation. II. The Hexaemeron in its Order. III. Creation in the Psalms, Job, and the Prophets. IV. Bible Ideu of Nature and the Supernatural. V. How was the Creation- Account Revealed? pp. 125-159. 1. Excursus on the Paradise Rivers, 217-222. 2. Excursus on the Flood, its subjective truthfulness, its partial extent, 314-322. 3. Excursus on the Hebrew Chronology. Condition of the Primitive Man. The Rapid Beginnings of History, 352-358. i. Excursus on the Confusion of Languages and the Dispersion — a true supernatural event, 873-880. 5. The Relation of the First Verse in Genesis to the Rest. The Chasm-Theory, 167. 6. The Creation-Sabbath, 196. 7. The Jehovistic and the Elohistic Distinction, Int. 107. 8. Astronomical Objection to the Bible, 182. 9. Scriptural Heavens and Earth, 1S5. 10. The Creation-Summary, or the Account of the Second Chapter, 201. 11. Time-Successions of the Sixth Day, 210. 12. Idea of Future Life in the Old Testament, 214. 13. Abel's Blood Crying, 257. 14. Earliest Ideas of Death. Case of Enoch, 278. 15. The Spirit and the Flesh, Ch. vi., 285. 16. Early Announcement of Human Depravity. Psychological Distinctions made in Ch. vi 6, S8T> 17. The Divine Repentings, 2S8. 18. The Bible Idea of Covenant, 300. 19. The Week and the Seven-Day Observance in the Ark, 811. 2y. The Noachian Sacrifice, 324. 21. The Noachian Blessings and Cursings, 835. 22. The Law of Homicide, 332. 23. Arabian and other Oriental Traditions on the Destmction of Sodom, 440-442. 24. The Rainbow and its Appointment as a Sign, 328. 25. Development of the Idea of Sheol. Jacob's Language, Ch. xxxvi. 35, 584-587. 26. The Interview between Jacob and Pharaoh. The Patriarchal Theology. The Idea of the Ea'islj Ijfe as a Pilgrimage, Ch. xlvi., xlvii., 637-640. 27. Jacob's Blessings, Ch. xlix. 28. Interpretation of the Words Goel, Malak-Haggoel, Redeemer, Angel-Redeemer, Ch. xlviii 16, 646 647. 29. Jacob's Dying Vision of the Tribes and the Messiah, Ch. xlix. 1-33, 651-654. Besides, the translators have added a large number of marginal notes, many of which might hare been placed in the body of the pages, aiid copious text-notes on Hebrew words and phrases, with illustrations from a rich store of oriental and classical learning. I congratulate my esteemed co-laborers on the successful completion of their difficult task, and commit this first volume of the Old-Testament division of the " Biblework " to the blessing of God, and the use of His ministers in the study and application of this most ancient and wonderful book. PHILIP SCHAFF. 6 Bible-House, New Yobk, March 10, 1868. AUTHOR'S PREFACE. The antbor has been mnch longer occupied in the preparation of •J^nesis for the "Biblework," than he at first supposed would be necessary; and this, together with the detention in reference to two of the New-Testament books, has seemed to bring the whole work to a stand for a time. This delay, however, has only been apparent and transient, since, in the meantime, different well-approved cii-wi>rkerB have carried on the work in the Old- Testament divisions, and will now, right soon, it is hoped, present the public with the long- wlshed-for results of their labors, wbile, at the same time, several New-Testament books ara again in course of preparation. * ♦ • I was especially detained upon the Introduction. The want of scientific method in tha culture of biblical theology which has prevailed until the present time, appeared to me to make it imperative that the questions necessarily belonging to the Introduction shovdd be treated under the form of this branch of theological science, — presenting the points, however, for the most part, merely in outline, with a reference to the authorities, but treating more fully and thoroughly the great tlieolocrical lite-questions of the day. * * * In the preparatory introduction, I believed that a proper view and statement of the character of the people of Israel should occupy the very first place in arohssology, since an archseology which leaves out of view the one vital, unifying, central point, the life of the people in question, must be a mere lifeless, conglomerate mass of knowledge. Thus, e.g, no one can have a true conception and estimate of the chronology of the people of Israel, who has not first rightly conceived and appreciated the characteristics of the people itself. I was especially anxious to open the question of Old-Testament hermeneutics, since the great and destructive errors, as to the fundamental principles of biblical, and particularly Old-Testament hermeneutics, threaten to make a very Babel of our modern Exegesis. The Sacred Scriptures never leave a doubt as to the fact that they communicate to us only words of life, and tlius facts and doctrines which find their expression in the light of their religious idea ; but this key to all exposition of the Scrip- tures is thrust aside by both theological extremes. The letter is not only put under pressure, but even strangled, lest it should say something more than it appeared to express according to the most restricted and limited interpretation. In this thought the two extremes rival each other in the effort to make a mere natural astronomical day of twenty-four hours oct of the divine days of the creation (Gen. i.). The one side thus seeks to secure the most complete orthodox locne of the creation, the other to make the Bible begin with a fictitious legendary description of the creation, under the form of the Jewish sabbath-institution." * Bishop Colenso reprei^ents this artithesia in one theological li/e ; iirst serving the letter with an orthodox ptirpoaa, nd then nsing it for mere critical ends AUTHOR'S PREFACE. If I have succeeded n^erely in giving an inipnlse towards a proper and satisfactory r^. of hermeneatics, I sLall hope for a special blessing from this part of my labor In the preparation of my work I have consulted particnlarly the com.nentaries of D. UTZ80H, &n., and Knobei, and, whenever it appeared necessary, those of Vox Bohlex and others. I have frequently aUowod the authors to speak for themselves; whenever, indeed, the briefest explanation of important remarks, or the peculiar characteristic expression of the commentators made it proper and best. In thia respect, also, the "Biblework" must ba naany-sided. But in the exposition I have never spared myself the labor necessary to ac qmre and state my own personal views ; and unprejudiced readers and critics will find that he work . not without its calling, nor . ithout its influence as one an,ong the independen. laborers m this exegetical field. I have n.t permitted n.yself to be swayed by the singula, and strong prejudice of the moment, which regards the sons of God (Gen. vi.) as an.els. and the ifa^^A Jehovah as a ,nere creature-angel. In regard to both these questions I am brought mto conflict with the interi .relation of Kuetz. * * » I., the practical division of the work, as in the theoretical, we have found it necessary to practise the utmost restraint in the use of helps. In this respect the work of J. Sohbooic; upon G™ (Berlin, 1846) has been of essential service, partly through its well-chosen extracts, and partly from the judicious remarks of the author; we have often, indeed, beeB embarrassed by tlie very richness of its contents. May this -'Biblework," in its Old-Testament division, meet with the same reception, and enter upon the same path of usefulness, which the New-Testament divisions ha^e already found; may this work upon Gexksis introduce a series of commentaries by ster- hng and valued co-laborers, and stimulate the progress and completion of the joint work, waich is faithfully devoted to the serrioe of the Ohnroh and the glory of the Loh. Bonn, May 12, 18,. In theii- historical name, as they are known in the language of other nations the Israelites are Hebrews (n-i-ins) ; according to Ewald, Lengerke and others, from the Patriarch Heber (Gen. x. 25; xL 16); but according to Hengstenberg, Kurtz (Geschichte des Alten Bundes, p. 132), they were called by this name since they came from the other side, i. e., across the Euphrates (i2S the land upon the other side, here the other side of the Euphrates). It may be urged in favor of this derivation that they were so called by foreign nations, who would naturally be better acquainted with their geographical, than their genealogical origin. They always caUed themselves after the theocratic honored name of their ancestor IsraeL They were a people who wrestled with God in faith and prayer. After the exUe, the name Jews passed from the tribe of Judah to the whole people, of whom that tribe was the central point, and they were usually so called by foreign nations. See Winer : Article Hebrews. Bleek : Mnleitung | Kirchen-lexikon von Wetzee und Welte. Article in's Alte Testament, p. 72. An article protesting Hebrder, against tlie prevailing view, may be found in the | The Israelites, as Hebrews, or immigrants into Canaan, may have exchanged their original Aramaic tongue for the Hebrew as their first historical language (Blbek's Mnleitung, p. 61.) This would be only in accordance with what actually occurred under the New Covenant, when the Hebrew Christians exchanged their own language for the classic language of the Greek and Roman world. In both cases, is the appropriated 10 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. language moulded into an entirely new language, through the power of the religious spirit. We leave it undetermined however how far this question must be regarded as already settled. [There is a very able article in the 2d vol of lue Biblical Repertory in which the author defends th« antiquity of the Hebrew language. — A. G.] As to their genealogy, the descent of Israel rrom Abraham, and more remotely fi-om Shem, forms the very kernel and soul of their authentic traditions ; while tha relation of other Semitic tribes to their ancestors is involved in uncertainty. See Genealogical table Gen. Ch. 10. Kurtz : History of the Old Covenant. The origin of the CoTenanl people, L p. 129. The essential question here is this : what is the fundamental characteristic, tha distinguishing feature of the Israelitish people. When God chose this people as his own, although it was a stiff-necked people (Ex. xxxii. 9 ; xxxiii. 3) ; although it possessed no art, science, political system, like that of the Greeks and Romans {set Introduction to Rdhr's Geography of Palestine) ; it does not follow that the choice ■was arbitrary, without a reason in the divine mind. Corresponding to the divine choice, there was a human disposition or quality, which God from eternity had designed, for the individual or people of his choice, and which he actually communi- cated in its origin. The striking peculiarity of Israel is the great prommence of the religious (Semittcj element in reference to God, vrhich is found in its highest and most genial form in this people ; in contrast to the prominence of the Ethical (Japhetic) element in refer- ence to the world. Israel therefore is preeminently a people of religion, not of art and science like the Greeks, nor of politics and law like the Romans. We may say indeed that it is a people of dynamic, not of dead formal forces or principles. As the people of God, which out of a profounder originality, introduces and unfolds among the hoary nations a new life, it places its living religion in opposition to the formal and lifeless Cultus of the heathen ; its dynamic poetry, and its science of the one all pervading principle of the world, to the formal poetry and science of the Greeks ; and its warfare and politics, animated and exalted by the great principles which actuate them, to the technical and unmeaning Roman politics and warfare. As it is itself an element of regeneration to the nations, so are its gift.s for the gifts and arts of the nations. Hence it follows that Israel must possess that comprehensive nationality, in which all the peculiarities of the different nations must be mixed. Thus it was destined and prepared to be the maternal breast for the Son of Man, the man from heaven, the head of all nations. Thus for the fathers' sake, who repre- sent its profoundest peculiarities, and for tlie root of Jesse, which shall bear the flower of humanity, it is the beloved people, tlie Elect One, Jeshurun, the favorite of heaven, the Apple of God's eye, the typical Son of God, the type of the true Sou of God to come, who is the fulfilling of its deepest faith and desire. Hence too in its darker aspect, its falls and crimes, it must represent the darkest side of humanity, and its worst characters, just as in its peculiarly chosen ones, its patriarchs and prophets, it may claim the noblest and most heroic spirits of the race. {See Laj^ge's Verfinsterung der Welt, p. 119.) Jewish State; in Fbdbrbach: TVadatt upon th. The most distorted features of the Hebrew Nation- al Character are found in Hitzio: Inirodudion to Isaiah ; in Leo ; Prelections on the History of the Nature of Christianity. The old heathen utterancei of contempt for the Jews are recorded in Raumer'e § 6. THE LAND OF CANAAN AND ITS POSITION ON THE EARTH. 11 Pale»Htu, p. 396. Herder, Hegel in his Prelectimn upon, the Philosophy of Religion, 2d part, pp. 42, 57. EwALD, and others have contributed to a more correct estimate of the Israelitish people. Franki's Lihanon, the family book of poetry, forms a coUec tion of the poetical glories, and exalted estimate foi the Jewish people (1855). The people of Israel must therefore from its very destination come into contact with the most diverse nations, with the astrological Chaldees from whom the family of Abraham sprang (Ur, Light in Chaldea. Abraham, in the starry night. Gen, XV. 5) ; with the Babylonians and Syrians, ever oscillating between pleasure and despair (devotees of lust and moloch) ; with the cultivated but depraved Canaanites (Kurtz: History of the Old Covenant, I p. 120) ; with the wisdom and lifeless Cultua of the Egyptians ; with the excitable and prudent Midianites ; with the kindred but ritill dangerously hostile Edomites, Moabites, Ammonites and Samaritans ; with the haughty and contracted Philistines (for whose origin, see Kurtz, p. 185); with the skilful and ingenious Phoenician ; with the pride and haughtiness of the Assyrian and Babylonian monarchies; with the moral intuitions, and tolerant spirit of the Persian world-power ; with the culture and reason-worship of the Greek ; and at last with the fateful, mighty, and cruel power of Rome. Upon this, as its fatal rock, after it had, imder all these interchanges and influences, unfolded its whole character, in both good and evil, it broke to pieces as to its historical form or nationality, in an exter- minating contest between the Judaic religious, legal spirit, and the strong political, and legal spirit of the Roman power. §5. THE LAND OP CANAAN AND ITS POSITION ON THE EARTE The land of Canaan, or the lowlands of Syria, in opposition to Aram or the high- lands (Gesenius, Lexicon, I'Js), the promised land, the Holy land, designated by many names (Raumer's Palestine, p. 32), was appropriated as the chosen home of the chosen people, as the land holding a central geographical position, connected with the different countries of the civilized world by the Mediterranean sea, and yet insulated from them (C. Rittbr : Der Jordan U7id die Beschiffung des Todten Meeres, Berlin, 1850); central also as to climate, lying midway between the debilitating tropical heats, and those colder climates within which life is supported only by hard labor; and central further as to its physical qualities between paradisaic fruitfulness, and sterile wastes. But so much has been written upon this land, in so many respects different from Asia, Africa, Europe, and yet so closely connected with them all, that we need only refer to the literature here. Haqenbach : Encyclopedia, p. 135. VoN Rac- «ikr; Palestine, p. 2. 7%e Bible Atlas of Weiland and Ackerman, 2d ed. (1845). Bernatz : Album des heiligen Landes (1856). Bible Atlas, by Kiepert (1858.) The plates, plans of Jerusalem, alluded to in Raumer's Palestine. Also the Periodicals upon this snbject. The Lands and States of Holy Scripture, in selected engravings with an explanatory text, by Frid'k and Otto Stradss (1861). The description of the land in Kurtz's History of the Old Covenant, i. p. 103. Zahn : Das Reich Oottes, i. Thl. p. 105. ZiANQB: Life of Christ, ii. i. p. 24. Bible Diction- aries by Winer and Zeller. We would call special notice to the article upon Palestine in Herzog's Real-Encyclopedia, Keil: Handbuch der Biblischen Archdologie, p. 15 fif. Th« Holy Land, by C. Tischendore (1862). Lasge's Biblework upon Joshua. [Robinson: Researches, with the maps. The articles by the same in the BibUotheca-Sacra. The articles upon Palestine by Thomson and Porter in the same periodical. Coli MAN : Biblical Geography, Text-book and Atlas. Wall-map by Coleman. Thomson : The Land ana the Book. Article Geography in Angus' Hand-Book Wilson : Lands of the Bible. Kitto : History of Palestine. Travels by Olin, Durbin, Bausmaioi 12 INTRODUCTION TO THli OLD TESTAMENT. BARTtETT: Walka about Jerusalem. Aiton: TIteHure. Bohr's Paleeiiie, Edin. (1848). Lands of the ilesnah, London (1854). Bonar: TKt Sinai and FaUstitie. — A. G.] desert of Sinai. Hacketi : Illustrations of Strip- \ 8rAin.IT §6. CHBONOLOGT OF THE HISTORY OF THE OLD COVENANT, OK OF THE JEWISH PEOPLR See Gattkber's, Ioeleb's, Brinkmeter's Chrono- loffie. Die Biographien der Bibel (1858). Hoff- mann : Aegyptische and fsraeliiisehe Zeiirechming (1847). Archinard: A la Chronologic sacree^ bajiee sai- les decouveries de Vhampollion (1841). Bibli- sche Chronologie rmt Fortsetzung bis auf unsere Zeit, Tubingen (1S51). Becker: Chart of Chronology, Leipzig {1S51). Jieiirage zu.r Geschichie des Alien Orients, by A. ton GnxsCHMiD, Leipzig (1857). Ewald: Gesehichte des Folkes Israel, i. p. 274. The Article Year in Winer's Bible Lexicon. Bunsen ; Bibelwerk, i. p. 201 ff. Biblische Jahrbiicher odef Vergleichende Zeittafeln fur die Alttestamentlichen Geschichten vom Auazug der Israeliten aus Aegypten bis auf Alexander den Grosser), Keil : Archaologi* i. p. 345. [Browne : Ordo Saclorum. Waito.n : Prolegomena. Bedford : Scripture Chronology. The Chronologies of Usher, Hales, and Chrono- logy, as Introductory to his Church History, bj Jartis.— A. G.] The Chronology of the Old Testament, as it lies in the records, was not intended for the purposes of Science, but determined throughout by the religious point of view, to which all geographical, astronomical, and scientific mterests are held subservient. Hence it has been said by the author of the Biographies of the Bible, " that among the mistakes of those who would find everything in the Bible, no one is more dangerous and wide-spread, than the attempt to construct a chronology from its pages." In his later investigations, however, he has seen reason to modify his judgment, and says " In the Bible, Genealogy has far greater importance, and occupies much more space than Chronology. The value which the Hebrews placed upon their genealogical tables harmonizes with the w-hole system of their religion and law, and with their expectation of the Messiah. They had their genealogists, from the time that they became a definitely formed state, and this remarkable feature in their customs hag acquired such a prominence, that they sometimes used the same word to denote genealogy and history." It is this very remarkable feature which imparts its distinguishing character, its Hpecific religious worth, its perfection even, to Biblical Chronology. In regard to this character the New Testament also in its dates holds closely to the Chronological key-note of the Old Testament ; although in the Evangelists and Acts it frequently connects the Biographical Chronology of primitive Christianity, with the Chronological dates of contemporary general history. We can thus speak of a scientific imperfection of Biblical Chronology, which is perfectly consistent with its religious perfection, and which on this very account ia of great service to the chronology of preneral history. The first imperfection is the want or' an unbroken series of dates by years, starting from some fixed point in the history. The second, is the absence ofa reference of the dates in the history of Israel, to the contemporary dates of general history. The particular enumeration of years of the Israelites are fragments, which are only joined together with difficulty. The references of Israclitish dates to those of foreign nations, especi- ally of the Egyptians, sustain the most diverse combinations. Hence the results .of the later determinations of Jewish Chronology differ so widely. It is only subse- quent to the exile that the Jews have placed tlieir mode of computation in connection with the chronology of general history by connecting with that of the Seleucidsfe g 6. CHRONOLOGY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE. 13 But in this precisely, consists the religious superiority of the Jewish Chronology that it is throughout genealogical, just as the whole biblical monotheism is grounded in the principle of personality. The Israelitish history proceeds upon the assumption that persons, (we might say even personal freedom), are the prime forming element* of history ; that the persons determined the facts, and not the facts the persons Every nation, as indeed every religion, has its characteristic computation of time through which it manifests its peculiar nature. Hence the Greek computes his time after the Olympiads, the Roman ab nrbe condi/a, the Mohammedan from th« flight of the prophet, with which the success of his religion was insured. The Israelite computes time by the genealogy of the Fathers of the race (nisin), by the ages of the Patriarchs, by the life of Moses, by the reigns of the kings. In addition tc this there appear in the history general genealogies. But when all the Christiar world reckons time from the birth of Christ, it only raises to its highest power tha Old Testament principle of personality ; since the years of redemption are the years of the universal life of Christ ; a continuous fulfilment of the word, " who shah declare his generation ? " But in this pecnliarity the Jewish chronology has been of essential service to the chronology of general history. Just as generally the Old Testament has given the death blow to heathen mythology, so the Old Testament chronology, by fixing the antiquity of the human race to about 4000 years B. 0. (for the different computations see the Biblical chronology, Tubingen, 1851, Preface, p. 1), has forever refuted the fabulous chronology of various heathen nations, e. ff., the Indian, Chinese, Egyptian. The general historical view of the periods of the development of the human race before Christ confirms the correctness of the biblical assumption as to the remoteness of its origin. In Ewald's view, the determination of the yearly feasts, which was in the hands of the priests, is of great aid in perfecting the Jewish method of computation. To the determination of particular years, was added the regulation of the periods of years, the Sabbath year (7 years) ; the year of Jubilee, which probably began with the fiftieth year (see Note 3, Ewald, p. 276). Then the Exodus from Egypt became a starting point for a continuous era, and (1 Kings vi. 1) 480 years were counted from the Exodus to the founding of the temple in the fourth year of the reign of Solomon. So the residence in Egypt was fixed at 430 years (Ex. xii. 40). In establishing these points the Israelites could avail themselves of the guidance of the Egyptian method of computation. According to Ewald, these two periods, the residence in Egypt, and the interval between the Exodus and the building of the temple, form the axes about which all the other determinations revolve. But as to the relations of the ancient Israelitish history to the history of other nations, Ewald points to the Egyptian Era of Manethon. To this Egyptian parallel Bun- sen adds that of the Babylonian and Assyrian. After the exile the Jewish era runs in close connection with the Persian, through the reckoning of the reigns of the kings (Ezra iv. 24 ; vi. 15). Since the Syrian Empire the Jews fall more com- pletely within the era of the Selencidje (1 Maec. i. 10). It is not our purpose to form a new chronological system of the history of tha Old Testament, but rather to vindicate the idea of Old Testament chronology. We throw out here however some brief remarks upon the method of ascertaining tome of the general points just alluded to. 1. It is -ipciJedly insorrect for the author of " The Dates of the Bible," in 14 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. regard to tht. chronology of the Old Testament, to place the Samaritan text of tht Old Testament, and the Septuagint, by the side of the Hebrew text, so that from their great diversities, he might infer that the biblical chronology was in the same degree unreliable. It is impossible that the Septuagint should rest upon traditions "rhich will bear comparison with those of the Hebrew text. The same is tme of the Samaritan Pentateuch. The Hebrew text has throughout the priority, and must therefore have the preference in any case in which they may be com- pared. 2. It is incorrect again to attempt to rectify Old Testament declarations by what are supposed to be diflerent declarations of the New Testament, as has been done by Usher, Ludov. Capellus and others, more recently by Becker, in his Chart of biblical chronology. The declaration of Paul (Gal. iii. 17) agrees with that made (Ex. xii. 40), if we take into account that the promise was not only confirmed to Abraham, but to Isaac and Jacob. The 430 years would thus date from the origin of the Israelitish jjeople, after the death of Jacob, to the Exodus. It is more difficult to explain the relation of the 450 years which the Apostle (Acts xiii. 20) defines as the period of the Judges, to the declaration (1 Kings vi. 1), that the period from the Exodus to the erection of the temple was about 480 years. A diversity exists here in the Jewish tradition, since even Josephus (Antiq. viii. 3, 1) reckons 592 years from the Exodus to the building of the temple: thus as- signing 443 years as the period of the Judges, while 1 Kings vi. ] fixes 331 years as the length of that period. Either the Apostle intimates in the i>-, that he fell in with the traditional indefinite reckoning, or the declaration reaches back, and includes Moses and Joshua among the Judges, (as they in fact were,) as it reaches forwards, and includes Samuel. In the determination of the bondage in Egypt to 400 years in the speech of Stephen, it is probable that, according to the promise, (Gen. XV. 13), the round number of 30 years at the beginning of the residence in Egypt, was fixed as the period of the happy existence of the Israelites there, and must be subtracted from the entire period of their residence. 3. It is not our province, nor are we in a position to criticise the assertions which Bunsen makes in regard to the Egyptian, Assyrian and Babylonian chronologies (compare the criticism by Gutschmid). In any case he has performed a great service in bringing the Jewish era in relation with these chronologies ; which he has done at a vast expense of learning and toil. We must, however, bring out more clearly the doubt which a more complete scientific determination has to remove. In the fir.st place, it seems without any adequate foundation that a chronology beyond the influence of the Theocracy should be presented as an infallible measure for the biblical decla- rations, as much so indeed, as if generally an unquestioned right should be conceded to Josephus against the Old Testament, and Evangelic history. In the second place, the determination upon this ground of the dates of Jewish history seems to us, to a great extent, questionable. In the third place, it is a result which no one should hastily concede, when the 480 years (1 Kings vi. 1), from the Exodus to the founding of the temple are here reduced to less than 352 years. We must leave it to a special investigation, to ascertain these points more certainly. The most certain dates for the determination of Jewish Chronology, are those oi Nebuchadnezzar and Cyrus. The conquest of Jerusalem by the former moi.arch, or the beginning of the Babylonian captivity, is assigned, not only by Bunsen, but bj Scheuchzer and Brinkmeyer, to the year 586 (not 588) R. C The return of thfi § 6. CHRONOLOGY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE. Jews from Babylon, according to the ordinary computation, took place 636 B. C according to Bunsen and Scheuchzer 538. From that time downwards, the Jewish computation is determined by the Era of the Seleucidae, which follows the era from the beginning of the Captivity in Babylon, or the destruction of the first temple. It begins with the year 312 B. C. A follow ing era, reckoning from the deliverance in 143 B. C, giv^s place igain to the com putation used under the Seleucidae, upon which follows the present computation of the Jews, the world era, beginning 3761 B. C, and divided into three great periods, the first reaching to the Babylonian Captivity, the second from that event to the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus, the third from that time to the present. From the Babylonian Captivity, going backwards, we reach the first point in the Jewish computation, through the sum of the reigns of the Jewish Kings. It has usually been fixed at 387 years, and the beginning of the reign of Rehoboam placed at 975 B. C. Bunsen places it in 968, and thus, if we follow his method of determinations, as it seems to be confirmed by the Egyptian dates of King Shishak (Sisak, who plundered Jerusalem in the third year of Rehobt la, ) we bring out the round number of 382 years for the reigns of the Kings. Solomon reigned forty years, and laid the foundation of the temple in the fourth of his reign (1 Kings vi.) This would give 1004 as the date of the founding of the temple. Connecting the 480 years, the interval mentioned between the Exodus and the founding of the temple, and the Exodus must have occurred about 1484 B. C. It is usually placed in round numbers at 1500, but more accurately at 1493. Bunsen, however, places the Exodus between the years 1324-1328, more definitely 1326, (Lepsius 1314.) But the confidence with which this determination is fixed, is based principally upon the fabulous narrative by Man- etho, of the events in the reign of the Egyptian King Mendphthah, (Bunsen, p. ccxii.) It is not credible that the simple, sober narratives of the Old Testament, are to be corrected by such a fabulous record as this (see Gutschmid, pp. 2, 10, 11, and 103, also, Knobel, Exodus, 112, 116 ff. ; upon the more extended argument of Bunsen, 215, see Gutschmid, p. 23). If we add the period of the residence in Egypt (Ex. xii. 40), 430 years, to the number (1 Kings vi. 1), the entrance into Egypt, or the death of Jacob must have happened 1914 B. C. For the residence of the patriarchs in Canaan, according to Knobel's computation, we may allow 190, or at the most 215 years. Abraham must therefore have entered Canaan about 2129. Knobel is inclined to reduce the 215 years, since in his view, the age of the patriarchs is placed too high, but, with Beer, Koppe, Ewald, and others, defends the 430 years, as the period of the residence in Egypt, against those chronologists, who follow the reckoning of the later Jews, and especially of Josephus, in whose view the residence in Egypt was only 215 years, with this remark, " that in these diverging computations too much stress has been laid upon uncertain genealogies." The date of the entrance of Abraham into Canaan points to a period still more remote, which may be fixed with considerable accuracy, through the declarations in Genesis as to the lives of the Patriarchs, and which, beyond question, gives a vastly more probable age of the race than 20,000 years, assumed by Bunsen. For the I'lnar year of the Ancient Israelites, see Winer's Real- mirterbuch. Article Ytar. For tkd months, the article Months. Also Bbinkmxter, pp. 43, 44 16 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. §7. THE NATUBAL HISTORY OP PALESTINE (PHTSIOA SACRA). Upon this subject we refer to the works at hand. Von Raumer's Palestine, p. 69 ; EJ:iL, p. 23, and other Geographical works. For the literature, see Hagenbach's Encyclopedia, p. 239. Die Calwer Siblische Naturgeschichte may be rec- ommended for its lirely and popular style. [Robin- son : Researches ; The Land and the Book, by Thox SON, a very interesting and instructive book ; Deu Stanley's work. Upon this and all other kindred subjects, the valuable Bible Dictionary by Soith, 9 vols. ; Harris : Natural History of tKe Bible ; 0»- BORN : Plants of the Holy Land. — A. G.] §8. BIBLICAL ETHNOGRAPHY. 3m abore, § 4. Ettbti : BUKyry of the Old Covmant. ii. p. 444. Lisco : 0. T., p. 206, VolkerHum, §9. THE THEOCRACY. We cannot comprehend the history of Israelitish civilization, without embraoitg the history of its worship, which lies at its foundation ; nor this again without a prior view of the common root, out of which spring both branches, the history both of the worship and civilization of Israel, i. e., the Theocracy. It is the faith of Abraham, that faith by which he left his home (Gen. xii. 1), mit knowing whither he went, which makes him an historical personage. Israel, also, from nameless, unhistorical, servile tribes, became the most glorious people of history through the reception of the legally developed Theocracy at the hands of Moses, The obe- dience of faith was the constituent principle of the people. Hence it is tht type of the church, that one people which the gospel has gathered out of all nations. Josephus ascribes the founding of the Theocracy, or the reign of God over Israel, to Moses ( Con- tra Apionem ii. 1, 6, see de Wette's Archaologie, p. 179). But Moses stands to the Theocracy, or the religious community of the Old Covenant under the immediate guidance and control of Jehovah, just as he does to the Old Covenant itself, i. e., be is not the starting-point or founder, but one who develops it under its legal form : who introduces for the people the grand theocratic principles, in the form of the fun- damental laws of the Theocracy. The Old Covenant law or right, according to which the Church of God, at its very beginning, recognized its conscious dependence upon the Divine Providence, and entrusted itself with entire confidence to His marvellous care, whil(5 it walked in the obedience to His commands which faith prompts and works, began with Abraham, with whom the Old Covenant itself began. The symbols of this supernatural order of things, are the starry heavens over the house of Abra- ham, and circumcision, the religious and profoundly significant rite of his house. Abra- ham was justified by his faith in the word of promise, and in this begins the germ- like organic growth of the Kingdom of God, which hitherto only in sporadic portents, like individual stars in the night, — in the saints of the earlier times — had irradiated the night of the old world. Hence the term Theochacy, as Aristocracy, Democracy, and similar terms, designates the principle of the government, not its form y* which ia * Comp. Cnippn B rtVanei^nt Testa. Lanaanne, 1838, p. 79. Lanqb's opening address at Zurich treats of the sasM iUUnctluu. g 10. BELIGION AOT) WOKSHIP OF ISRAEL AND OF SURROUNDING NATIONS. p designated by the terms Monarchy, Hierarchy, Oligarchy. It is not the outward form of a political power or government. We cannot say, therefore, that the Theocracy ceased in Israel with the erection of the Kingdom. The division of Jewish histoi,» into the reign of God, the reigns of the Kings, and the reigns of the Priests, rests upon an error, which confounds the distinction between the immutable Old Testament prin- ciple of government, and the mutable political forms under which it appears. Th« reign ef God does not exclude the reign of the Kings, as a form in which it appears ! on the contrary it blooms and flowers in its representation through the regal power oJ David and Solomon, as before in its rejwesentation through the prophetical and judi- cial power of Moses and Joshua, and in later times in its representation through the priestly dominion of the Maccabean Judas and Simon. The organic principle of the divine dominion branches itself into the three fundamental forms under which Israel was led ; the prophetic, kingly and priestly. Hence the Providential leading of Israel, we may say indeed, the consciousness of the dominion and leading of Jehovah, endured in Israel, under the Kings as under the Judges, in the Kingdom of the ten tribes as in Judah, by the rivers of Babylon as in Canaan, however much the prevailing unbelief and apostasy of the many couid transiently obscure that consciousness; and it was only when Jerusalem was destroyed by Titus, that despair filled the hearts of the people, in the consciousness that for some long, indefinite period, it had been rejected by Jehovah. But the typical form of the Old Testament theocrac)', as it was estab- lished by Moses (Ex. xix. 6), has now passed into the real Nevsr Testament Kingdom of God, the jiacriXua tu>v ovpavCyv, which had been already predicted by the prophets, especially by Daniel (chap. ii. and viL). The typical appearance of a people formed by God to the obedience of faith through His revealed word, led and protected by Him, has reached its fulfilment in the people of God, founded by His saving virtue and power, a holy commonwealth ; and in truth, by the word of God, united in a hu- man, spiritual life, and led to an eternal glorious Kingdom, which, in its introductory form, is begun here, and has its continuous, efficient organ in the Christian Church. Thus Abraham, in his righteousness of faith, stands as the living type of the King dom of God, but the type of the whole theocratic cultus is its altar, as the type oi the whole theocratic civilization is the shepherd's tent. §10. RELIGION AND WORSHIP OF ISRAEL AND OF SURROUNDING NATIONS, Abraham appears as an historical personage only through his religion, and the Is- raelitish people takes its origin from religion. Other nations have formed their own human religions in their own way, but here the divine religion, viewed in its relation to general history, makes its own point of departure, the father of the faithful, and the organ of its growth — the people of Israel. As the Greek tribes were formed into a people through their Hellenic culture, and the Roman tribes through the city of Rome and the Roman State, so in a more marked way has Israel grown to be a his- torical j?*ople through its religious calling. Even its natural origin was conditioned through faith (Gen. xv.). It IS not our purpose here to dwell particularly upon the faith of Abraham an Isaac ; we will only give those periods whioh are noticeable in m archseolo^ical point of view. In the first place faith itself. 2 18 INTKODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. 1. Monotheism and the Apostasy, or Symbolism and its heathen form, Mythology. 2. Calling of Abraham and the heathen, or SvTnbolical Typology, and SymboUcal Mythology. Abraham separated from the people for their sal ration. 8. The Patriarchal faith in its development, and heathenism in its ramiiieations. 4. The Mosaic legal institutions, and their coiiii terpart in the Heathen world 5. The development of the Mosaic law, and th» idolatrous service of the surrounding nations. 6. The Prophetic elevation of the national spirit and the Apostasy. 7. The rending of the common pubUc leligiou spirit, and its true concentration. Then follows the more direct solemn expression of faith, the Cultus : its pie-con dition circumcision, its central point the sacrifice, its spiritual consecration prayer and instruction. The different stages of the Cultus are marked by the temporary and constantly moving tents of the Patriarchs (simple sacrifice), the tabernacle of Moses (the legal sacrificial system), the temple of Solomon (the fully developed liturgy), the second tem2:)le (the martyr sorrows of the people pointing on to the real sacrifice). All these points will be more thoroughly treated in their proper places. For the literature of Biblical History, see Hagknbach : Encyclopedia, pp. 189, 194, and 197 ; for the literature of Biblical Theology, [k 200. Also Keil : Archceoloqy, p. 47. §11. SACRED ART. We have already designated the sacred art as dynamic. It is clear, therefore, that Poetry must here hold the first place, and after this the Song and Music : and then the Sacred Chorus or religious dances. Symbolical Architecture and Sculpture close the series, as painting seems to have been almost entirely neglected. For a correct estimate of Theocratic Art, the following points are of importance : 1. The religious element always outweighs and controls the moral. It is framed for the purpose of worship, not civilization. 2. The dynamic principle, as in all the theo- cratic relations of life, is of far greater moment than the formal. 3. All Symbolic Art has a typical signification, i. «., it not only serves the purpose of an aesthetic ritual, and of philosophic contemplation, but by virtue of a real eflScient principle, of a seed of true spiritual life, ever strives to give the beautiful appearance or representation its complete corresponding reality in life. For the literature of Hebrew Art and Music, see Haoenbach : Encyclopedia, p. 139. Keil : Archu:- olor/y, 2d vol. p. 182. Compare the articles Music and Musical Instruments in Winek. Also the articles upon the temple. For the Hebrew Architecture, tee the article upon tliat subject in Haoenbach : Encyclopedia; Schnaase Gi-xchickte der bildenden Kunate, i. 241. [The ai^ tides Music and Musical Instruments in Kitto : En- cyclopedia. Smith : Bible Dictionary. Also the Bibla dictionaries of the American Tract Society, Presby- terian Boards and Sunday Schoc. CJnion; Jahn : Ar chwology. — A. G.] §12. THEOCRATIC LAW AND JURISPRUDENjI. The fundamental principle of theocratic law and jurisprudence, is that esUmata of personal life grounded in the vivid knowledge of a personal God, which leads first to a recognition of the fully developed personal ''fe (personal rights), then to the i r-j § 14. THE HISTORY OF ISRAELITISH CIVILIZATION. u tecdon and culture of the undeveloped, or as a matter of histoiy, outraged (inarriagt rights), then to the awakening of the suppressed (rights of strangers), and lastly to the judgment upon those individuals and tribes who, through their unnatural sins and abominations, have subjected themselves as persons to the curse and destruction. See Haqenbach, p. 1S9, under the heading, Stoats- vet'f^^sung {Michaelh^ HiHlma7in^ Saalschuiz) ; J. SoHNELL : Da& israelitische Jiecht in seinen Gh'iind- ziigen dargestellt, Basel (1853). Compare Keil : Are/uBologie, ii. p. 196. [Commenkiries on the Laws of Moiea, J. D. Micha.elis, English Translation, Lon- don (1814), Commentaries on the Laws of the An cient Hebrews, by E. C. Wines, 2d edition. New York. The Biblical Encyclopedia and Dictionarie* Jahn ; Hebrew Commonwealth, translated by 0. E. Stowe, Andover and London ; Lowrie : The Ht- brew Lawgiver, — A. G.] §13. ISRAELITISH WISDOM AND SCIENCE. In no region is it clearer that all the developments of life among the Israelites are preeminently dynamic, than in the intellectual. The wisdom of the Hebrews hag upon its theocratic grounds failed to reach the true science, as Greek science, upon its merely human grounds, has failed to reach the last and highest principles of true wisdom. But the theocratic faith, working in its djiiamic direction, has laid the ground for the new birth of the ante-Christian, heathen science, as it has thoroughlj refuted the theory of two eternal principles, of the eternity of matter, or as it has estab lished that one profound, all-pervading view of the world which rests upon the living synthesis of the ideal and real, upon the assumption of the absolute personality. Since science is the striving after the highest intellectual or ideal unity, it cannot dispense with the Old Testament, if it would attain to its perfect freedom under the New Tes- tament. We must be careful not to confound the relation I science, with each other. For the Jewish science, set of Theocratic Judaism, and post-CIiristian Judaism to | Keil : Archaeology, iL p. 162 ; Haoenbaoh, p. 134. §14. THE HISTORY OF ISRAELITISH CIVILIZATION. Periods. — The Nomadic state — the Bondage — the Conquest — time of the settlement and agricultnn commerce — the dispersion. I. DOMBSTIC LlPB. 1. Marriage. — Its religious and moral signifi- cance. The Law of Marriage, The Marriage cere- Agriculture, mony. The Marriage state in its moral influence ! Mining, and development. The famihj. Training of chil- dren. Domestics. Slaves. The house. 2. The house as a tent. — The dwelling The lillage. The market place. The city. 3. The care and ornaments of the family, — (Sothing. Jewelry. Luxuries. 4. The work of the family. — Production. Pastoral life. Hunting. Fishing. 6. The festivals of the family. — Hom« pleasures and joys. Society. Sports. Hospitality. Household sorrows. Siclmess. Death. Burials. Usagei of mourning. 6. Food of the family. — Laws relaticg to food. Meal times. * We reserve the subject of Jealonay, and of the eexual offences, as indeed of the aaaomed diillonltles in the OU reetament generally, for a separate Excursus. 20 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. n. IsKAEL AS A State. The principle. — The Theocracy as above. 1. The orgajiization of a community, a. The organic anion of the tribes in the land. b. The organic division of the land among the tribes, c. The law of inheritance or primogeniture. 2. ITie establishment of government. The three states or conditions. Priest- establishment of law and jurisprudeTue, Law& Judgments. Punishments. The place of judgment The Sanhedrim. Law of the Zealots. [Nazarenes.— A. G.] The Prophetic Judgments. Judgment an act of worship. For the literature, see Hagenbach, p. 138; Eui^ ly. Prophetic. Royal. Urim and Thummim. 3. The ii. p. 1 lU. Social Inteecouese. 1. Commerce. — Its conditions, weights, meas- i 2. Personal intercourse.— In the gate, TJaits, ores, money. Its forms. Barter, caravans, traffic by land, trade by sea. For the Israelitish measures, BlBTBEAV, BUNSEN, 1. Vol. journeys, modes of travel. 3. Intellectual intercourse. — Writings and Uterature, theological schools, science, special sciences, cultus. 4. Art. — See Cultus. § 15. HISTORY OF ISRAEL. See HAaENBAOH : Encyclopedia, p. 186. Lanof : I ing paragraphs upon the theological and homileti Uatthew, Am. ed., the Introduction and the follow- | ical literature of the Old Testament. § 16.. THE INTERNATIONAL LAW OF THE ISRAELITES. The root of this international law lies in the first promise (Genesis iii. 15), in tne blessings of Noah (Gen. ix. 25), especially in the promise to Abraham: "In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed (Gen. xii. 3-7) ; and in its fuller explana- tion (Gen. xxii. 18), all the nations of the earth bless themselves." The first declara- tion in what form this promise should fulfil itself, viz. through a holy Kingdom, is found in the blessing which Isaac gave to Jacob (Gen. xxvii. 27) ; the second and more definite declaration in the blessing which Jacob pronounces upon Judah (Gen. xlix. 8). After establishing the pre-conditions (Ex. xix. a legal separation from the nations, and a legal association with them), Moses organized the tribes of Israel into a sacred camp, a warlike host, destined to carry on the sacred wars of the Lord. It enters at first upon the removing, or in a modified sense the uprooting, of a corrupt heathen people, for the purpose of founding a free Israelitish nation.al life. The wider relations of Israel to the nations must be determined through its contact with them — in war and peace, according to the laws of war and treaties of peace. The victories of David awakened in him and in 1\q people, for a time, the thouglit that he was called, with a theocratic political power, to found a sacred world-power, to which all nations should be in subjection. (2 Sam. xxiv.) But the thought met the •evere punishment of Jehovah, who thus turned the miud of the Israelitish people, before the declining of its political glory, to a spiritual conquest of the nations. Sol omon entered this path as a Prince of Peace, and reached great results, but he rashlj is 17 and 18 THE OLD TESTAMENT LAKGDAGES Z, anlioipated the New Testament future, the premature individual religious freedom. •jv'hich produced similar destructive results in Israel, with the later idolatrous intoler arice. Since then the Jewish public mind has ever oscillated in uncertainty between the two thoughts of a spiritual and political conquest of the world ; ever falling more decidedly under the influence of the latter thought— which even prior to the extermi- oatin"- Jewish wars had made them the odium generis humani ; — although the prophets with increasing distinctness and emphasis bad made the external world- dominion dependent upon the inward spiritual conquest of the world, and therefore promised it only to the true seed of a spiritual Israel. The strict legal separation of Israel from the nations stands in contrast with its position between the nations, and its blessed intercourse with those who differed most widely from each other, in their whole spirit and tendency. Its Pharisaic and fanatical separation from the nations stands in contrast with its outward geographical connection with them {See Lange : Geschichte des Apost. Zeitalters, i. p. 208 ff.) and its mingling with heathen nations of the most diverse tend ency and spirit. It is by pushing its particularism to its utmost limits, that Israel has brought about its own dispersion among the nations. Concerning the Israelitish international law, its warfare, the celebration of its victories, and the treaV .es of peace, see Keil, ii. p. 289 ff. [The popular works on Biblical antiquities may be consulted, but the ioforniation which they give is — perhaps necessarily — imperfect and unsatisfactory. — A. G.] 2. The Lakguages. § 17. THE PROVINCE OF OLD TESTAMENT LANGUAGES. In determining the province of Old Testament languages, it is essential that we should have a correct idea of the distinction between the genius of the Semitic languages, and th.at of other languages, especially the ludo-Germanic family. It appears from this, that the Semitic idiom, owing to its directness, heartiness, and so to speak inwardness, possesses in a high degree a fitness to express the religious and moral aspects of doing and suffering, the moral affections and distinctions ; while it wants in an important sense, the opposite characteristic of indirectness and reflective- ness. In particular, the Hebrew language, with the Greek, thus the language of the Old Testament, with that of the New, forms the broad contrast of the most complete direct method of expression, with the most perfect vehicle for expressing the results of philosophic thought and reflection. But both peculiarities are fused into one, in the language of the New Testament, as the higher new-creative form of the Septuagint. For the literature, see Hagesbach, p. 122; Bleek: EirUeitung, pp. 37 and 103 [also Haternioi; Introduction to th: OU Testameni. — A. G.] § 18. THE OLD TESTAMENT LANGUAGES.— LEXICONS. See the list of Hebrew Dictionaries and Con- cordances in the Commentary on Matthew, p. 17 (Amer. ed.). J. FfiRST: Hebrew and Chaldee Die- tuynary of the Old Testament, with an appendix •ontaining a brief history of Hebrew Lexicography, 2 vols. Leipzig, 1857. [Second ed., 1863. English translation by Davidson, London and New York, 1867. Fiirst does not supersede Gesenius. Comp also B. Davidson and Bagster's Analytical ana Chaldee Lexicon. London, 1848. — A. G.] Z2 INTRODDCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. 19. THE OLD TESTAMENT FORMS OF SPEECH.— GRAMMARS. Olbhaussm : Hebrew Orammar. Orammaire B^aique de J.M. Rabbinowicz. Paris, 1862. See Lasoe's Matthew. Am. ed. page 17. [Gesenics, EwAtD, BcsH, Stuart, Nordhiimer, Gohaht, Tbb GELLES, Green. — A. G.] 20. REMARKS. The development of the Old Testament forms of speech is pervaded throughout by a profound, earnest, moral and religious spirit. Even if the heathen nations of Canaan used this language, and notwithstanding all these moral treasures, have, through their awful corruption, grown ripe for judgment, this does not alter the fact. For these tribes may have put on the Semitic language as a strange garment, or they may have fallen even from the heights of its spirituality, and therefore have faUen so low. The Scripture itself testifies that their decline was gradual. We must distinguish also between the elementary ground forms of the language, and its reli- gious and moral development in Israel. We call attention here to a few striking exam- ples of the profound spiritual significance of the Hebrew forms of speech, onj is in Kal, to groan, sigh, be moved by suffering, in Niphal is to have compassion, in Piel to comfort. The spirit of the language thus informs us, that the power to give com- fort depends upon our compassion, and this in turn grows out of our suffering ; nni is in Kal to eat, to consume, in Niphal mutually to devour, i, e., to carry on war ; •]"ia is in Kal to bow, to bow the knee, to beg, to implore, in the intensive Piel to bless, to secure one's happiness. The so-called different species have the peculiarity that they bring into view the moral act, in all the distinctions of doing and suffering, and of the reflecting self-determination of the man. And how rich moreover is the Hebrew language in its expressions, fitted to convey the more direct life of the sou] and spirit. See Stier : Neugeordnetea Lehrgebaude der HebraUchen Sprache. For the literature of the Fbilologia lacra, see Haoenbacb, p. 122 flf. THIRD CHAPTER. Fnparatory Introduction. Its constituent parts, so far as the form of the Text is concerned. Old Testament Hermenectics. §21. LITERATURE. Set Haoenbaoh: Encyclopedia, pp. 162 and 165 ff. [The principal English Worlo ire W. Van Mil DEBT, An Inquirji into the general principles of Scripture Interpretation (Oxford) ; T. T. Conybeare'i Bampton Leciuret ; Davidson; Sacred Hermeneutics ; Fairbairn : Hernieneutical Manual; Ernesti Prmciplea of Biblical Interpretation, translated by C. ff. yerro^, Edinburgh (1843); Seiier: Biblical Her wieneutics, London (1866). — A. G.] § 22. OLD TESTAMENT HERMENEUTICS. Sjg § 22. TUB NECESSITY FOK A NEW CONSTRUCTION OF BIBLICAL, ESPECIALLY OF OLB TESTAMENT, HERMENEUTICS. That there is some reform needed here is clear from the fact that modem criticism, as the assumed last sound result of the grammatical and historical explanation of the Scripture, finds everywhere in the sacred records of the anti-heathen concrete raonothe- iam, i. e., the Old and New Testaments, heathenish ideas or representations, or rathei brings these same notions and representations into the whole sacred te.\t. As heathen- ism springs directly from this, that the idolatrous mind lays undue stress upon the bare letter in the book of creation ; that it separates and individualizes its objects as far as possible ; that it places the sense of the individual part, in opposition to the sense of the whole, to the analogia fidei or spiritus which alone gives its unity to the book of nature, while it dilutes and renders as transitory as possible the sense of the universal or the whole ; so precisely modern unbelief rests upon an exegesis which op- poses aU analogy of faith, which presses and even strangles the letter until it is re- duced to the most limited sense possible, while it suffers the more universal and his- torical in a great measure to evaporate in emptj', general, or ideal notions. As heathenism laid great stress upon the letter in the book of nature, it fell into polytheism. The particular symbol of the divine, or of the Godhead, became a myth of some special deity. A God of the day and the light was opposed to a God of the night ; a God of the blessings of life and of happines.s, to a God of calamities and of evil ; a God of the waters, to a God of the fire ; and finally, the God of one idea to the God of another ; the God of one thing to the God of other things ; i. e., one Fetisch to another. The final goal of Polytheism was Fetischism. On the other hand, the grand unities of the text of nature, and with these of his- tory, the revelations of mercy, truth, peace, and beauty were not embraced in one living concrete unity, in the idea of a personal revelation, but were diluted into the abstract unity of the one pantheistic one ; the one everywhere appearing and then vanishing, formless, impersonal, divine essence. Pantheism ends, when pushed to its legitimate consequences, in Atheism. The two fundamental laws of human thought, a true analysis and synthesis, were used in a false method, since they place in their room an abstract absolute analysis and synthesis, and then to escape from the intolerable opposition, they mingled all distinctions and combinations into a confused mass, and then separated the mass again in the same fantastical manner. This could only issue on the one hand in a pantheistic polytheism, and on the other in a pantheistic dualism. Modern criticism presses the letter of scripture in a direction opposed to Cocceian- ism. If Cocceius transforms all places in the scripture, from the seed to a tree, and forces into it an utterance of the whole developed truth of revelation («. ff., the Prot- evaugelium), this criticism inverts his whole method, since it circumscribes the letter within the narrowest signification possible. Thus, according to its method, Christ, according to the gospel by Matthew, must have ridden upon two asses at once ; the Apostle Paul must have conceived of Christ as in his being, physical light ; John must bave denied him the human soul and spirit, because he says : " the word was mada flesh ; " Jehovah must have in heaven a literal palace ; and the speaking with tonguei oust have been a mere stammering or Jarf^ou. Tlii^ i< the mere logomachy into which 24 tNTRODUCTIOX TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. this modern Talmudism relapses, like the Jewish Talmud, seeking to interpret tha scriptures in a heathen method. On the other hand, this same criticism evaporates the more general truths of sacrec scripture, especially those which are at the same time historical, into mere abstract generalities. Thus, e. g,, the birth of the Godman, is nothing more than the birth of the theanthropic consciousness ; the resurrection of Christ only the re-awakening of the idea of Christ ; the whole eschatology nothing more than the symbolism of the immanent and pi'ogressing world-judgment. The Alpha and Omega of Christianity, as indeed of all revealed religion, is the living synthesis of spirit and nature, of idea and fact, of the divine and human, finally of the Deity and humanity ; and the central point, the key and measure of all the doc- trines of revelation, and of all true interpretations of scripture is the great watch- word : " The word was made flesh."' The modern pseudological criticism consists in the disruption of this synthesis. The letter is taken as the mere word of man, and the historical fact as a purely human event, while, in truth, in the form of symbolical declarations, the universal religious ideas, the eternal facts of the spirit, are brought into Ught only through these ever varying human ideas and facts. There is no unity. For both the personality lying at the foundation, the alpha, and the glorified personality, the omega, are wanting ; and instead of this, there is only within the disturbing and blinding influence of the niaterial world, the gradual progress from one ideal unknown to another, lying still ft«rther in the region of the unknown. The last result of all spiritual hojjes and expectations is the absolute riddle. It must be granted that this exegetical method has its precursor in the poverty and shortcoming of the orthodox exegesis. Even here we find to a great extent, an extreme literal exegesis in a perpetual interchange with a fabulous allegorizing of the scripture. What this literal exegesis makes comprehensible, and to some degree im- presses, is the sense of the infinite importance of the biblical word, in its definite and individual form. What, on the other hand, the whole history of the allegoric inter- pretation of the scripture declares is, that conviction, living through all ages of the church, of the divine fulness and symbolical infinitude of the scripture word. The four-fold and seven-fold sense of the allegorizers of the middle ages, is the rainbow coloring, into which the pure white light of the symbolical and ideal sense of scripture is resolved, to the mediaeval longing and faith. But when adherence to the letter becomes so rigid that it denies any room for poetry in the historical statement, because it mistakes the idea, whose clothing is this symbolical poetry ; when, e. g., it insists with stifi-necked obstinacy that the six creative days are six ordinary astro- nomical days ; when it sees in the stojjping of the sun at the command of Joshua, a new astronomical event : when it makes Lot's wife to become a real particular pillar of salt, and Balaam's ass actually to speak in the forms of hmnan speech ; then it iij justly chargeable with being dead and spiritless, and places weapons in the hands of unbelief It is only pushing this view to its consequences, when the literal inter- pretation involves itself in absurdity. Moving in its circuit, this same unspiritual criticism changes the allegorical interjiretation of particular parts of the solid word» of the bible, into an allegorical interpietation of the entire word, ami thus s])read over the firm monotheistic ground of the holy scripture, the variegated cloud covering of a jiantheistic view of the world and theology. Although the text sounds through- out monotheistic, the idea must be taken in a jiantheistic sense, since the text is nothing else than the polythei.stie dismembered form of the one pantheistic spirit. The spirit of § 22. OLD TESTAMENT HERMENECTICS. 2t this criticism indeed so daringly inverts the true relation, that it transforms an entirt historical apostolic letter, like that to Philemon, into an allegorical jjoint of doctrina while it inversely interpi-ets an entirely allegorical and symbolical book, like th< Apocalypse, as if we must understand it literally throughout. But the assumption of the mythical character of the sacred books is the grand means by which this £>;iina misty spirit of modern pantheistic ideas is bound in with the rigid crass literal sense. In reference to the Old Testament, many theologians who are firm believers in revelation, have iield that the theory of mythical portions could not be erroneous, if they would not be involved in the untenable results of the literal exegesis. The modern interpreter of the scriptures, in his explanation of large portions of the Old Testament, thinks it necessary, as the only solution of difficulties, to choose between the mythical, or purely literal theory. This alternative is accepted, especially as to the creative days, paradise, the marriage of the sons of God with the daughters of men, and points like these. But even this alternative is fundamentally erroneous. It mistakes the ABC for the full understanding of the principle upon which the bible is written, the truth, viz., that the peculiar subject matter of the theanthropic revealed word must have a pecuhar form. The bible contains airal Xeyd/xeva not only as to its subject matter, the mii-acles, and as to its form, peculiar forms of expression, but is itselt. in whole and in part, an aTTttf Xiyofi-ivov as to its contents, and therefore necessarily as to its form. We apply this to the Old Testament. The Old Testament, as containing the records of concrete monotheism, or rather of the concrete monotheistic revealed faith, cannot contain any myths. It can and must indeed contain historical statements, which so far and no farther, resemble myths as the melon resembles the gourd, or the parsley the hemlock. But no one need be deceived by the most striking resemblances. Is it not true, in the first place, that mythology is the peculiar living garment, the unalterable form of heathenism, especially of heathen polytheism ? Is it not true, secondly, that the Old Testament, -nnth its monotheism, forms the great historical antagonistic contrast to the heathen polytheism ? Is it not true also, thirdly, as Hegel has said, that the true form can never be separated from the contents, but must be determined throughout by them ? But then it is inconceivable that the Old Testament should have carried out ita antagonistic opposition to the subject matter of heathenism, by using the specific form of heathenism, i. e., by (he use of myths. It is inconceivable because the myth is a religious statement, in which the con- sciousness has lost the distinction between the symbol and the symbolized idea. In other words, the myth as such is never barely a form. In it the idea has lost itself in the image, and is bound there until the day of future redemption. On the other hand, the very nature of the Hebrew view and idiom consists in this, that it first clearly grasps the distinction between God and the world, between his spirit and hie ligns, and then establishes the distinction firmly. Hence even in all its individual parts as a revelation of faith, it has kept itself ever awake to the consciousness of th distinction between its images and the realities to which they correspond. To sucJi an extent is this true, that to avoid being entangled in any one figure, even when it is purely rhetorical, the Hebrew in some way changes his poetical statements and expressions, a fact which appears strange to one acoustomed to the constancy with which figures are used by classical writers, e. p., see the 18th and 21st Psalms 30 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. Mythology not only elaborates iadividual figures, but strings one to another until it forms a complete mythical circle. Finally, the myth as such has no historical efficiency or results. It is the form oi », passive lifeless religion. Religion, having life and activity, must have a form suited to its inward nature. The Old Testament, as the record of the revealed faith, contains no merely literal historical statements, in the same sense in which profane history contains them, which records facts for the sake of the facts, and in its practical instruction goes no further back than to second causes, and oftentimes to those only which are most obvious aud familiar. We must distinguish clearly between the religious history of the scriptures and common history. Not of course in the sense that it is less historical, or less a nar- rative of facts, but in the sense that it presents the fact in the light of its highest first cause, its idea, its symbolical imjjort, and therefore in a somewhat poetically elevated style. The biblical fact wears a poetical dress in its presentation, from a threefold point of view; 1. through its relation to the fundamental religious thought or idea, in which the writer comprehends it in the light of divine illumination ; 2. through its relation to the fundamental religious thought of the book, i. e., its special connection with revelation in which the writer states it ; 3. through its relation to the central thought of divine revelation itself, with which the Holy Spirit has connected it, whether the author was conscious of it or not. We take, e. g., the passage which speaks of the Cherubim, who after the expulsion of Adam and Eve, guarded the gate of Paradise, especially the way to the tree of life, with the ilaming sword. The fact is this, that the first man as a sinner, was through the terror of God, driven forth from the original place of blessedness which he had polluted by sin. Viewed according to the religious thought or idea of the passage in and by itself, these terrors are angels of the Lord, personal manifestations of the personal aud righteous God, who keeps man, guilty and subject to death, from any return to the tree of life (Ps. xviii. and civ.). Viewed in connection with the fundamental thought of Genesis, these Cherubim are destined to keep man from the heathen longings after the old Paradise, and to impel him onward to the new tree of life, the religion of the future as it came to be established in Abra- ham (Gen. xii. 1, Go out of the land of thy fathers). Viewed, finally, in its relation to the general spirit of the scriptures, these Cherubim introduce not only the doctrine of '.ngels generally, but also the doctrine of the fundamental form of the Old Testa- me>t revelation through the angel of the Lord, and the angel of the divine judgments who is ever impelling humanity, through all history, from the threshold of the old paradise, to the open gate of the new and eternal paradise. As to the relation of a defi- nite fact to the special religious idea, e. (j., the expression, Lot's wife looked behind her and became a pillar of salt, not only records, that through her indecision and turning back she was overtaken by the storm of tire, but also contains the thought that inde- cision as to the way of escape, begins with the first look after the old, forsaken goods of this life ; and that every judgment of death upon those who thus turn back, is erected along the way of escape as a warning to others. As to the relation of the particidar expression to the individual book, i. e., the fundamental view or purpose of the author, modern criticism would save itself a hundred vexed questions, from an inadequate conception and treatment of the sacred text, if it would proceed from this funda- mental thought, and thus underst-and the arrangement of particular books, what they include and omit, their connections and transitions. These vexatious questions, e. g., — Which of the three evangelists is the original ? — Which of tlieni is correct ? — Wliicl' § 22. OLD TESTAMENT HERMENEUTICS. 21 preserves the true connection and the original expression ? would cease in a gieal measure, if we will only concede to the sacred writer, what we usually concede t« other writers and artists, viz. : that he has a fundamental thought — a prevailint principle upon which he constructs his work. That the history of Joseph, e. g., ii more particularly related than that of Isaac or the patriarchs, is closely connected with the fundamental thought or principle of Genesis, that it should narrate the istory of the origin of all things, dovvn to the origin of the holy people in Egyjit, aa Jiat was brought about through the history of Joseph ; and not only the history of the origin of this people, but of its exodus from bondage, which was inwoven with the great crime of Joseph's brethren, who sold him into bondage. As to its connection with the principle of scripture as a whole, this history is an expressive iraace of divine Providence, in its relation to human innocence and guilt, as it is destined to be the type of all the subsequent providential leadings of this nature, down to the history of Christ. In every particular fact, the religious idea of the absolute divine causality rises into prominence above all natural second causes. As the heathen is entangled and lost in second causes, so the theocratic believer must ever go back to the sovereignty and providence of God. He does not deny the second cause, since be rejects all one- sided supernaturalism, but clothes it in a new form in the splendor of Divine Provi- dence. The Cherubim with the flaming sword appear later as the symbolic forms of Divine Providence (Ps. civ.), as the Cherubim of the storm upon which Jehovah rides (Ps. xviii.), as the seraphim, the angels of tire, who should consume the temple of hard- ened and obdurate Israel (Isa. vi.). Even moral second causes, human freedom and human guilt, must be placed under the divine causality, and this not according to the assumption of a crushing fatalistic idea of Providence (Wegscheider), but according to the fundamental law of Divine Providence itself. When the Bible records that God hardened the heart of Pharaoh, it informs us also that Pharaoh was a despot and hardened his own heart ; and further, that all his guilt was foreseen, and, under the righteous judgment of God, set for the glorifying of his name in the execution of the plan of his kingdom. That is a strong one-sided supernaturalism, which utterly denies not only natural but moral second causes, when they are not made prominent in the statement of Divine Providence, or, perhaps, notwithstanding they are made prominent. For the same reasons, the authors of the books of the Bible have not recorded all the facts of the sacred history remarkable to human view, with the same minuteness, but only the principal points in the development of the king- dom of God, through a given period of time. They devote themselves more to the pictures of personal life than to the description of their impersonal surroundings ; to the creative epochs, than to the lapse of time between ; to the turning-points of a grand crisis, more than to the after progress and development ; rather to the great living picture of individuals illustrating all, than to an external massing together of particular things. The method of writing the sacred history of the Bible is like its chronology, its view of the world, throughout living, personal, dynamic. As to the connection of the particular books of the Bible, it is undeniable that the great pro found, all-pervading formative element is the ideal fact of the saving self-revelatioi of God even to his incarnation, i. «., the soteriological messianic idea. As the direction of any given mountain range is determined by a certain concrete law of nature: so, much more is the formation of any individual part of the Canon. But as to its relation to the other parts, its outward connection and articulation, it cannot b« Zb INTKODUCTION TO THE OLD TLriTAMENT. denied that in the region of revelation, there must have been not only an inspiration of the records themselves, but of the records in their present form, and that it is just at one-sided to deny the traces of this inspired editing of the sacred records (Luke i 1), as to enfeeble their testimony, by the supposition of an uncanonical biblical book- making ; of a painful and laborious compilation and fusion of diverse elements oi parts into one. Biblical hermeneutics cannot well deny that the monotheistic and theocratic tradi- tions are older than the oldest written records. Neither can it deny that even since the art of writing was known, the living discourse, the oral narrative, the revelation through facts, is older, and in some sense more original, than the written word. But it asserts and must assert, that the written word throughout belongs to the region of revelation — to the very acts through which the revelation is made — and forms indeed the acme and the limits of sacred revelation. And as to the sacred tradition, it is not to be confounded with the idea of tradition as it is usually associated with the idea of the myth. The sacred tradition, in its wealth of religious ideas, lies back of the myth ; the popular tradition, in the ordinary sense of the word, lies on this side of the myth, nearer to authentic history. The heathen myth is the heathen dogmatics, as they belong to the earlier age of any given heathen people. The popular traditions are the heathen ethics of the same people, an ethics exemplified in fabulous pei-sonages as they were concerned in the chief events of that people during the transition period, from its mythical to its historical age. We can trace this relation both through the Greek and the German traditionary period. In the blooming period of the ethical traditions the poetic, sceptical, trifling, even ironical transform.ation of the myth takes its origin. We can now distinguish by certain fixed ch.aracteristics the Old Testament sym- bolical statements from the mythical statements. The acute attempt of Schmieder to deteimine the i minary to the Biblical history, 1837, does not lead to relation between the religious method of writing his- 1 satisfactory results. See Lange : Positio Dogmatik, lory, and the ordinary methods in his essay : Preli- \ p. 385. The general distinction : — it is all true but is not all actual, — leaves the relation both as to quantity and quality, between the ideal truth and the historical events, so un- determined, that it will not avail to fix firmly the characteristics of Scripture, in its distinction from all myths, as from all ordinary historical writings in which events are traced to their causes. We have treated hitherto only of the biblical method of writing history, but we must now treat of the biblical method of stating things generally, in order that we may place in contrast the idea of the myth, and tl>e coun- ter idea of the scripture word, according as they stand connected with, or opposed to, each other. We may distinguish the historical and philosophical (or, more accurately, physical or philosophical) myths, and according to this distinction, we may view the Bible word in contrast to them, as to its facts, and as to its doctrines. The affinity between all mythology and the whole scripture, according to which the scripture and especially the evangelical history, may be viewed as the fulfilling of all myths; is the union of the idea and the fact, or of actual signs, or of words, to a symbol of the eternal, in the language of poetry. But even liere the biblica fact is clearly dislinguished from the historical myth. The latter has the minimum of reality only, jicrliaps the mere moral longing or wish, or it may be some facts of the popular or heroic natural life, brought by a poetical § 22. OLD TESTAMENT HERMENEO'TICS. 'H symbolism into union with an idea, and made to be the bearer of that idea; while the biblical fact always has an historical basis, whose greatness and importance is fell throuiihout the history of the kingdom of God ; one particular event, which has reached its peculiar definite expression in the light of its universal significance. The^biblical fact through its ideal transparency has been raised from an individual to a general fact, and tiius become a biblical doctrine. Its unessential individual form may have disappeared in the splendor of its idea, but the total fact remains. On the contrary the element of reality which lies at the foundation of the historical myth, is to sucl an extent transformed by the ideal poetry, and its historical actuality is so far im susceptible of proof, that it becomes more or less a question whether there is such ar. element or not. But as the biblical fiicts have throughout the splendor of ideal truths, so the biblical doctrines have throughout the energy of facts. They are facts ot the active religious consciousness, clothed with so decisive an energy and significance, that we may view them as the eternal deeds of the Spirit, presented in the clear distinct light of particular passages, e. ff., the Psalms, Proverbs, the Sermon on the Mount. This historical character of efficiency is wanting in the philosophic myths. We under stand them first, when we have rescued through Christianity the philosophical and moral doctrines which they contain. The myth itself waits for redemption from its bondage through the idolatrous sense, by the virtue of the scripture word. In its free form it appears as an ancient symbol. As to the chief distinction, we would prefer, for our own part, to distinguish in all myths physical, historical, and religious elements, and hence would class them as preeminently scientific, historical, or religious, as one or the other of these elements might come into prominence. To the style of the historical myth we would oppose the style of the Old Testa- ment histories, to the style of the scientific (philosophical) myth the Old Testament doctrinal writings, to the predominantly religious myth the Old Testament prophetic word. As the preeminently religious myth forms the synthesis of the physical and historical, so the prophetic word forms the higher unity of the historical and didactic word. The science of hermeneutics therefore, as the hermeneutics of the prophetic word, must bring out clearly, that in this region all the historical is in the highest measure ideal and symbolical (e. g., the temple of Ezekiel, the concubine of Hosea) and all the didactic is destined in its eternal actual energy and results to reach beyond the Old Testament limits. We trust that these suggestions for the wider culture of biblical, especially Old Testament hermeneutics, may find useful illustration in our Biblework. But this must be borne in mind : we hold that particular parts of the Old Testament must remain to us in a great measure dark and inexplicable, so long as the distinction between the ordinary style of history, and the higher religious style, is not more firmly established, and consistently carried out. This holds true in our opinion especially of the books of Chronicles and the book of Esther^ and, among the prophet- ical books, of Daniel and Jonah. Finally, as to the well-known distinction between the Semitic and Japhetic modeo of speech, there is not only at the foundation, that misconceived and misapplied difference, the opposition between oriental directness and occidental reflectiveness and further the opposition between the religious and the secular or the mediate view of the world, of the old and new time, i. e., of the spontaneous or original develop 30 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. ment of genius, aod the derivative culture of civilization ; but also the oppositioi between the religious method of presenting history and doctrine, and the morf pragmatic \'iew of history, and the dialectic mode of stating doctrine. It is evi- dent, however, that such a distinction does not destroy the unity of the Spirit, the communion of ideas and faith between the two spheres. By the faith, Abraham must have understood essentially the same truths which auy enlightened Christian whether a theologian or philosopher, understands to-day. (For the promotion of Old Testament Exegesis through more correct hermeneutlcal principles, see Appendix.) OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM. § 23. BIBLICAL CRITICISM AND ITS RELATED LITERATURE. Compare Hagenbach : JEncyclopedia, pp. 145, 150, 151. Uagenbach makes the science of Introduction preliminary to that of Criticism We hold that this order must be inverted, since Introduction is impossible without Criticism. Biblical Criticism is the scientific examination of the Bible as to its historical and traditional form. It decides according to historical or outward, and according to real or inward, signs, as to the biblical origin of the sacred books, as one whole, and as individual parts, i. e., as to their authenticity and integrity. In the course of its procedure it passes from the examination and purging of the text, to its construction, confirmation and its restoration to its original form. It is thus, to follow Hagenbach, according to its sources of determination (or rules) outward and inward, according to its results (decisions) negative and positive, Criticism. We must observe, however, the manifold signification which has been attached to the contrasts between negative and positive Criticism (used now in a historical, and then in a dogmatic sense) ; between a lower and higher Criticism (now as a question upon the integrity and authenticity, now as a decision according to the existing witnesses, manuscripts, translations, or according to scientific com- bination, upon the spirit of various writings and passages). There can be no ques- tion that Criticism belongs to the most essential and vital functions of biblical theology. It is, 1. Necessary ; 2. not merely a modern Criticism of recent date, but has e-^isted from early time ; and 3. like every theological function, it has been sub- jected to great errors, and requires therefore a criticism upon itself. [There is a large class of English works here, among wiiich those of Hamilton, Jones, Walton : Prolego- mena ; Kennicott : Dmertations ; Stuart : Ernesti ; Davidson : Criiieimt ; Gerard : Inalitvtes of Biblical Criticism; Hoeslet: Biblical Criticism, London, 1810, may be consulted. — A. G.] § 24. DESIRABLENESS OF AN ORGANON OF CRITICISM. It is remarkable that Theology, with an immense activity of the critical processes, IS still without any well-formed theory of Criticism. We have on several occasions suggested that such an organon is still wanting. It should aim to establish all the leading principles for the theological and critical process, and then to exclude all g 24. DESIRABLENESS OF AN ORGANON OF CRITICISM. S] officious critical assumptious. The first fuiKlainental position would be, thai there must be an agreement as to tiie religious and philosophical criticism of Revelation and of Christianity itself. Starting from the modern philosophica.' assumptions of Deism and Pantheism, some have criticised exegetically and historically the biblical records, i. e., they have mingled in an unscientific manner philosophical and purely infidel prejudices, with real critical principles, in an unfair procedure, thus it has occurred that the results of this critical blundering have been set forth and commended as the results of a higher criticism of the historical view {see Lange Apostol.Zeitalter, i. p. 9). It is most important therefore to determine first of all, in order to meet satisfactorily the religious and philosophical preliminary questions, whether one recognizes or not the idea and reality of a personal God, of his personal revelation, of his personal presence in the world, and his personal communion with the Elect, i. e., the souls of men awakened to the consciousness of their eternal per- sonality. The organon of criticism places this recognition, or rather knowledge, at the very portal of its system, and denies to those who reject the living idea of revelation, the right and the power to engage in any scientific exegetical and historica, criticism. Then it would be the aim in this first division of the Organon of criticism, to fix firmly the ideas of the originality, especially of the authenticity and integrity of the Bible. The first fundamental characteristic of biblical originality is defined in the Evangelic word, " the Word was made flesh," i. e., by the supposition that in the whole region of revelation, we are dealing with an indissoluble synthesis of idea and fact, i. e,, with personal life; but never with ideas without historical facts, and never with historical facts without an ideal foundation and significance. This is the very A B C of a sound criticism, over against which the latest spiritualistic critical fraud, which has spread from Tubingen through a part of the Evangelical church, must be viewed as a paganistic idealism, modified by its passage through Christianity ; and according to which also the ultra supematuralistic interpretation of biblical history, as a mere narration of events in their order from cause to effect, without ideal contents or form, appears a lifeless and unspiritual. tradition of a fundamentally worldly Empiricism. The succeeding question as to the authenticity, is determined accord- ingly by this, that in every biblical book we must take into view its peculiar inward form derived from the spirit of the book, as well as its historical declarations. Still further, the different Genera scribendi must be determined as they are ascertained from the actual appearance of the biblical books, and from the spirit of Revelation. It is accordingly critically incorrect to insist that the book Ecclesiastes, according to its declaration, must be regarded as the work of Solomon, since we are here dealing with a poetical book, which may put the experience of the vanity of the world in the mouth of the Son of David. But it is critically incorrect also to deny that the Apocalypse is the work of John, since we are here concerned with prophetic announce- ments, which rest expressly upon the authority of the Apostle. True poetry does not assume a fictitious name, when it puts its words in the mouth of a symbolical and fit personage, out prophecy would, should it resort to the same procedure. Then as to the integrity of the biblical books, criticism must determine, as is evident fi-om the countless variations in the text of the New Testament, and fi-om the free relation of the Septuagint to the Old Testament, that from the earliest time the records of revelation in the sanctuary of the church of God, were not regarded as literal and inviolable documents, but as the leaves and words of the Spirit, and that notwitb aa INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. Standing this freedom the authentic word, as tc all essential points, was held sacred. For with all the diiierenees of the Septuagint, it is not possible to bring out of the Old Testament any essentially modified Old Covenant, and amid all the variations of the New Testament, we still discern the same gospel in all its essential features. In reference to both questions, however, it is evident from the relation of Genesis to the original traditions, of the Gospel of L'lke to the records he had before him, of the second Epistle of Peter to the Epistle of Jude, from the resemblance as to thought and form in many passages between different authors (e. g., one between Isaiah and Mic.ah), that we must explain not only the first origin and elements of the biblical records, but also the theocratic and apostolic form in which we now have them, as properly belonging to the region of canonical revelation. With regard to the rules or criteria of biblical criticism, the idea of actual revela- tion, i. e., of the effects of the living interchange between the personal God and the personal human spirit, forms the first rule. This involves, first, the recognition of historical facts belonging to true human freedom, as the Pantheist cannot regard them ; secondly, the original religious facts, which are entirely foreign to Deism ; thirdly, the specific facts of revelation as it rends asunder the suppositions of Dual ism. Without the recognition of the historical, the religious, the theocratic heroism, we have no rule for the critical examination of the contents of the sacred scripture. Then, in the second place, we must fix firmly the idea of human personalitj awakened and freed through the personality of God, as it involves a complete origin ality both as to its own views and productions. As the Bible throughout is an original work of the Spirit of God, so each individual book is an original work of the chosen human spirit who wrote it. Innumerable questions which criticism is inade- quate to solve, find their solution here. To ascribe, e. g., the production of the second part of Isaiah to the Scribe Baruch, or to Mark the authorship of the original Gospel, sifter which the other synoptics in a most extraordinary way have copied, or the Epistle to the Ephesians to an imperfect impression taken from that to the Colossians, or the Apocalypse to John Mark as its author, rests upon the failure to estimate properly the originality of the biblical writer, the originality of his works, and the connection between the two. It is clear th.at, with originality, we con- cede to the writers of the Bible that thorough consistency of spirit which is peculiar to a living, spiritually free personality. From the originality of Revelation as a whole, in its connection with the original- ity of the writers of the particular books of Revelation, arises the originality of the collection of the biblical books. They are the closely connected products of one peculiar intellectual creative forming principle ; and therefore form one complete Canon, as they are one complete Cosmos, i. c, the organon of criticism presupposes the analogy of faith. But as it presupposes this analogy, it has at the same time to ascertain its essential elements out of its fundamental thoughts, i. e., the peculiar fundamental truths of biblical theology. With the existence of the ar ilogy of faith, which reveals itself further m th« analogy of the Scriptures, is determined the human side of the Holy Scriptures, agreeably to the historical differences and manifold forms, i. e., the germ-like incipi ence, the historical gradual growth, the regular development, the indissoluble con- nection, finally the perfect completion of its facts and doctrines according to the idea c f revelation. g 26. CRITICAL QUESTIONS IN THE TREATMENT OF THE OLD TESTAJIE.NT a3 § 25. THE PRINCirA.L CRITICAL QUESTIONS IN THE TREATMENT OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. Tn the introduction to the Old Testament the following important critical que* tions hold a prominent place: the unity of Genesis, the Mosaic authenticity of the Pentateuch, the authentic historical character of the historical books following the Pentateuch, the age of Job (also as to its historical basis), the limits as to time of the collection of the Psalms, the authenticity of the writings of Solomon (and tho import of the Song in particular), the relation between the first and second parts of Isaiah (ch. xl.-lxvi.), between the Hebrew text of Jeremiah and the text of the Septuagint, between the book of Daniel and Daniel himself, the import of the book of Jonah, and filially the relation ot the first part of Zcchariah to the second (ch. ix.-xiv.). The ecclesiastical and theological interest in these questions will be essentially met and satisfied, if, in the first place, genuine historical records of revelation, flowing from the time at which the revelation was made, are recognized as the foundation, iind to some extent essential component parts, of the writings in question ; and if, in the second place, it is firmly held that the bringing of these records into their present form took place on canonical ground, within the sphere of Old Testament revelation, under the direction and guarantee of the prophetic Spirit. Under the energetic influence of these two positions, the canonical faith in the Bible, and a free critical examination, have approximated each other, ami under their more perfect influence they will cele- brate their full reconciliation. And if in the process some prejudgments of the ecclesiastical tradition must be conceded, so criticism in its turn must yield up a masa of thoughtless errors and exaggerations. Traditional theology will come into liberty through a proper estimate of the historical character of the biblical books ; and criticism itself will be freed from the mistakes into which it has thoughtlessly fallen through a low estimate of the ideal contents of the sacred writings. ^^lthoumon, is conceded even by the modern criticism. But it is evident from the division -nto five books, that the collection grew gradually to its present form. The existence of Psalms originating during the Exile is beyond question (Ps. cii., cxxxvii.). But the attempt to place a large part of the Psalms in the time of the Maccabees, has been triumphantly refuted by Ewald and Bleek (Bleek, p. 619). The supposition that the heroic uprising of a people for its faith, must always have as its consequence a corresponding movement of the poetic spirit, is groundless. The Camisards, e. g., have sung the Old Testament Psalms of vengeance. But the Maccabees stand in a similar relation of dependence upon the Old Testament Canon, as the Camisards. Solomon stands beyond question as the original prince of proverbial poetry, as David is the first great master of lyric poetry. They shared in founding the highest glory of the sacred poetry and literature of Israel, just as they shared in the highest [* The internal cliajacter of any book must of course have great weight in deciding the question whether it is to be reoeived as the word of God or not ; but having so received it, the mere improbability to us of the events it narrates wiU not justiiy us in holding that to be an allegory which claims to be a history. This is certainly dangerous ground on which to stand. For if the mere fact that there is .so much that is improbable here, authorizes us to assume that the booh Is an allegorical representation of an important and precious truth, it will be easy to reduce large portions of the Biblioa. Historv to allegorical renreaentations. Nor is the supposition in any sense necessary here, since the narrative, viewed HI ateral history, teaches the same truth with eaiial or greater force.— A. O.I 96 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMEPn-. glory of the theocratic and political kingdom — in war and peace. They have indeed through their sacred poetry transferred the typical character of their political power into a prophecy of the true Messianic Kingdom, militant and peaceful. But just as the later Psalms have been grafted on to the original stock of the Davidic Psalms, so later proverbs have been added to the collection of Solomon. (1 Kings v. 12 fl") On this ground the didactic poem — the Preacher of Solomon — in the use of poetical license is represented to be the work of Solomon. That the book is of later origin is cleai both from its language and its historical relations (Bleek, p. 642). That the Song also is not correctly attributed to Solomon as its author may be inferred from it? fundamental thought.* The virgin of Israel — the theocracy — will not suffer herself to be included among the heathen wives, religions, as the favorite of Solomon, but ever turns to her true beloved, the Messiah who was yet to come. We hold, therefore, that this poem takes its origin in that tlieocratic indignation which the religious freedom of Solomon — going in this before his time — and his uumerous mar- riages through which he mingled with heathenism, occasioned. We may trace clearlj the expression of a similar sentiment in the nuptial Psalm. (Ps. xlv. 11—13.) Modern criticism doubts less as to the originality and authenticity of the Prophetic writings. But it exercises its analyzing activity especially upon the prince of all Messianic prophets, the Evangelist of the Old Testament, Isaiah. We pass over here the dif ferent exceptions which have been made in the first part of the book which is re- cognized in the main as belonging to Isaiah (ch. i.-xxxix.). We remark in general that all critical grounds growing out of the prejudice against any prediction are un worth j of notice. The whole first part is throughout organically constructed upon that pro- foundly significant fundamental thought of the prophet, viz., that out of every judg ment of God there springs to the same extent a corresponding redemption, so that we cannot easily assign the construction of this main part to a stranger. As to the second part of the book (ch. xl.-lxvi.) we hold that the collected reasons urged against its genuineness wUl not stand the test. The first reason is this : the prophet would in these prophecies have placed himself upon that, to him, far distant standpoint of the Babylonish captivity as in his historical present, in order from that point to pre- diet events still more distant in the future. This is not the method of the prophets, but it is the method of the Apocalyptics. If we distinguish the definite, artistic form of the apocalyptic vision from the more general form of prophecy, the first distinctive feature, as to form, is clearly the all-prevailing artistic construction, with which a poetical and symbolical expression corresponds. The second distinctive feature, as to form, appears in the regular progress from epoch to epoch in such a way that the seer ever makes the new point of departure in his vi3ion, his ideal present. This latter formal distinction points to the first real, or material distinction between the two. Apocalyptic prophecy, more definitely than general prophecy, looks beyond the first I* In reg^ard to the authorship of these books there is a wide diiferenco. The name of Solomon appears in the title to the Song, it does not in that to the Preacher. There he comes into view as Kohdeth, a term which, as Henfrstenberg argues with great force, shows that he is viewed only in his representative character, as the highest Old Testament re- presentative of divine wisdom, in distinction from mere worldly wisdom. The real author of the book puts these wordi Into his mouth, as one who was well known to hold this position. Those to whom the book came wouhl understand this at once. There is more here than mere " poetical license." Ileneslenberfj thinks that the book does not profess to be fnna Solomon. But the .Song does. And the title here is confirmed, 1. liy the (reueral cuirectness of the titles ; 2. By the his- torical references in the Song which point to the time of Solomon; 3. liy the entire thought of the poem itself. Even Lange's view as to its fundamental thought does not justify the inferences which he draws fiom it. For there is nothing imnatural in the assumption that Solomon himself should have felt " the theocratic indignation * against his own crrori ■nd sins, or that tho Holy Spirit should have used his experiences in giving form and expiession to the truths len taiw|bt.-A. 0.1 5' 25. CRITICAL QUESTIONS IN THE TREATMENT OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 31 restoration of Israel and the first coming of the Messiah, to the final restoration and completion. But with the more developed Christology, is closely connected a clearei and more definite statement of the great Antichristian power, which enters betweer the first and second coming of Christ. We regard then the second part of the book of Isaiah (ch. xl.-l.xvi.) as the first Old Testament Apocalypse. That pecaliar and easily distinguished part of the prophecy of Jeremiah (ch. xlv.-li.) is clearly an apocalypse representing especially the typical Antichrisliau power. The apocalypse of Ezekiel presents in contrast the deep valley of death (and indeed the valley of death of the people of God stiU lighted by hope, and that of Gog and Magog into which hope sheds no ray of light) and the high mountain of God with its mystical temple thereon (from ch. xxxvii. to the close of the book). The book of Daniel is one peculiar Apocalypse. Among the minor prophets, Obadiah, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah, may be viewed as apocalyptic books, which portray in a peculiar style the judgment of God upon Antichrist, as whose type, the first regards the people of Edom, the second Nineveh, the third Babylon, while the last sees the day of wrath breaking out upon the whole Antichristian jjower of the Old world. Edom is viewed also as the type of Antichrist in Isaiah (Ixiii. 1-6) and in Jeremiah (xlix. 7-22). The entirely apocalyptic nature of Gog and Magog in Ezekiel (xxxviii., xxxix.) is recognized and fixed in its place in the New Testament Apocalypse (ch. xx. 8), as indeed the stream issuing from the temple (Ez. ch. xlvii.) is there again taken up in its New Testament completion. As to the time which Isaiah in the second part of his book views as present, he has the pro- phecy of the Babylonian exile (ch. xxxix.) as a presupposition. He takes his departure from this. In a similar way we find the future viewed as present in the Apocalypse of John ; indeed, in the form in which he introduces the vision, I saw, the whole eschatological future in ideal progress passes before him. The most serious difliculty which meets us, in the second part of Isaiah, is the prediction of Cyrus by name, un- less Cyrus is a symbolical and collective name. As to the diflerences in style, it would be a matter of some moment if the first part was marked by a soft, flowing expression, while the second was more intense, fiery, violent. But as the reverse is the case, the style of the first part belongs evidently to a young man, that of the second to riper years. Now and then indeed the youthful, ingenious play upon words, which marks the first part, appears in the second. It has been objected, that, upon the supposition of the genuineness of the second part, it is impossible to explain why in the justification of the threatenings of Jeremiah (ch. xxvi. 17, 18), the elders did not refer to Isaiah as well as to Micah. But if according to tradition Isaiah suffered martyrdom in his old age under Manasseh, such a reference would have been out of place. That re- ference to the example of Micah seems to say, pious kings would never allow a bold, true prophet to be executed. The king of .lereraiah still claimed to be a pious king. The example of Manasseh therefore (we speak only of the possibiUty that the tradi- tion was true) could neither be a proper measure, nor a fitting reference iu the case. In favor of its genuineness we present the following argument. Men of the in- tellectual heroism of the authors of the second part of Isaiah, and the New Testament Apocalypse, cannot attribute their ui rks to a name already renowned, if these works are presented as historical or prophetic testimonies. They must from their greatness stand in their own time as acting persons, who could not conceal themselves if they would, and would not if they could. A city set on a hill cannot be hid. There is the widest difference between the wretched apocryphal works, and such works ol 88 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. the highest grade in their kind. It is entirely another case also, when a poet intro duces some historically renowned person as speaking. In his own time he was know» generally as an author, and if a later time is not careful to preserve his name, but allows a poetical speaker to take his place, that is a peculiar literary event, fi-om which no general principle can be drawn. As to the case of the poems of Ossian, McPherson owes his best thoughts to the old Celtic popular songs ; his mystifying of his content' jioraries was connected with peculiarities of character, of which we find no trace ia the canonical apocalyptics. For the difference between the Hebrew text of Jeremiah and the teit of the Septuagint, compare Bleee, p. 488. Our point of procedure in the decision of this question is the principal difference, viz., that the Septuagint inserts the peculiar Apocalyptic close of Jeremiah (ch. xlvi.- li.) after (ch. xxv. 13). We regard this interpolation as a decided weakening of the peculiar significance and importance of that whole section ; and we think that as with this chief point of difference, so all the others must be decided in favor of the Masoretio text. Since the prophecy of Daniel, as a whole, makes the impression of an apocalyptic work, retaining its unity throughout, this circumstance must not be left out of view in the critical examination of the book. It does not however enable us to decide between the original predictions of the prophet, and the casting of them into their present form. Three cases are possible. First, that a later prophet has attached his visions to the name of the historical Daniel. Against this supposition see the re- marks above upon the second part of Isaiah. Secondly, it may be held that some later person has wrought the original prophetic works coming down from Daniel, into a new apocalyptic form. The perfect unity between the contents and form of the book lies against this supposition. Then it remains that the book must be from Daniel himself The diflSculties which oppose this supposition are the following : 1. Why does the book stand among the Kethubbim and not among the prophets? It seem? probable, that at the time of the collection, the highly apocalyptic nature of the book, which connects it closely with sacred poetry, determined those who formed the collection to distinguish it from the prophets in a narrower sense, with their less highly colored apocalyptic works. It may be urged in favor of this, that it has been interpolated by portions,* — most probably at the time of the Maccabees — which in their style are plainly in contrast with the rest of the book. The entire paragraphs (ch. X. 1 to xi. 44, and xii. 5-13) are thus interpolated. Grave circumstances of the time have probably occasioned this interpolation, drawn from actual appearances m history, as also an interpolation in the second Epistle of Peter (ch. i., xx.-iii. 3) from the Epistle of Jiide, was occasioned by similar circumstances. It grew out of this interpolation, that the book should have its place among the Kethubbim, if it had not always stood there. 2. Why has Jesus Sirach (ch. xlix.) not even named the book of Daniel ? — This would be decisive certainly, if there were not generally serious de- ficiencies in this author, and if in making his selection he had not in his eye those men who had gained renown, in respect to the external glory of Israel. In his view Daniel had by far a too free — unrestricted by Jewish notions — universal character and tepd •?ncy. 8. Why do we not find some trace of the use of Daniel by the later prophets I 111 this connection it should be observed that the four horns (Zech. i. 18) and th« • [Compare, however, upon thle point Henosteniirro : Authentic dea Damiel,~~A. G.l 8 26. CRITICAL QUESTIONS IN THE TREATMENT OF THE OLD TESV/xMENT. 3J four cpposers of Zion (Zech. vi. 1) appear certainly to presuppose the representation of th£ four world-monarchies (Dan. ch. ii. and vii). And so also the more deiinitt revelation of the idea of a suffering Messiah in the second part of Zechariah presup- poses the previous progress of that idea in prophecy (Isaiah liii. ; Daniel ix. 26), 4. The difficulties which some have raised from the historical particularity of ch. x. and xi , are met by the supposition above — that these chapters are a part of the in- terpolation. The intimation of Antiochus Epiphanes, in the little horn (ch. viii.), con- tains certainly a striking prediction, although not a prediction of Antiochus Epiphanea himself, but of that one despotic Antichristian power which should arise out of the third world monarchy (not out of the last) which was fulfilled in that Antiochus But it is certainly incorrect to identify the preliminary Antichrist Antiochus (ch. viii. 8) with the Antichrist imaged in ch. vii. 7. This last springs out of the ten horns of the fourth beast. On the contrary the goat (ch. viii.), i. e., the Macedonian monarchy, has one horn, out of which come the four horns, the monarchies into which the kingdom of Alexander was divided. Since the number/bwr is the number of the world, this can only mean that the one, third-world power should divide itself into its chief component parts. With this goat of four horns, whose form is clearly de- fined throughout, the fourth animal (ch. vii.), whose form is very indefinite (and in which, in the face of the modern exegesis, we recognize the Roman world power), haa no resemblance, but the third animal (ch. vii.), the leopard with his four wings of a bird, and the four heads. The wings of the leopard correspond to the swiftness of the goat, and the number four of his wings and heads with the four horns of the goat ; while the fourth animal (ch. vii.) has ten horns. The image of uhe final Antichrist (in ch. vii.) and of his judgment is much more significant than the image of the typi cal Antichrist (ch. viiL) and his judgment — which forms only an episode. Since at the time of Antiochus Epiphanes the Maccabeean family of the tribe ot Levi gradually attained regal power, and therefore the announcement of the Messiah out of the tribe of Judah must have been thrown into the background {see the timid clause in favor of the future Messiah, 1 Mace. xiv. 41), it is very bold in the critics to refer a book so full of the Messiah, and in which all hope in any temporal Jewish dynasty disappears, to this very period of the Maccabees. In regard to the controversy as to the authenticity of the second part of Zechariah (ch. ix.-xiv.), it deserves to be considered, that the first suspicions against this section arose out of a purely theological misunderstanding. Since the quotation of the pro- phet Jeremiah by Matthew (ch. xxvii. 9, 10) is not found verbally in Jeremiah, but appears to be taken from Zechariah (ch. xi. 12, 13), Mede conceived that the section (Zech. ix.-xi.) was written by Jeremiah. But Matthew actually intended to refer to Jeremiah, since for his purpose the chief thing was the purchase of the potter's field, of which he found a type in the purchase of the field at Anathoth made by Jeremiah 'ch. xxxii.). In this citation he now inserted the allusion to the passage in Zechariah which speaks of the thirty pieces of silver, without any express reference to it («ee Lange: Leben Jesu, ii. Bd. 3. Thl. p. 1496). Out of this erroneous supposition that Zech. ix.-xi. must have been written by Jeremiah, has arisen the prevailing question as to the second part of this prophet. Later, it was not so much the New Testament citation, as a collection of internal marks, which occasioned the doubt of the critics. But the criticism is so unfortunate as to undertake to transfer the second part of Zechariah to a much earlier date, and hence comes into collision with an important principle of biblical hermeneutics. 10 IMTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. The principle is this : The great biblical idea makes no retrograde movement in the course of its development, i. e., no movement from a more to a less developed, oi from a more to a less definite, form. But as it would be a retrograde movement of the Messianic idea, if the Servant of the Lord (Isa. liii.) should be taken merely for a col- lective name for the prophets, while already a definite developed announcement of a personal Messiah existed in the first part of Isaiah, so it would be a much more strik- ing retrograde movement of the Messianic idea, if the second part of Zechariah were to be regarded as an earlier composition than the first. For here, in the second part, we have nearly a continuous biographical portraiture of the personal Messiah in typical images. In ch. ix. 9, the Messiah comes to his city Jerusalem as an humble king of peace, riding upon a peaceful animal, the foal of an ass; in x. 11, he goes before his returning people through the sea of sorrow, beating down the waves of the sea ; in xi. 12 he is as the shepherd of his peojjle valued at thirty pieces of silver, and the silver pieces were left in the potter's chest {see Lange: Leben Jesu, ii. 3, p. 1494); in ch. xii. 10 is the deed done, because one has pierced him, and they begin to mourn for him as one mourns for his only son ; in xiii. 6, 7, he complains : lo ! I have been wounded in the house of my friends ; the sword has awakened against the shepherd of God ; the flock is scattered, and now he gathers his little ones ; in xiv. he appears for judgment upon the Mount of Olives ; it is light at the evening time ; a new holy time begins, in which the bells upon the horses bear the same title as that upon the mitre of the High Priest : " Holiness to the Lord." The critics propose to transfer this fully developed Christology back to the time of Uzziah, when the doctrine of a personal Messiah began to unfold itself If some critics remove the section in question to a later date, or divide it into two parts and two periods, they do not change the case at all. They still deny the above-quoted fundamental principle of hermeneutics. If they turn us to the fact that the symbol- ism, which so clearly marks the first part, is less prominent in the second, we may remark the same receding of the symbolic text in Jeremiah and Hosea. But if ch. X. 6, 7, speaks of the kingdom of Judah and Israel as still in existence, ch. xii. 6 of Jeinsalem as still standing, it must be observed, that for the symbolical, not for the purely historical, view of the prophet, these forms are permanent in the kingdom of God. We can only refer briefly to the fixct, that, with respect to the original mysteri- ous coloring, their obscurity and profoundness of statement, and other similar marks, the first and second parts of Zechariah have the same type and character. § 26. CRITICAL AIDS FOR ASCERTAINING AND CONFIRMING THE INTEGRITY OF THE BIBLICAL BOOKS. Here belong the records which form the internal hutory of the text of the biblical books : the Hebrew M>xt. the SanMritan Pentateuch and the translations, tlie Chaldee paraphrases, the Greek translations, thi Vulgate, the Masoretic text, and the printed text Compare Bleek: EinUiiung, p. 746 S. } 2f ELEMENTS OK THE HISTORICAL A_ND CRITICAL SCIENCE OF INTRODUCTION. 4) FOURTH CHAPTER. Historical and Critical Exegetics in the tiarrower sense, or the human side Jeremiah from the 13th year of "l Tosiah to the subjection of the > kingdom (588). The same. )The Alexandrian recension pr«f ' Ezekiel. From five years before "1 the destruction of Jerusalem until V 16 years after. J Hosea presupposes the state of things under Jeroboam II. Joel. Under Uzziah about the ) year 800. \ Amos. About 790. A few years ) after Joel. j Obadiah. After the captivity of ) the Jews. After 588. f Jonah. One of the later books. Uncertain whether before, or after the exile. ;er books. 1 e, during, \ Micah. The first years of Heze- > kiah (768). f Nahum. After the 14th year of ) Hezekiah. r Habakkuk. A younger contem- ) porarv of Jeremiah. f The same. 790-726. 867-838. 810-788. 889-884. 824-788. 768-700. 710-699. 660-627. erable to the Masoretic text < After the taking of Jerusalem. ) Probably in the last time of J«^ roboam II. i During the reign of Uzziah. ' About 800 B. C. I Nearly contemporary with JoeL I Immediately after the destruction I of Jerusalem. Commonly referred to the time of Jeroboam II. The origin of the book falls at least in the Chaldaio period ; perhaps in the beginning of the Persian. j In the reign of Hezekiah. Th \ declarations in the title not reliable. {Before the year 600, or before the conquest of Nin<;veh. J Probably during the reign of Jehoiakim. (4 INTHODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. De Wkttk. Zephaniah. In the first years of ) Josiah (639). ) Haggai. At the time of Zerul>- ) babel and Joshua (636). / Zechariah. Some months later"! than Haggai. The second half of I Zechariah probably belongs to the I time after the exilo. J Keil. 640-626. 519. From 619 on. Blee£. The time of Josiah, 642-611. The second year of Darius Hys I taspes. The second half (ch. 9) proba- bly earlier than Joel. The oldest part of written prophecy '? Time of the king Uzziah ! ! Ch. 1 0. Time ■{ of Ahaz. Ch. xi. 1, aud 2, later than the foregoing and foUoaing. Ch. xi. 4, 17, same as ch. ix. and X. With a full misconception of symbolical representations. ' The collection at the time of Nehemiah. A somewhat earliei [ origin. Probably not long after the erection of the altar of burnt offer ing in the temple of Jerusalem fo. the worship of Jupiter. The Mac cabeean age. The Psalms. Down to the exilel p^^^ p^^^ j^ jj^^ ^^^ ^j.^^,, ^ ^ -^^^ jj^^ reception of Mac- and probably after. Not to the )- ,' . o _ . r Maccabeean period. Malachi. Probably in the time ) 433.424. of Nehemiah (444). ) Daniel. At the time of Antio- ) chus Epiphanes. ( At the time of the exile. I From UaTid to the tune alter S Agamst the n ^ r the exile, but not after Nehemiah. ^ cabeean Psalms. Lamentations by Jeremiah (588). [ The same. -j The Song. The time of Solomon. (■ Solomon. Proverbs of Solomon. The time "1 of Solomon. Time of Hezekiah. I From the time of Solomon to Last chapter probably three years f Hezekiah. later. J The same. ( The time of Solomon. 1 Solomon. Not by *" fmia Ecclesiastes. Belongs to a late, 1 m, i- r i^ j xt t, , . \ : ■• •" J i-i M The times of Ezra and Nehe- unhappy, but m rehgious and bte- > .V rary culture, advanced, age. ' °"* ' The book of Job. The time of the decline of the kingdom of Judah, near to the Ghaldaic period. The time of Solomon. The oldest collection Many genuine proverbs of Solomon. Still the collection not by Solomon. Collection at the time of Hezekiah. The rest probably later. r It falls perhaps in the last timt of the Persian dominiou ; but per- haps still later in the time of the (Syrian dominion. {Probably between the Assyrian and Babylonian captivity. The speech of EUhu a later interpolar tion. Concluding Remarks. — In the investigation of the dates of the biblical books, the history of the development of the biblical ideas has not been allowed sufficient weight. This is true emphatically of the idea of a personal Messiah. In its more de- finite form it enters with the prophets Isaiah and Uicah, t. «., about the middle of the eighth century, B. C. It is perhaps credible that the idea of the Messiah should not .appear in a later historical book. But it is incredible that the Messianic idea in a later book should recede again to the idea of a typical Messiah, which meets us in 2 Sam. Tii. Indeed, since the idea of the typical Messiah first appears here, and a whole period lies between the appearance of the typical Messianic image, and the ideal Messianic image, the origin of the 2d book of Samuel must be this whole period earher than that of Isaiah and Micah. Generally the prophets form the strongest bulwarks against the excesses of the critics. Hengstenbcrg, Delitzch, aud others, show how frequently they use the historical books, especially the Pentuteuch, in. eluding Deuteronomy, and how therefore they pre- suppose the existence of these books. But what loii;.' periods must have elapsed betiveon the founding of the let/al theocracy, between its culminating point uiii er David aud Solomon ; and the prophetic doiihi: § 30. PERIODS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT BOOKS. 4ij and despondency as to its external and legal appear- ance ! — Let us take the idea of personal repentance as the measure. II', on good grounds, we view the SlBtPsalm as the penitential Psalm of David, is there •ny Bimilar deTelopment of the idea of personal re- pentance in Deuteronomy ? So likewise there is n< similar statement of a personal experience of grace Critici.'sm rightly uses the citations of the prophet^ but it should use also with greater care the histof of religious ideas. §30. THE PERIODS WHICH THE OLD TESTAMENT BOOKS EMBRACE. 1. Genesis. The time of primary history from the beginning of the human race, to the death of Jacob. 2. Exodus to Deuteronomy. The interval between Jacob and JMoses. {See above, § 6, Chronology.) Then 40 years. (Numbers with a space of 37 years.) 3. Joshua. A period of about 17 years. 4. The books of Judges and Ruth. Various estimations. See the § 6. Chronolo- gy. Das Calwer Handbuch, 320 years. 5. The two books of Samuel. About 100 years. 6. The two books of Kings. About 380 years. 7. The two books of Chronicles. From the beginning of the world to the end c'f the Babylonian exile. 8. Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther. Omitting the period of the Babylonian captivity {70 years, or deducting the 14 years of the removal before the destruction of Jerusalem, 66 years), a period of about 130 years. §31. THE ORGANIC STRUCTURE OF THE BIBLICAL BOOKS. See the IV. Division. THIRD SECTION. THE THEANTHROPIC CHARACTER OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURE AS TO ITS FORM AND CONTENTS, OR THE BIBLICAL CHRISTOLOGI- CAL THEOLOGY, ESPECIALLY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. Geneeal Biblicai, Theology of the Old Testament. §32. CONTENTS. It treats: 1. Of the nature of the revealed salvation, its fiindamental forms, and Its foundation ; 2. Its development, and the steps in that development ; 3. Of its aim and tendency. 46 INTEODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. A. The revealed Salvation, its fundamental forms and its foundation. §33. THE REVELATION OF GOD IN THE WIDEST SENSE. The revelation of God is both objective and subjective, i. e., the God of revela tion, in revealing the knowledge of himself, stands over against the minds fitted ta receive the revelation. God cannot reveal himself, without placing over against him self the glass upon which the rays of light fall, viz., angels and men. No created mind can know God, unless he reveal himself to him. But in the mutual action and influence between the spiritual and human world, the revelation of God progresses through diflferent stadia. 1. The most general revelation of God; objec- tiTC : The creation. Kom. i. 2. General revelation of God ; objective : The history of the world. Rom. ix.-xi. 8. Special revelation of God, or the revelation of salvation in its progress; objective: The old covenant. 4. The most special revelation of God, or the rL'volaiicjn of salvation, in its introductory perfec- tion ; objective : God in Christ reconciling the world. 5. The final, complete, introductory perfection of the revelation of God in Christ; objective: The great epiphany. God all in all. The consummation and transfiguration of the general revelation through the upecial. 1. The most general revelation of God ; subjec- tive : The mind and conscience. Rom. ii. 2. General revelation of God ; subjective : Livet of individuals. 3. Special revelation of God, or the revelation of salvation in its progress ; subjective : The faith in the promise. 4. The most special revelation of God in its in- troductory or first consummation ; subjective : Jus tifving and saving faith. 5. The final, complete consummation of the subjective revelation of God in Christ. The in- tuition of God in Christ, and in the whole city of God. Through the sin of man the first most general revelation of God is blinding to him (Isa. XXV. 7). Even the more definite, moral revelation of God in history, and his own destiny, becomes to man a farther obscuration of the Deity (Ps. xviii. 26). Thii blindness or darkness appears in the views of man concerning the enigma in history, and man's evil destiny. Through the objective side of the special revelation this darkening of the minds through unbelief often completes itself in hardness. The world is hell, viewed from the stand-point of hellish spirits. On the contrary, all the subjective and objective circles of revelation meet in ever increasing splendor, in the special sphere of revela- tion, in faith. But the special revelation, in its objective and subjective aspects, not only facilitates the knowledge of the general revelation, but carries on the gen- eral revelation to its consummation and glory. § 34- OPPOSITION AND DISTINCTION BETWEEN GEJTERAL AND SPECIAL REVELATION. General revelation is the foundation on which the special rests ; the special is the • eproduction and realization of the general. WHhin the historical circle of the general revelation there arises, in consequence of the fall, the obscuration of the revelation of God, through nature and conscience, fdnce the primeval religion of man was thus chaneed into a mere capacity for religioD §35. THE SUBJECT OF REVELATION. 47 But within the same circle are formed the sources of special revelation, since the primeval religion of the chosen becomes an active, practical exercise of their religious nature. General revelation as a natural revelation, looking to the past, is an unveiling of the foundations of the world and life ; of the original divine institutions. Special revelation, looking to the future, is a revelation of salvation, and therefore alwayi both an ideal revelation and an actual redemption. General revelation uses as its instruments symbolical signs and events, vehose bloom and flower in the life of the spirit is the divine word. Special revelation makes use of the divine word, whose bloom and seal is the sacramental symbol and facts. There the symbol is prominent, here the word. §35. THE SUBJECT OF REVELATION. In the most general sense, the subject of revelation is the relation of God to man, as a foundation for religion, which is the relation of man to God. God reveals him- self to man according to his living relations to him, according to his will in reference to him, hence in his purpose of salvation, the actual salvation, the promise of salvation ; but also according to his claims upon man, in his law and in his judgment. He makes plain to man his peculiar destiny, his sinful nature, his guilt, since he plainly reveals bis own will to man in order to prepare him to receive bis salvation. This salvation is thus the central theme of revelation, and indeed as a fact, as a personal life, as an eternal inheritance, is destined to extend from the chosen until it becomes the com- mon good of humanity. The subject of revelation is, therefore, redemption. §36. THE INTERCHANGE BETWEEN REVELATION AND REDEMPTION. As the eternal living spirit, God communicates himself, his life, when he com- mtinicates the living knowledge of himself. Man, as a spiritual being allied to God, cannot rightly know God without receiving into himself the divine life. But as man is sinful, he is blinded as to his intelligence, to the same extent that he is perverted and enslaved in his will. Hence there cannot be a revelation of salvation to him with- out redemption, nor redemption without revelation. It follows also that the intro- duction of this revelation must be very gradual. With the spiritual eye the heart must be purified, with the heart, the eye. Revelation is the ideal redemption, re- demption the actual revelation. In this interchange between revelation and redemption, in general, revelation precedes redemption, biit at the same time it must, through its preliminary redemp- tion, prepare the way for every new stage in its development. And just as in the chosen spirits, the channels of the revelation of saving truth, revelation precedes re demption, so with the great mass of those who are the subjects of redemption, tb redemption precedes, as a preparatory discipline, the illumination through revelation 48 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. §37. THE OBJECTIVE FORM OF THE REVELATION OF SALVATION. The objective form of this revelation is throughout the Theophany, as it rises from the form of the ideal, dynamic theopbanies, to the grand real Theophany of God ill Christ. It manifests itself in the elements of human faith, strengthened to open vision or sight. Its first form is the miraculous report, the divine voice, the word, whose dull echo — the Bath Eol — meets us only in the region of the Apocrypha. Its second more developed form is in the miraculous vision, in a narrower sense, angelic appearances, as an ideal dynamic Christophany, surrounded and even represented by wider encircling angelophanies and symbolical signs. Its third and perfect form is the incarnation of God in Christ. Its eflect throughout is prophecy ; the miracle of prophecy. But the Urim and Thummim is the theocratic, legal enlargement ot prophecy ; in which it was made permanent, and accessible to the people whenevei it might be needed. §38. THE SUBJECTIVE FORM OF REVELATION. This is throughout the vision, whose basis or real aspect is ecstasy, the sudden transposition of the mind from the stand-point of faith to that of sight. The vision generally appears as a day-vision, during which the usual consciousness of sense is shadowed or suspended as in the night. But it appears in children, in common la- borers, or men sunken in fatigue, as a dream of the night, in whom, however, the moral consciousness shines as clear as in the d.ay. Its pre-condition is the higlier in- tuition possessed by chosen religious minds, by the spirit of God made fruitful in some great historical moment, which indeed contains the seeds of the future, which the seer filled by the Theophany prophetically explains. There is no conceivable theophany without a corresponding disposition for the re- ception of visions ; no vision without the energy and effect of a theophany. But the one form may prevail at one time, the other at another. In general, revelation advances from the Old to the New Testament, from the prevailing objective form, or theophany, to the prevailing subjective form, or the vision. Hence the succession in ♦he names of the prophets : Roeh, Nabi, Chozeh. § 39. THE OBJECTIVE FORM OF REDEMPTION. The objective form of redemption appears in a series of saving judgments, intro- duced through revelation by means of theophanies. Its fundamental form is the miracle. §40. THE SUBJECTIVE FORM OF REDEMPTION. It manifests its. 'If in a heroic, divine act nl' (;iiiii. ulios" symbol is the sacrifice, whose result is conversion. §41. THE mSTORlCAL GRADUAL PROGRESS AXU FORM OF REVELATION 4'( §41. THE HISTORICAL GRADUAL PROGRESS AND FORM OF REVELATION. The realization in history of the revelation of salvation is gradual, fundamentallj the same with the gradual growth of history itself. ' This gradual progress is con- ditioned: 1. Through the fundamental law of all human growth, into which th« divine revelation aS a revelation of salvation necessarily enters. Thus the develop- ment of revelation is the grandest nature, the crown and glory of nature ; for the regular unfolding of the Old Testament advent of Christ, of the personal life of Christ.^ and of that kingdom of heaven founded by him, reaches from the beginning to the end of the world, and transcends all the limits of the events of natural history. 2. This gradual growth is conditioned through the necessary interchange between a hoiy God and unholy men, in whom the grace of God first gradually forms according to the law of freedom for itself a point of union and a point of departure for its wider progress, *'. «., it is conditioned through the constant interchange between revelation in a narrower sense and redemption, we may say even between prophecy and miracle, between the vision and the sacrifice. 3. Then it is conditioned through the slow process of the interchange between the chosen as the starting-point of revelation, and the popular life, or the interchange between the apocalypse and the manifestation (phanerosis). Generally, however, its history is embraced in two periods. 1. From the beginning of the introductory revelation to its completion, i. e., to the completion of the personal life of Christ, i. e., to the introductory or first end of the world. This is the special history of revelation in the narrower sense. 2. From the beginning of the final complete revelation, or the historically introduced revelation, i. e., from the beginning of the church to its completion, the second advent of Christ, i. e., the final end of the world. We now speak only of the periods of revelation in the narrower sense. 1. The period of that in one aspect symbolical, in the other mythical, primary reli* gion : from Adam to Abraham, 2000 years B. C. The lighter aspect of this period is the symbolical religion, the knowledge of God in the fight of nature and history, with sporadic lights of revelation through the word. 2. The period of the patriarchal religion of promise in its genealogical descent, mtroduced and established through the word of God and human faith : from Abra- ham to Moses, 1500 B. C. In the first period the symbol is prominent, the word subordinate ; in this the word holds the first place, the symbol the second. In the first period faith was sporadic ; in Abraham and his seed it becomes genealogical. 3. The period of the Mosaic legal religion : from Moses to Elijah, or to the de- cline of the glory of the Israelitish kingdom. The symbol preponderates above the word. The internal character of the religion of promise at the beginning, is now surrounded by the external forms of the law, for the purpose of bringing a whole people to share in the Abrahamic faith, and at the same time secure its wider develop ment. Elijah turns himself to the past, as the last restorer of the law through th« miraculous judgment by fire. 4. The period of prophecy, or in which the law began to be viewed in its internal character, in which the word preponderates, not the symbol : from the miracles of Elisha, marked by their design to save, pointing to the future, and from the Mes-si- anic prophecies of Isaiah (Hosea, Joel, Amos) t(5 Malachi. 4 50 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. 5. The period of national piety, or of the national realization of the prophetic faith, introduced in a hiijtorical manner, under the disappearance of canonical iuspira. tion, but also under the appearance of the idea of martyrdom : from Malachi to the time of Christ. fi. The period of the concentration of the Messianic longing of Israel, or the seed- like formation of that state of mind which was fitted to receive the Messiah, whose very heart or central point is the Virgin, and around her the truly pious, especially the Baptist, enveloped, as in a shell, by Pharisaism, Sadduceeism, Essenism, Sama- ritanism, Alexandrianism, and Hellenism, which in a general sense may be viewed as springing from one another. The history previous to the New Testament. 7. The period of the life of Christ to its completion in his ascension, and to the great seal of its completion in the founding of ohe Christian church, through the out- pouring of the Holy Spirit. §42. THE CONTRASTS BETWEEN THE ANNOUNCEMENT AND THE FULFILMENT OF SALVATION. As nature found its goal in the first man, and the primeval time in Abraham and the Old Covenant, so the Old Covenant itself, as the preannouncement of the salvation in Christ, has found its goal in Christ. Christ is the end of the law, the preliminary goal or end of all things. But the introductory revelation of Christ in the time of the New Testament, must reach again its comprehensive final goal in the eternity of the New Testament, the eternal gospel, the second coming and epiphany of Christ with its eternal results. The Old Testament is the religion of the future. As to the word of promise, it finds its fulfilment in the word of the New Testament ; as to its types, the shadowy images of good things to come, in the facts of the New Testament salvation. Hence it follows that the Old Covenant, as to its national, legal, external value, is abrogated through the New Covenant, but that the Old Testament, as the word of God, is exalted through the New Testament, to be a constituent part of the eter- nal revelation, as it furnishes the foundation, introduction, and illustration of the New Testament. As the gospel itself is a provisional law for the unbeliever, so the Old Testament law was a provisional gospel for the believer. §43. THE FUNDAMENTAL FORMS OF THE PREFIGURATION OF SALVATION. These forms, in words, are the original traditions, the promise, the law, prophecy^ the testimony of martyrs. These forms, in facts, are the allegories, symbols, tyjies, i. e., the dawn, the repre- lentatio'ni,, and the germ-like preparations for the New Covenant. Typology commences with the jx'rsoual types (Adam, Melchizedec, Abraham, fcc), passes on to the historical types (the sacrifice of Isaac, the exodus from Egypt), finds its tentral point in the types of the law (the Mosaic cultus), and coniplett^ g 45. THE DEVELOPMEXT OF BIBLICAL THEOLOGY. 5l itself in the mental type, and types in disposition, the preannouncements in the in- ward state and feeling, of New Testament states (Ps. xxii. ; Isa. vii., &c.). The types and the word stand in relations to each other, similar to those betweet redemption and revelation. § 44. THE FULFILLING OF SALVATION. The fulfilling of salvation is the completion of the theanthropic life of Christ, in its world-atoning, world-redeeming, and world-glorifying power and result. It may be divided into the introductory fulfilling and the final completion, i. e., into the time of the first and of the second advent of Christ. The first period embraces the history of the one peculiar completion of the life of Jesus, and its development in the four fundamental forms of the four gospels, and the varied doctrinal fundamental forms in the different apostolical types of doctrine, especially of James, Peter, Paul, the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews and of John, to which, however, we must add, in theii historical significance, the doctrinal types of the other apostles. The wider and final completion of the life of Christ extends through the different periods of the New Testament kingdom of heaven. {See Lange : Matthew, Am. ed., pages 3, 4, 5. B. Hevelation of Salvation / its Development and its OooL §45. THE DEVELOPMENT OF BIBLICAL THEOLOGY. Biblical theology develops itself in essentially the same way with biblical reli gion. But it develops itself according to its nature after the following fundamental principles : 1. Biblical doctrine proceeds in its essential development, as in its chronological divisions, from a ftindamental Christological principle : Man destined to the image of God, or to the perfection of his life in the revelation of the God-man. 2. The essential development of biblical doctrines, e. ff., the doctrines of the name of God, of his attributes, of man, of sin, &c., advances in the same measure with the chronological development of biblical doctrine in dififerent periods of time. 3. Every biblical doctrine in its germ -form existed already in the earliest period of revelation, e. ff., the doctrine of immortality. 4. No biblical doctrine reaches its perfect form untD the latest period of revela- tion, i, e., the New Testament fulfilment ; and this fully developed form is reached m the apostolical period, e. g., the doctrine of the Trinity. 5. Every biblical doctrine in its course of development presents a marked, distinct continuity ; although one doctrine may now rise into prominence, and then another. Bence a break and opposition between the Old and New Testament would be a monstrous supposition, if, e. g., the central part of the revelation of God in the Old Testament (the angel of the Lord), should be regarded as a created angel, and not as Christ himself in the preparatory stages of his incarnation, while the central ■*'gur« 11) the New Testament revelation is the God-man. INTKODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. 6. Heterogeneous, uot, strictly speaking, theocratic doctrines, may prepare the way for the development of revelation, and promote its progress. They have served this purpose fi-om the beginning inwards (Chaldean, Syrian, Palestinian, Egyptian, Persian), but the grand forming principle of revelation would never allow any in- trusion of foreign elements. It is only in the apocrypha that we find any traces of Buch an intrusion. V. The development of biblical doctrine is ever in the direction of an onward progress, an unfolding, from the germ, of a growing spirituality, of a rejection of temporary forms, but never the form of a progress and growth through opposition All the antitheses of sacred scripture, even that between the Old and New Testa ments, are harmonious, not antagonistic or contradictory oppositions. 8. Within the period of any individual biblical doctrine, there is an opposition and a progressive movement, and between the most diverse periods there exists every where the unity of the spirit, and hence an indissoluble connection. 9. The word of God, or the principle of revelation, rules and shapes the books of scripture, as a strong, active, moulding principle. But in the relations of that word to humanity, it is ever in its unfolding, breaking through the bonds of human error and in its spirituality proceeds from one stage of revelation to another, to realize its divine fulness, in a more complete, transparent human perfection. 10. The word of God in its development never destroys human nature, while it dissolves the shadows within which it lies. It rather sets free, in the measure of its development, the original powers of the human nature. Hence these marks of origi- nality, as they were already evident in the characters of the patriarchs, appear in their most striking forms in the lives of the prophets. It is an absurd and monstrous supposition, therefore, of which they are guilty who, denying the perfect originality of the four gospels, view the gospels of Matthew and Luke as copies from the original of Mark. 11. The doctrine of Jesus passes through well-defined periods of development. We can distinguish : 1. The explanation of the law in its inward all-prevailing sig- nificance. 2. The explanation of the Old Testament idea of the kingdom of heaven. 3. The explanation of the Old Testament types of circumcision, and the Passover. 4. The explanation of the Old Testament cultus. 5. The explanation of the entire Old Testament symbolism, .and of the whole symbolism of creation. These chronolo- gical stages of the development of the doctrine of Christ are made the essential fundamental forms of the doctrine of Christ, in the doctrinal types of the apostles, James, Peter, Paul, the Epistle to the Hebrews, John. These types of doctrine sup- plement and complete each other, but they are as fiir removed as possible, in their harmonious agreement, from correcting each other. 12. In the book of Genesis biblical doctrine is a union of the word of God with the purest expression of human artlessness ; in the Apocalypse, it is the union of the same word with a conscious, and, as to the Hebrew form, perfected, sacred art. Remark. — The fundamental laws of the develop- ment of (he introductory revelation in the sacred ■cript/ires are also the fundamental laws controlling the introduction of this revelation into hun anity, ig the course of the development of the ChiMt^u Church. § 46. BIBLICAL DOCTRINE OF GOD, OR THEOLOGY IN TUE NARROWER faENSE. 58 SPECIAL BIBLICAL THEOLOGY IN OUTLINE. § 46. BIBLICAL DOCTRINE OF GOD, OR THEOLOGY IN THE NARROWER SENSE. Biblical theology in the narrower sense, or the doctrine of God, may be divided Jito the doctrine of the knowledge of God founded upon his revelation of himself; of the name of God, which has its ground and reasons in his nature ; of the demoustra tion of the being of (iod, resting upon the evidence of his universal existence, perfec- tion, and power; * of the method of his providence, and of the attributes of God, or the fundamental form of his vital relations to the worhl and man, grounded ultimately in his peculiar personality, or the threefold personal distinction in his essence. Remarks. — 1. The revelation of God is theground upon wliich all our knowledge of God rests. 2. The name of God is not the nature of God, but designates objectively the entire revelation, and subjectively the whole of religion. 3. The nature of God is designated by the fundamental distinctions : The Lord, Love, Spir- it. 4. The name of God, proceeding from the uni- versal to the particular, passes through the names Elohim, Eloha, El Eljon, El Schadai, Elohim Zeba- otL, to the name Father in heaven ; and proceeding from the theocratic to the universal, it passes from the names Jehovah, Adonai, Jehovah Zebaoth, to the name God and Father of our Lord Jesua Christ. 5. The Holy Scriptures recognize and distinguish defi- nite fundamental forms of the revelation of the di- vine Providence, which lay the foundation for the proofs of the divine existence. The general relation of God to the world may be divided into creation and providence. The creation may be viewed as the original creation and as the new formation of that which was originally created. Providence may be regarded as the supporting, ruling, co-working ; and the co-working as judgment, redemption, and glon- fication. 6. With the unfolding of providence, the definition of the divine being according to his attri- butes comes clearly into view, in which, however, we must carefully distinguish between the essentia] and merely nominal marks or designations. In every period there prevaiLs a peculiar definition, determined according to the divine attributes. In the primitive period God is designated as the exalted one (EI El- jon). In the period of the promise as the Almighty (El Schadai). In that of the law as the Holy one. In the transition to the prophetic as the righteous, wise, good. In the period of the prophets as the most glorious, the Majesty. In the national period as the condescending ; and in the New Testament as the gracious and merciful. 7. The distinctions in the divine nature or essence pass through different stages God and his Angel ; the Angel of the Lord (Gen. xvi. 7 ff.) ; of his countenance (Exodus xxxiii. 14 ff.) ; of the covenant (Malachi) ; God and his own Son ; God and his threefold name. § 47. BIBLICAL DOCTRINE OF MAN, OR ANTHROPOLOGY. The world as the basis and birthplace of man comes first into view here, and the world as Creation, as Nature, as the Cosmos, as the Aeon, or as the natural world defined through, the spiritual. Then man in his normal state, in his nature (Biblical Anthro- pology and Psychology), in his destination, his paradisaic origin and condition, and his fitness for trial. Then further, man in his sin, his tall, his sinfulness, and his original sin ; and corresponding to thi«, on the one hand, the guilt, judgment, death, condemna- bility, and on the other his inward discord and strife, his fitness as a subject of re- demption, his outlook into the spiritual world, both as one of wretchedness and bliss, 'lis cooperation with divine grace, or his preparation for the Advent of Christ. [ * This is a very inadequate rendering of the expressive terms wliich Dr. Lange uses : Daseins, Soseins, Hierseins, is which he includes the whole field &om which we draw the argruments for the being of God : not merely his existence, hoi lis existence Much as he is, the concrete idea of God given us in the Bible. — A. G.l 54 INTKODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. Remarks. — 1 The creation ia a. a single act, b. lets, works, c. a continuous energy or work, d. it marks tlie world as conditioned in the highest sense. 2. Nature is the relative independence of the world. Its first feature calling for notice is the principle of oatura Its second, the law of nature. Its third, the stages in the development of nature. Its fourth, the goal of nature ; the sphere of freedom in which the grand nature of the kingdom of God is developed. 8. The Cosmos is the beautiful harmonj- of the world. It hold."" its celebration in its ideal perfection. The sacred reflection of the Cosmos is the Sabbath — the sacred human festivals. 4. In the Aeon the living spiritual principles of the world are represented. We must distinguish first the spiritual and human world, and then further the Ontology of the spiritual world from the experience of man in regard to it, as it first enters with the fall. 5. Biblical Anthropology is both dualistic and a system of trichotomy. As to its dualism man belongs in one aspect to the ma- terial, in the other to the spiritual, world. Accord- ing to the trichotomy man is, as to his divine quality or nature, spirit, as to his heavenly or superearthly form, soul, and as to his earthly organism, body. 6. In the destination of man to the image and like- ness of God, we must maintain, that man, as the image of God, is destined to his self-reahzation in communion with God ; and that particularly, as to his bodily nature, he is destined to a generic self-realiza- tion in the spread of humanity from one pair, and as to his spirituality, to his ideal self-realization in the God- man, and as to his soul, to his social self reallzatict in the kingdom of God. 1. With the paradisaic stat« of man comes into consideration tlie pure beginning of his life, which is both potential aad actual, i. «., in one aspect innocence, in another righteousness ; then his need of being tested, and finally his fitnesi for the lest. 8. In the doctrine of sin we must dis tinguish the ideas of sin, of evil in the wide sensBi and strict moral evil. Then the nature of sin, iU genesis, and its development. 9. The consequences of sin may be viewed as natural and positive, or as death and as judgment in the following stages: Guilt and its imputation. This again branches it self a. into the continuation of sin : 1. Sinfulness, or the status corruptionisy and pun- ishment ; original sin, and the curse of sin ; the hardening (stage of unbelief) and the r» jection, fitness for condemnation ; The second death or condemnation. b. into the reaction against sin ; the natural reaction, or the consciousness of guilt on the part of man, tha positive reaction, or the preparative grace of God : 1. the desire after the lost Paradise and the Cher- ubim; 2. the desire sifter a new and higher salvation and the Protevangelium ; 3. faith and the promise ; 4. the stages of faith and the stages of the advent of Christ, 2. 3. 4. § 48. BIBLICAL CHRISTOLOGY, AND SOTERIOLOGT. Ohristology may naturally be divided into the typical and prophetic Old Testament messianic Christology, the evangelical Christology, or the history of the conscious being and revelation of Christ in his life, and the apostoHc Christology, or the biblically com- pleted doctrine of his person. Soteriology embraces the doctrine of the three Messianic offices of Christ, of the historical unity of the work of Christ, and of his eternal theanthropic work, in which he descends into the abyss of human judgment through his compassion, and raises believing humanity to the inheritance of his Sonship and blessedness. Remarks. — 1. The Old Testament Christology Sows from the fact, that from everyjudgment of God (here springs a divine promise, and that thus the re- ligion of the past is transformed i.ito a religion of the future. This religion of the future, under the providence of (iod, eve' moves onward to the future in acts and in consciousness : in the one througli the miracles, or in the atlegoi'ical, symbolic, and typical history of salvation ; in the other through prophecy ni its diili'icut stages. As to the allegory, the forms of the higher nature are in opposition to the formii of the lower nature, and thus represent the opposi- tion of the kingdom of God to the kingdom of dark- ness. In the symbolical acts and works, the human civilization becomes the image of the divine cultus. In the region of the types, i. e., of the germlike pre- figuriition of tliat which is to be comjileted in the fu- ture, we must distinguish the typology of the Covenant (Covenant or Testament), the typology of the kingdom and tlic typology of the Messiah. Messianic prophect §49. THE DOCTRINE OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD. Sf proceeds from the prophecy of the human conflict, the iemitic revei'ence for God, the blessing upon Abraham, the warlike and peaceful sceptre of Judah, the typical Messiah in the genealogy of David, to the prophecy of the ideal personal Messiah ; and again from the one prevailing form of the Messiah, it advances to the distinction of the lowly and suffering, and the exalted glorious Messiah. But with the idea of a suffering Christ there appears the idea of Antichrist and his typical signs or marks. With the prophecy of the Messiah there is unfolded also a prophecy of the redemption and transfiguration of the world through a series of saving judgments proceeding from those which are introductory, to those which are uni- versal and complete. 2. In the Evangelical Christo- logy, or the Christology of the hfe of Christ, we may view the Christology of the stages of his personal life (his miraculous birth, baptism, transfiguration. resurrection, ascension), and of his self-consciousnesi in his teachings, of his Christological acts, his miraclea and his redeeming work. .S. In the biblical Soteri- ology we must distinguish the unity of the work of Christ, from its division into his three offices. The one entire work of Christ has been profoundly de- scribed by Luther and others as an exchange of r^ lations. Christ has taken our sin, i. e., the conscious" ness of condemnation, upon himself, in order that he might make us sharers in his righteousness ; i. «., in his great compassion he has entered into our con- sciousness of guilt, as a consciousness of judgment, that he might take us into the consciousness of his righteousness. As to the offices, we must distinguish his prophetic redemption or world-atonement, his priestly expiation, and his kingly redemption in « narrower sense. (See Lange : Poiitiv Dogmatik, p. 793 ff.) §49. BIBLICAL PNEITMATOLOGY AND THEOCRATOLOGY, OR THE DOCTRINE OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD. This embraces the doctrine of the Spirit of God, and his works, or of the Old Tes- tament typical kingdom of God, based upon his universal and absolute kingdom over the world, in its friendly and hostile relations to the kingdoms of the world (Daniel, ch. ii., vti.) ; of the New Testament kingdom of heaven established by Christ, in its opposition to the kingdom of Satan, and of the final appearance of the perfected king- dom of God, in the glorified world, and in its complete triumph over the kingdom of darkness. The doctrine of the Old Testament kingdom of God treats of the historical signifi- «iance and importance of the opposition between Judaism and Heathenism. The doctrine of the New Testament kiiiirdom of God branches into the doctrine of the personal definite method of salvation, of the ecclesiastical and social institu- tion of salvation, and of the application and spread of this completed salvation to the utmost boimdaries of the world. Its stages are the following : 1. a. individual death ; 8. a. social death, or the fall of Babel ; t. a. death of the old world. End of the world ; b. intermediate state ; b. Anti-Christendom ; b. the final completed resurrec- tion, and the separation in the judgment; e. the individual progressive re- surrection ; c. the appearance of Christ and the millennial kingdom ; e. the eternal energy and result of the city of God, and itl glory to the honor of God. (Rev. xxii.) The doctrine of the completed kingdom of God rests upon the biblical disclosura of the Aeon of the blessed, and the Aeons of the condemned, over which rules, im- partii-g to them unity, the absolute fulfilment of the divine purposes, of the end of the world, and the glory of God. 56 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. Remarks. — 1. Pneumatology is more widely de- reluped through the doctrine of the Spirit, for which theology has as yet done comparatively little (see Lange : Theol. Dogmatik, p. 926), [see also Owen : Work on the Spirit. — A. G.]. 2. The doctrines of the absolute dominion of God, of the kingdom of the grace of God, and the kingdom of glory, must be more accurately distinguished than has been done hitherto. 8. The interchange between the progress of the kingdom of God and the kingdom of darkness, how they serve to facilitate each other's progress, how in critical moments they reject and exclude each other, how the apparent subjection of the first is al ways the real subjection of the last, how the victory of the kingdom of God, through the cross of Christ, is as a preliminary victory decided, how the two kingdoms move on side by side to their widest com- fletion, and how the last apparent triumph of the kingdom of darkness, in the revelation of Antichrist, introduces his final judgment under the triumph of the kingdom of God ; all this needs a more adequatt estimation, explanation, and statinent. 4. The sig- nificance of the historical opposition between JudSf ism and Heathenism, Hebraism and Hellenism, re quires a clearer and more detailed statnient. Beyond the hostile opposition between Shem and Ham, there may be seen also the friendly opposition betweer Shem and Japhet, tending to supplement each other. 5. For the organism of the individual method of sal- vation, which generally lies still in great confusion (see Lange : Positiv Dogmatik, p. 950). [This ia less true perhaps in England and in this country, than in Germany. — A. G.] For the Christological structure of the church in its various stages — the same, p. HOT, and finally for its organism durinf; its eschatological stages, p. 1225. SECOND DIVISION. FR ACTIO AL EXPLANATION, AND HOMILETIOAL USE OF THE OLD TESTAMENT In the apostolic communities, and through the entire apostolic age, the reading of the Old Testament was confessedly an essential foundation for the public solemn edification of Christians. Hence we find, in the New Testament writings, the first fundamental outlines of the practical explanation of the Old Testament. We may go Btill further back, and say, that ju-^t as the New Testament gives a doctrinal and practical explanation of the Old, so the later writings in the Old Testament serve to explain the earlier and more fundamental portions. But as Christ enters, or is intro- duced, in the New Testament, as the absolute interpreter (Matt. v. 17), so his Apos- tles carry on his work as interpreters of the Old Testament. We call special atten- tion, in this view, to the Gospels by Matthew and John, the Acts, the Epistle to the Galatians and that to the Hebrews. The apostolic Fathers also have proved in a large measure interpreters of the Old Testament. Besides some allegorical fancies in the epistle of Barnabas, we re cognize some very valuable and profound suggestions. Clemens of Rome, in his first letter to the Corinthians, after ho has e.vhortcd the Corinthians to repentance, quotes testimonies and examples from the Old Testament, from cli. viii.-xiii. and passing over other citations, even in reference to the life of Christ, ch. xvii.-xix. and still farther on, he constantly mingles quotations from the Old Testament witli those from tho New. This is true also in some measure of the second epistle boaiit;g the same name. The Ignatian epistles are in this respect remarkably reserved, perhaps out of regard to the Judaizers. In Polycarp «i.lso the citations from the New Testament are tery prominent. The anonymous lettei to Diognetus represents still more strikingly PRACTICAL EXPLANATION AND HOMILETICAL USE OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 5; in this respect, an anti-judaistic stand-point, although there is no necessity for im puting to its au .hor a Gnostic antagonism to the Old Testament. In the Pastor of Hernias there are not wanting Old Testament allusions, still he is more closely related to the Old Testament, in his imitation of the prophetic forms, and in his leg.al vieW; than in that living appropriation of it which characterizes the New Testament. The book of Hermas points to the great Christian apocryphal literature, in which the Jewish Apocrypha perpetuates itself, and in which indeed the most diverse imitations of the Old Testament writings are continued. (The Sybellines, the 4th book of Ezra, the book of Enoch, and others.) Among the Apologists, Justin Martyr, about the middle of the second century, appears as a Christian philosopher who was familiar with the Old Testament. ThiH is clear from his dialogue with Trypho. But also in his Gohortatio nd Graecos he, as also others of the Fathers, not recognizing the better peculiarities of heathenism, traces back the monotheism and wisdom of Plato to Moses and the propliets. In his apologies, which were directed to heathens, he makes use of Old Testament prophe- cies. Tatian, notwithstanding his Gnosticism, refers to the Old Testament. Theophi- lus of Antioch {ad Autolycwn) contrasts the Old Testament account of the creation, with th.at of Hesiod (ii. 13), in which, although an Antiuchian, and before that school, he explains the historical facts symbolically, while retaining at the same time the historical sense. He continues the history of Genesis, and of the Mosaic system, with constant reference to heathenism. Generally speaking, his representation moves upon the line of the sacred scriptures from the Old to the New Testament. Besides the general free use of the Old Testament in the Fathers, which even becomes exces- sive, in so far as the Old Testament conception of the cultus, its hierarchical and sacrificial ideas, and certain leg.al precepts, have been adopted in a more or less ex- tern.al way into the New Testament doctrine, order of worship, and constitution ; there are special portions made prominent, in which the Old Testament continues its life in the New Testament theology, and in the cultus of the church. The first of these is the manifold exposition and explanation of the work of creation, especially of the six days' work, by which we oppose both the heathen dualistic view of the world and Polytheism. The second is the Christian development of the doctrine of the kingdom of God, especially of the Messianic prophecies. The third is the Christian, human, pastoral, and catechetical development of the decalogue. The fourth is the transmission of the Old Testament Psalmody in the New Testament Hymnology and Cultus of the Church. To these we must add th.at allegorical method of exposition, which culminated in the Alexandrian school, by means of which the Christiiin consciousness appropriates to itself and reproduces in a Christian way the whole contents of the Old Testament. Finally the culture of the biblical method and style of preaching, under the influence of the Old Testament, in connoction with the Greek and Roman rhetoric. As to the first point, Clemens of Alexandria li.ad in view a commentary upon Genesis. There was a work of Tertullian, now lost, npon Paradise. About the year 196 Candidus wrote upon the hexwuieron. Besides a work upon Genesis, Hippolytus published several works upon the Old TestamcBt scriptures. Origen prepared a commentary npon Genesis, and also a series of mystical homilies upon the same book, as also upon a large number of other biblical books. Cypiian published a song upon Genesis. Victoriiius, about 290, wrote a Tractatus dt Fahrica mundi. Methodius, about the same time, CommenUirii in Genesin. Hie racns (the heretic), in 302, Lucubrationes in Hexcemeron. Eustathius, 325, Com 5B INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. meiitarius in Sexwmeron. James of Edessa, about the same time, HexoBmeron aa Constant inani. Basil the Great, about 370, nine Homilies upon tlie six days. His brother Gregory of Nyssa also wrote upon the six days' work. About 374, Ambrose wrote six books upon the same theme. Jerome, towards the end of the 4th century, prepared questions upon Genesis. Chrysostom wrote 67 Homilies upon Genesis. Augustine wrote upon Genesis in many of his works. These works show clearly how important Genesis, the doctrine of the creation, the statement of the six days' work, appeared to the Fathers, in their controversies with heathenism. That the explanation of the ten commandments was in like manner, next to the gradually perfected apostles' creed, one of the oldest branches of Christian catechet- ical instruction, needs scarcely any proof. The idea of one prevailing view of the Old and New Testament kingdom of God appears already in the apology of Theophilus of Antioch. The Chronography of Julius Africanus, the Chronicon of Eusebius of Cesarea, as well as his arrangement and demonstration of the gospel, lay a wider foundation for the same idea. The great work of Augustine, De Civitate Dei, belongs here, as also the sacred history by Sulpi- tius Severus, and generally the prevailing character of the historical statements or chronicles of the West, running down through the middle ages, since they all go back to the Old Testament and even to Adam. As to the importance of the Old Testament Psal- ter, and its history in the Christian Church, com- pare Otto Straus : The PaaUer as a Song and Prayer Book. A historical tractate. Berlin, 1859. Through the allegorical explanation of the scripture in the Alexandrian School, and still more in the middle ages, the entire Old Testament assumed a New Testa- ment form and meaning, as to the inner Christian life and spiritual experience, while at the same time, as to the organization of the church and the cultus, the New Testa- ment became simply a new publication of the old. On the Mediaeval exposition of the scriptures, compare TTie A Uegorical Explanation of (he Bible, especialli/ in Preaching, by Von Mogelin (1844). Elster : The Exegetical Theology of the Aliddle Ages (1855). Tholdck: The Old Testament in the yew, 4th edition ^1864). J. G. Rosesmuller : History of Interpretation in the Christian Church (1795- 1814). Meter : Gesehichte der Schriflerkldrung, 5 vol. 1802-1899. Sciiuler: Gesehichte der Ver- Snderung dee Geschmackes in Predigen, 1792. For the critical and theological exposition of the Old Testament generally, consult M. BAnMOARTEN : Com- mentary upon the Old Testament, the General Intro- duction to the Old Testament. [See also upon the use of tlie Old Testament in the New. Fairbairn: Typology, 2d edition, aud Hermeneutical Manual. Alexander, W. L. : Connection and Harmony of tht Old and New Testament. London (1853). Pri- DEADx: (Ponnection, new ed. London (1866). — A. G.] The mediaeval mystics especially gave the widest limits to the letter of the Old Testament, and brought out into the light the multiplicity of the ideas lying at its root, as they rightly conjectured, through the theory of the fourfold sense of scrip- ture. Littera geata docet, quid credos allegoria, Moralis quid agas, quo tendas anagogia. The Song of Solomon was a favorite book for spiritual exposition, even in the time of the Father?. It was still more so during the middle ages, and has retained its position in the field of homiletical and ascetic literature to this day. The cats logue of tlie literature of this book alone would make a small volume. PRACTICAL EXPLANATION AND HOMILETICAL USE OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 5a There has lately been republished : The word* of St. Bernard upon the Song ; German, by Fern bacber, 1862. The exposition of the Bible was generally, during the middle ages, to a great ex tent practical, or designed for edification, and this indeed for the most part in a mys- tical way. This was true even with the expositions of the scholastics. This is in accordance with the practical direction of the middle ages, with the ignorance of the riginal languages, with the prevalence of dogmatics and church institutions and laws, and with that resulting, repressed respect for the Holy Scriptures. Gregory the Great, in this |)oini of view, opens the middle ages, when, after the canon of Origen as to the threefold sense of scripture, he composed his Moralia in Jobwn, after hav- ing provided in a collection of excerpts (Procopius of Gaza about 520 ; Primasius of Adrymettum about 550 ; Aurelius Cassiodorus after 562), the so-called Catenifi for a necessary aid to the learned exposition of the scripture. Isidorus of Hispalis, the venerable Bede, and others, follow later. A certain peculiarity attaches itself to the British method of exposition, as it was founded by the Archbishop Theodore ol Canterbury ; to the German exposition as it, e. g., is represented in the Saxon Evan gelical poetry of Heliand ; and later to the French and German mystics, who take their origin from the mystical writings of the Pseudo-Dionysius. The clear reference of the Holy Scriptures to the inner life, especially as a contemplative life, may be re- garded as the great acquisition of the middle ages. This prajtical exposition of the Scriptures, it is true, as practised by Claudius of Turin, Alcuin, Paul Warnefried, Rabanus Maurus, Christian Druthmar, Peter Lombard, Cardinal Hugo, Abelard, John of Salisbury, Thomas Aquinas, Albertus Magnus, but especially by the mystics Bernard of Clairveaux and his followers, was used for the advantage of priestly and monkish classes. Meanwhile the reformation of the exposition of the Scriptures was prepared dur- ing the middle ages. It must first of all be brought back to the original languages and the grammatical sense. The learned Jews of the middle ages, with their lin- guistic studies and expositions of the Old Testament, provided for this return (Aben Esra, Jarchi, Kimchi, and others). As to the New Testament, whose learned expo- sition in the spirit of Chrysostom, Qilcumenius, Theophylact, and Euthymius Ziga- benus, had prosecuted, that human learning, transplanted from Greece to the West, and awakened and cultivated in the West itself, served the same purpose which the labors of the Jews did for the Old Testament. Thus there was prepared, since Nicholas of Lyra (who died about 1340), Wicliffe, Huss, with Laurentius Valla, Reuchlin, Erasmus, a scientific exposition of the Scriptures, which began at once by its critical process to free itself from mediaeval traditions. But the exposition of the Scriptures must at the same time be made popular, and, in tlie form of Bible readings, sermons, catechisms, household instructions and training, be introduced among the people. Besides a few great popular preachers (Berthold, the Franciscan, 1272, John Tauler, 1361, Vincentius Ferreri, 1419, Leonard of Utino, 1470, and others), the pious sects of the middle ages, especially the Waldenses, and the well-known forerunners of the Reformation, labored to secure this result. The last-mentioned class prepared that introductory, profound, and scientifia )sposition of Scripture in which the Reformation arose, and through which alone it could 8U'>cessfully assert that full, new unveiling and revelation of the Holy Scrip ture as it lived in the heart, the word of justification by faith, and thug established its sole authority in matters of faith. 50 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. With the great reformers, that introductory exposition of the Bible, purified through its critical processes, brought back to the grammatical and historical sense, while at the same time mystical and inward, on one side learned, on the other popular first entered into the popular life, however the fetters of ecclesiastical exegetical tradition may have restrained the freedom of individuals. This exposition in its scientific aspect led to a new construction of the entire theology, in its ecclesiastical aspect to the laying anew all the foundations of church institutions and order, in its popular aspect to the production of countless sermons and hymns. Flaccus lUyr- icus reduced these acquisitions to their rules in the first protestant Hermeneutics in his Clavis Seripturce Sacrce, 1567. From this time onward the history of the exposition of the Scriptures is so com prehensive that we can only describe it after its periods. To the period of the Re- formation, in which the prevailing principle was the Anodogiajidei, and during which the Lutheran Exegesis struck into a synthetical and critical direction, and the Re- formed into an analytical and practical, succeeded at first the period of interpreta- tion according to the Orthodox symbols, and in which the different confessions shaped and determined the exegesis. This period extends through the ultra-critical exegesis of the Unitarians, and partially also that of the Arminians, and through the allegorical exposition both of the Catholic and of the Protestant mystics (Madame Guion, Antoinette Bourignon, Jacob Boehnic), which here again, as in the middle ages, forms the side-stream to the new scholastic main current. This last tendency passed over partially into the subjectively practical pietistic school, whose principle of interpretation was the word of God, the word of personal salvation, as the seed of person.ll regeneration. The Lutheran interpretation, as it was pre-eminently dog- matic, was ever seeking to find the New Testament dogmas in the Old Testament, i. e., it distinguished less accurately the times. The Reformed, with a more correct estimate of the historical, distinguished definitely times and economies, and found, therefore, in the Old Testament the typical profigurations of the New, but fell also, in the Cocceian school, into a typology which knew no rules, or into allegorical fan- cies and excesses. This distinction was reversed in their views of the law. Luther made the opposition between Moses and Christ too great, while Calvin suffered him- self to be influenced by the Mosaic system even in questions of ecclesiastical law. For the orthodox the Bible was a mine of dicta probantia, for the mystics it was a record of a visionary, inspired, mysterious, all-pervading view of the world. Pietism strove to unite these in its method of interpretation. That Rationalism, in its period, has both corrupted and promoted criticism, has made exegesis more shallow and superficial, while it has made it more pure and simple, has both falsified and uprooted scripture doctrine in its reference to life, as it has developed it practically and morally, is now confessed, i. e., it is confessed that it forms in one total representation a revolution of unbelief, and a reform of the believ- ing consciousness. But if it advances from that grammatical historical principle, illy understood (since the bibliqal letter was not seen in its peculiar depth, the biblical facts or persons in their complete originality), to the last destructive results of the pseudo-criticism, so also it has in its interchange with supernaturalism from the same principle, correctly understood, wronglit a more profound exposition of the scripture, according to the fundamental principle of scripture. It has introduced the Christ olog- ical explanation of the scripture, which forms the living centre of the present exposi- tion of the Bible. However, it har not interrupted the flow of biblical investignlior rKAOTlCAL EXPLANATION AND HOMILETICAL D3E OF THE OLD TESTAMENT, fl] and exposition, but urged it on more rapidly, since it was animated by the idea, that the doctrine of the Bible would prove the most efficient means of overthrowing th« churchly dogmatics. A striking testimony for the extraordinary activity in the inter- pretation of the Scriptures, from the Reformation until our own time, is found in th« commentaries, the collections of sermons, concordances, systems of biblical theologr and especially the Bibleworks, which are now appearing so rapidly. Catalogues of collected Bibleworks, exegetical and bomiletical, maj be seen in Walch : BMinlheca theol. vol. iv. p. 181. Winer: Handbach der iheologhchen IMeratur, i. p. 186. The Supplement, p. 11. Danz, p 134. In Starke: Biblework we find named as his predecessors the Bibleworks (Lutheran) of BI'.ne- MANN, Cramer, Dietrich Veit, Xicolaus Hasics, Joachim Lanre, Horch (Mystical Bible, Marbuigh), Olearius, the two Osianders, Zeltner (Reformed), Castellio, Tremellics, Piscatue, Tossands (Cath- olic), Walafried Strabo, Lyra, Padlcs a Sancta Maria. Further, the Ernestine Bible, theVViirtemberg Summarien, Die Tiibingische Bibel, under the direc- tion of Matthew Pfaff (Lutheran). — Reformed works : Die Berleburgische Bibel, the English, Belgio, Ge- nevan (with notes by Maresics) Bibles. Das Deut- Bche Oder Herborn'sche Bibelwerk. — Besides these. Hall: Practical Applicaiions,'FTi\heT^sc\iC Parallel- bibel, Il'enii thesaums. Also a series of speci.il Bibleworks upon the New Testament. Hedinoer, Majus, Muller, Qoesnel, Zeisios. Of modern Bibleworks we name: Von Hetzel (10 Theile, fSO -1791), with 2 Theile iiber die Apokryphen (von Fdhrmann in seinem Handbuch der theolng. Literatuf ungiijixtig beurtheilt). Altenburger Bibel-Commeu tar fiir Prediger, 1799 (von einem Verein von Pre digern). Those of Oertel, Fischer, and Wohl- fahrt. Dinter and Brandt. Also the list in Lange Biblework, Mattheic, Am. ed. p. 19. For the great number of works, preparatory to the Holy Scriptures, Lexicons, Concordances, and similar aids, see Danz and Winer. Lange: Matthew, Am. ed. pp. IS, 19. English Bibleworks : Nelson : Antideistic Bible. Burnet: Xew Testament. Henry: Exposition [in England, the general commentaries, by Poole, Gill, the two Clarkes, S.amuel and Adam, Patrick Lowth, and Whitby, Scott, Burder, and others of less note. In this country the literature is rich in special com- mentaries, wliile there are no general commentaries, unless we include in the teim popular works, like that published by the American Tract Society. — A. G.] The practical exposition of the Scriptures was limited, in the Lutheran church by the order in which they were read in the church service, in the Reformed by its stronger dogmatic tradition. But in the end the more profound view of the Analogia Jidei there, and of the Analogia scripturae here, led to the great reform in biblical criticism, exposition, theology, preaching, and catechetical instruction, which places us to-day on the very threshold of a new epoch. (See Remarks, § 1.) Recently the study of the Old Testament centres again upon Genesis, the Mosaic records of the creation, the six days; since the conflict with modern unbelief, for the defence of these principles of the kingdom of God, which are here laid down in the beginning of the Scriptures, must be met and settled here. For the literature: .5feLcDwiG; Ueber die prak- tische Atmlegunff der heilic/en Schrift,FranM}ivt, 1859. Dickinson : Phi/sica vetus et vera, sive tractatu» de na- turali veritate Nexaemeri mosaici, London, 1702. [The works of Hitchcock, Hugh Miller, Dana, J. Pyk Smith. The Bridgewater treatises. Lord, the articles in the Bibliotheca sacra, urging the view of Prof. Gcyot. 7%e Commentary on Genesis, by Ja- 50Brs. Wiseman : Lectures. Tatlkr Lewis : Six Days of Creation, and The Bible and Science MtjRPHY: Bible and Oeology. Pattison : The Earth and the Word. Kurtz : Bible and Astronomy. Sdmner : The Records of the Creation. Birks : On die Creation. Hancock : On the Deluge. The con- troversy, started by Golenso, has already been fruitful in its literary results. See Mahan : the spiritual point of view. Green; The Pentateuch vinditMai (against Colenso). — A. G.] «2 INTKODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. THIRD DIVISION. THEOLOGICAL AND HOMILETICAL LITERATURE UPON THE OLD TESTAMENT. See Lanoe : Matthew, Am. ed. pp. 17, 18. For the older literature consult the catalogue in Starke: BiUework, the appendix to the fifth part, entitled General register, &e., pp. l^l. Also Heidegger: £n- chiridion, \>p. 16, 16. Waloh: Bibliotheca theolog. Tol. iv. p. 205. Fdhrmann : Haiidbuch der theolog. Literatur, li. p. 3. Danz : Worterbwch, p. 938, Supple- meut, p. 10. Winer: i. p. 67, Supplement, p. 31. Hagenhach : Ene.yclopadie, p. 176, to which is added the literature of biblical Philology, p. 122. Compare also a sketch of a history of Old Testament exegesis in Bleek : Einleitung, p. 129. KuRTZ : History of the Old Testament, p. 62. De Wette : Einleitung, p. 159. [See also the comparatively full lists of the older literature, given in Horne : Introduction, and the partial lists in Kitto : Cyclopedia, and Smith ; Bible Dictionary, Davidson : Hermeneutics, the his- torical part. — A. G.] 1. Introduction.— De Wette, Haevernick, Bleek, Stakhelin (1862). — Special critical works. Stakhelin : Kritische Untersuchu7igen uher den Pen- tateuch, Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings (1843). Koe- Nio: Alttestamentliche Studien, 1. Heft: Authentic desBuches Josua(1836); 2. Heft: Das Deuterono- mium uud der Prophet Jeremias (1839). Also G. A. HAnFF, RiF.HM, Caspari : Contributions to the intro- duction to Isaiah. Henqstenberg : fieft-ai^e. Geiger (Jew) : Urschrift und Uebersetzungen der Bibel, &c. (1857). [DkYiviSOii: Introduction. McDonald: /ti- Iroduclion to the Pentateuch. The Introduction to Baumgarten: Commerdary — in the 1st vol. Hamil- ton: The friend of Moses. — A. G.] 2. General examination of the Old Testa- ment.--CiiAPPLiis, L.auganne(1838). Koiildruegge, Elberfeld (1858). Boehner, Ziirich (1859). Fried- rich, GoMPACH, Westermeyer, Schaffhausen (1860). 3. More general Commentaries. — Kurzge- fasstes exegetisehes Jlandhuch, by HnziG, IIirzel, Olbhaiisen, Thenids, Knobel, Bertheab, &c. (Leipzig, 1841, ff., embraces also the Apocrypha). The Commentary now in progreBS by Keu. and DKLITZ9JB. For special commentaries : sec Lance: Sfattheu, Am. ed. p. 19. [Besides those referred (o, there may be consulted : On the Old Testament, on Genesis, and the Pentateuch : Bonar, Cum- MINOH, Gkavkh, Hamilton, Jacodds, Jamieson, Mi.-HPHV Wordsworth. — Also Abbott: On Jonah. BiRDGES : On Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. Rev. J Bcrrodghs: On //b»ea. Bi:rrows: Otit/ie Song. Ca RTL: On Job. Davidson: On Esther. Drake: On Jo nah and Hosea. Greenhill and Gdtbrie: On Ene kiel. Horslev : On the Psalms. Moore : On the Pro phets of the Restoration. Tregklles : On Daniel Young : On Ecclesiastes. — A. G.] 4. Bibleworks. — Ehrmann : The five books of Moses down to Esther (1733). Michaelis : Transla- tio7t of the Old and New Testament, with explanations. Berger and Augusti : Praktische Einleit. in's Altf Testament (1799). Bleckert : Das Oesetz vnd die Verheissiiiig {1S52). PnitippsoN : Die heilige Schrifl in deutscher Uebersetzung, &c. 3d ed. (1862). The- saurus biblicus, 1 Dan., Suesskind (1856). General Bibleworks, Lange : Matthew, Am. ed. p. 19. 6. Works embracing the principal points io question. — a. TTie kingdom of God ; Jewish History : JosT (1859). Dessacer (1862). Da Costa (1855). Chr. Hofmann. Kdrtz: Sacred History of the Old Covenant. Hofmann : Weissagung und Erfullung. BiiEHRiNQ (1862). [Edwards: History of Redemp tion. Alexander ; History of the Israelitish Nation. Blakie: Bible History. Coe: Sacred History and Biography, London, 1860. Fleetwood: History of Ijie Bible. Kitto, Johnston : Israel in the World. 6. Smith: Hebrew People. Utahley : History of the Jew ish Church. — A. G ] 6. The History of the kingdom of God. — WiiATELY : Kingdom of Christ. Histories of the king- dom of God, by Hess, Zahn, Brakm, and others. Structure of General History, by Weitbrecht, Eh- renfeuchter, Etth, and others. Apelt : Die Epochen der Oeschichte der Menschheit. (The Gospel of the Kingdom, Leipzig.) Ehrlich : Leitfaden fiir Vor- lesnngen iiber die Off'enbarnng Gottes (1860). Lisco (1830). Kalkar (1838). Kircher (1845). Apel (I860). Cairo and Lctz (1858). Thecrer(1862).— b. Christology. Naeoelsbach: Der Gottmensch,the(\m- damental idea of Revelation in its unity and historical development (1853). Trips: Die Tluophanien in the historical books of the Old Testament (1858). Badb Christoloqie des Altcn Testaments. Sciioi.z : Hand- bueh der 'Ilieologie des Alten Bundes (1S61). Theo- logia dogmatics Judaiorum brevis Expositio, by RoEiii. Bkrthoi.iit: Christologia Judaiorum. Ew. ALD, Henostenberg, Hofmann, Coquerkl, Ldt«, Stkudel, Okmi.er, IIak.vernick. Mayer Die patri THEOLOGICAL AND HOMILETICAL LITERATURE UPON THE OLD TESTAMENT. 03 archd/ischen Verheissungen und Mesxianischen Psal- men. HiTZiG: Die prophetischen Biicher des Alten Testaments (1854). Sohegg; Die kleinen Propheten (1854). — c. Messianic ti/pes. Kanne : Christus im Al- ten Testament. HiLLER ; Die Reihe der Vorbilder Jesu Christi im Alien Testament, new ed. by A. Knapp. Lisco : Das Ceremonial gesetz des Alten Testaments (1S42). Baeur : Sipnbolik (\SS1). Baf.hr. Salo- monische Tempel, — also Kurtz, Fkiedricm, Sarto- Eins, Keil, Kliefoth, and others. — A more partic- ular leference will be made in the Biblework upon Leviticus. [Fairbairn: Topology. Marsh : iecteres, and works of less note and importance. Matthews, Keach, J. Taylor, Gould.-A. G.] — d. Messianic pro- phecies. 'Sev:ton: Lecture on the Prophecies. K(ESter, Knobel, EwALD, Tholitck. Staehelin : Die Messia- mschen Weissagungen, &c. (1847). Meinertzhagen : Vorlesungen iiber die Chriatologie des Alten Testa- ments (XHi?,). Reinke: Die Messianischen Psalmen (1857). — Die Weissagungen(\66'i). — Henostenberg : Christologij, 2d ed. Baur: History of tlie Old Tes- tament Prophecy {1861). [Smith: Scripture testimony to the Messiah ; Magek : On the Atonement ; Faber : On the Prophecies ; Warburton ; Divine Legation; Hdrd : Introduction to the Study of the Prophets ; Jones : Lecttires ; Graves : Lectures on the Penta- teuch; McEwen: Essay ; Samuel Mathers: On the figures and types of the Old Testament: KiDD : Chris- tophany; Steward : Mediatorial Sovereignty ; Turn- bull: Theophany. — A. G,] 1. Principal writers of recent times J. D. Michaelis, Rosenmullkr, Dathe, Meurer, J. J. Hess : Of the kingdom of God (1774-1791). Heng- Btenberg : Chnstology; Beitrage ; Authenticity of the Pentateuch ; of Daniel ; Books of Moses and Egypt ; History of Balaam and Ms prophecy ; on the Psalms ; work upon the sacrifices ; on Job ; Ecclesiastes ; the Song of Solomon ; and a work upon the Apocrypha. Ewald: History of the people of Israel ; Poetical book ; Prophets ; Jahrbucher der biblischen Wissen- tchaft, 11 vols. Umbeeit : Praktischer Commentar zu de?. Propheten. Hopfeld : Die Genesis ; die Psal- men. Delitzsch : Genesis ; Psalms ; Song of Solo- mon. Baumgarten : Commentary upon Pentateuch and Zachariah. [On Genesis: Bush, Hackett, Jaco- bus, — on Psalms : J. A. Alexander, — on Job : Barnes, CoNA NT, — on Proverbs: M. Stuart, Bridges, —on the Song: Burroughs, — on Ecclesiastes : Young, — on Isaiah : Barnes, Henderson, Drechsler, Alex- ander,— on Ezekiel : Haevernick, Fairbairn, — the minor Prophets: Henderson, Percy, Moork. — A. G.] ■S. Sermons upon Old Testament Books S. Fdbbmann : Handbuch, p. 263. Hohnbaum ; Prcdig- («n, 2 vols. (1788-1789). Beyer: Die Geschichte der Urwelt in Predigten, 2 vols. (1795). The History of Israel in Sermons (1811). Predigten, von Sturm (1785). [Graves: Lectures on Pentateuch. Ful LER : Discourses on Genesis. Lauson : Lectures on Ruth a7id Esther. Scott : Lectures on Daniel. Mc Duff: On Elijah. Norton and Chandler: On David. Blunt : On Abraham ; and a very wide literature of this kind in the works of the older English divine*, —A. G.] 9. Homiletical and practical 'writings on th* Old Testament. — Beykr : Predigten, an attempt to guard the unlearned against the attacks of enemies and scoffers. Bender : Old Testame/it examples in S«i-mo««, 3 vols. (1857-1858). Gollbard: Outlines of sermons upon the historical books of the Old Tes- tament (1854). W. HoFMANN: Predigten, vols. 4 and 5. F. W. Krummacher : Neue Predigten, book of the advent (1847). H. Arndt: Christus im Alten Bunde (1861). G. D. Krummacher: Predigten. Emil Krummacher: Gideon, der Richter Israeli (1861). Natorp: Predigtenvhei- das Buch Ruth (\mS). Akndt: Der Mann nach dem Herzen Goftfs (1836). DissKLHOF (1859) : Upon Saul and David. Baum- garten: David der Konig {\8&2) ; Introduction to the book of Kings, Halle (1861). Paulus Cassel: Ko- 7iig Jeroboam (1851). F. W. Krummacher: Homilies upon Elijah and Elisha [published by Tract Society, N. Y.— A. G.]. Diedrich: Das Buch Hiob (1858). Ebrard: The same. The Psalms, by J. D. Frisch, new ed. (1857). Burk: Gnomon Psalmorum (11 6i>). Oetinger: Die Psalmen Davids, newly revised (\86(>). Veillodter: Predigten (1820). Iken; Trostbibel far Kranke, in einem passe7iden Auszug aus den Psalmen (1835). Psalmen von Thalhofer [Catholic] (186(i). Taube and Gcenther : On the Psalms. Hammer: Di» Psalmen des Alten Testaments ; The words of St. Ber- nard upon the Song (1S62). F. W. Krummacher, Jahn, Maydorn : Das Hohe Lied. W. Hofmann : Die grossen Propheten, explained in the u^itings of the Reformers. Schroeder : Die Propheten Hosea, .Joel, Amos, iiberselzt und erldutert. Diedrich : Daniel. Hosea, Joel, Amos, briefly explained (1861). J. ScHLiER : Upon the Minor Prophets. Lavater : Pre. digten iiber das Buch .Jonas. Brieger : The 53d Ch, of Isaiah (1858). Rinck: Der Prophet Haggai (1851) [Chandler: Life of David; Hall: Contemplations; Faber : Horae Mosaicae ; Ryder : Family Bible ; Blunt : Coincidences of the Old and New Testament. The Royal Preacher. Hamilton. One of the volumes in Edwards' works contains suggestive notes upon various passages. Guthrie: Go.'spel in Ezekiel. Brown: Evenings ivith the Prophets. Burt: Redemp lion's Datvn. Caldwell: Lectures on the Psalms Chalmers : Daily Readings. Ccmmings, Kitto, Hun- ter: Sacred Biography. Maurice: Prophets ciuJ King' Patriarchs and Lawgiver!. — A. G.j M INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. Remark. — The literature upon Genesis, and io a great measure for the Pentateuch, will be found m the special Introductions. 10. Apocrypha. — Beckhaus: Bemerkungen iber den Gebrauch der apokryphischen Bucher. Das Exegetische Handb^ich von Fritsche and Geimme. — (Volkmar: //aWiuoA, 1. Theil.) Against the Apocrypha by Mann (1S53). Keerl (1855). Wild (1854). Oschwald, and others. For the same Hengstenbero. Fiir Beibehaltung der Apo- kryphen (1853). Stier (1853). Scheele (1865), and others. [Jones: On tht Canon. Axexandke: On the Canon. Wordsworth: On the Canon. Thoenwell : On the Apocrypha. Prideaux : Con nection. — A, Gx] FOURTH DIVISION. THE ORGANISM, OR THE ARRANGEMENT OF THE BIBLICAL BOOKS. a. Names of the Bible. The Ola Testament: the Law, Josh. i. 8; Matt. ixii. 36; Ps. cxix. 92; Matt. v. 18; Luke xvi. 17 ; John X. 34; xii. 34. The Scripture, or Holy Scrip- ture, John V. 39 ; Rom. xv. 4 ; Gal. iii. 22. — The word of God. — The law and the prophets : Matt. v. 17. Moses and the prophets: Luke xvi. 29, 31. The law, prophets, and other writings, the prologue of Jesus Sirach. The law, prophets, and the Psalms: Luke xxiv. 44. The book of the law : Jos. viii. 34, &c. The law in many cases designates the giving of the law in the narrower sense. 6. The Different Bibles. When we speak of the Bible it is presupposed that we are treating of one definits fixed object. But this is not the case. In reference to the Old Testament, we must distinguish the Bible of the Jews in Palestine, the Bible of the Alexandrine Hellenists, the Septuagint, and that Christian arrangement of the Bible already introduced b; Josephus. We apprehend the Bible first preeminently as the book of the Religion of the future. Hence upon the basis of the Thorah, law (the five books of Moses), there is laid the great grou]) of the prophets, Nebiim. The earlier or former prophets follow upon the earlier histoiical books, Joshua, Judges, the two books of Samuel, and the two books of Kings, not only because these books were written by the prophets, but much more because the Israelitish history was recognized as typical and prophetic. Tiien follow the Later iirophols — our minor and greater prophets — with the exception of Daniel. The third division includes the Kethubbim, i. e., the writings regarded purely as writings, not so named merely as the latest collection, writings in a general sense, but destined from the very beginning to work as writings in a higher rank. To the later historical books, Chronicles, Ezra, Nchemiah, are added the [loetical books : Psalins, Job, Proverbs, then the jjrophet D:iniel, and the Megilloth (rolls), th« Song, Ecclesiastes, Ruth, Lamentations, Esther. The introduction of the theocratic life, the unfolding of th.at life to the New Covenant, the bloom and flower of the theocratic life, this is unquestionably the ideal ground and source of the arrangement That the Alexandrine Bible rests upon a theory of inspiration, more free and wide; than the canonical limits, is evident from its embracing the Old Testament Apocryphi ORGANISM OF THE BIBLICAL BOOKS. 66 with the canonical books, which the Septnagint could never have done, had it held fast the pure Hebrew idea of the Canon. From the circumstance that the Seventy have not made the canonicity of the apocryphal books of special impoitance, soma have drawn the groundless inference that they held the same position as to the Canon with the Hebrew Jews. They were kept from asserting the canonicity of the Apoc- rypha by their ecclesiastical prudence, just as the Sadducees were prevented by the same prudence from denying the canonicity of the Old Testament books beyond the law. The Christian arrangement of the Old Testament into historical books (from Genesis to Esther), didactic books (from Job to the Song), and prophetic books (from Isaiah to Malachi), corresponds better with the Christian point of view, since a paral* lei is thereby secured to the arrangement of the New Testament. The term, didacti' books, answers better to this parallel, than the expression poetical books. But even as to the Hebrew Jews, and their judgment upon the Hebrew Bible, the Pharisees had a different Bible from the Sadducees, and these again from the Essenes. The first enlarged and obscured the Old Testament through their tradi tions. Their direction ended legitimately in the Talmud. The second emptied the law of its deeper living contents, since they expounded it as exclusively a moral, and in that sense only a religious, law-book. They were the forerunners of the modern deistic Judaism. The third allegorized the Old Testament and divided it, with thorough rationalistic arbitrariness, into canonical and uncanonical portions. In their dualistic theosophy, as the Alexandrine philosophy of religion, they were the fore- runners of the Cabbalah. That the Bible of the post-Christian Jews, i. e., the Old Testament obscured and enlarged by their traditions, is an entirely different Bible from the Old Testament which unfolds and glorifies itself in the New Testament, is as clear as day. The injurious effects of the Catholic tradition upon the Holy Scripture, which is obscured by the attempt to place the Apocrypha upon a level with the Old Testa- ment, is confessed. The Greek church at the synod at Jerusalem, 1672, emphatically adopted the same view of the Bible, as the way had been prepared for this, through its traditional development. It cannot be denied, indeed, that the evangelical Protestant Bible may be and has often been obscured, e. g., when it is explained in accordance with a one-sided view of the Lutheran doctrine of Justification, or the Reformed doctrine of Predestination. The manifold sufferings, obscurations, disfigurations, and crucifixions of Christ in his church, are reflected in the entirely homogeneous sufferings of the Bible. In the evangelic sects of the middle ages and the forerunners of the Reformation, the buried Bible was unearthed from its tomb. With the profound development, spiritual quick- ening, and culture of the church, will it first be recognized in all its glory. c. The Old and New Testaments. The one word of God, or Holy Scripture, lalls into the records of the Old and New Covenants, into the Old and New Testaments. The unity of the two as the word of God is conditioned upon the nisus of the Old Testament towards the New (tlie promise, the prophecy of the Messiah, Jer. xxxi. 31 &c.) and upon the reference of the New Testament to the Old (Matt. i. 1 ; ii. 5, &c. Isa. vi. 39, and similar places). In this way the absolute superiority of the New Testament to the Old is as cer INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. tainly preannoimced in the Old (Ps. li. ; Jer. xxxi. 31 ; Isa. Ixvi. 3 ff. ; Dan. vii.), as h b expressly declared in the New Testament (Matt. xi. 11 ; xii. 41, 42 ; John i. 17, 18; Acts XV. 10, 11 ; 2 Cor. iii. 6 ; the Epistles of James and the Hebrews). With this it is taught, on the one hand, that the value of the Old Testament aa to its external aspect and for itself, in reference to the Jewish national and exclusive religion, is abolished. (Gal. iii. 19 ; iv. 5 ; Ephes. ii. 15 ; Col. ii. 44 ; Heb. viii. 13.) But it is taught also, on the other hand, and with the same distinctness, that th New Testament firmly establishes the Old in its eternal value, as the foundation, the preparation, the introductory revelation, on which it rests. (Matt. v. 17 ff. ; John v 39; Rom. iii. 31.) d. The Oboanish of the New Testamxht. Bee liAwas : Matthew, Am. ed. p. 24. e. The Oroanism or the Old Testamebt. The book of the Old Covenant as the prefiguration of the New Covenant, or of the Advent of Christ. ll The Announcement of the New Covenant in the Old. The Thorah (the law). a. Genesis, or the universal foundation of the theocratic particularism, and of the particularism in its universal destination or aim and tendency. b. Exodus, or the prophetic and moral form of the law of the Old Covenant (the tabernacle in Exodus is regarded chiefly as the place for the law, and the law-giver. It is the place of the human cultus only in a secondary point of view. Hence the tabernacle appears here, and not first in Leviticus). c. Leviticus, or the priestly and ritual form of the law of the Old Covenant. d. Numbers, or the kingly and political form of the law of the Old Covenant (the martial host of God and its march. Typical imperfection). e. Deuteronomy, as the reproduction of the law in the solemn light of the pro- phetic spirit. S) The actual typical development of the Old Covenant until the decline of its typical glory and the preparation for its ideal glory. Historical books. a. The book of Joshua. The introduction of the theocratic people into the typical inheritance of the people of God. The conquest. The division. b. The book of Judges. The independent expansion of the Israeliiish tribes in the land of promise. The stages of apostasy, and the appearance of the theocratic heroes, judges, in the different tribes. The tribes after their dark side. As an appendix, a gleam of light, the little book of Ruth. e. The books of Samuel, or the collection of the tribes and the introduction of the kingdom by Samuel, the last of the judges (the desecration of the priest- hood, the introduction of the kingdom, the j)reparation for the prophets in the stricter sense, through the schools of the prophets). The first hook, Saul the rejected king. The second book, David the king called of God. d. The two books of Kings. The theocratic kingdom from its highest glory to its decay. The first of Solomon, the type of the Prince of Peace, and of tlte kingdom of peace, until Elijah, the type of the judgment by fire; the second from the ascension of Elijah, or the apotheosis of the law, to he decline of the kingdom, of the people of the law. ORGANISM OF TUE BIBLICAL BOOKS. Ql e. The two books of Chiouicles. The Old Testament history of the kingdoir of God, in a theocratic point of view, from Adam until the order for the re- turn of Israel from the Babylonian captivity. /. The book of Ezra. The priestly and ritual restoration of the holy people an** the temple. g. Nehemiah. The theocratic and political restoration of the people and tht holy city. h. Esther. The wonderful salvation and change in the history of the peopl* of God, during the exile, dispersion, and persecution. 3) The preliminary New Testament bloom of Old Testament life in its course of development. 1. The theocratic and Messianic Lyrics. The Psalms. 2. The didactics of Solomon in their universal scope and tendency, a. Job. The inscrutableness and vindication of the divine wisdom and righteousness, especially in the trials of the pious. b. The trilogy of Solomon. a. The foundation and regulation of the natural and moral world in th« wisdom of God. Pi-overbs of Solomon. §. The vanity of the world in the folly of human designs, which do not recognize the eternity, in tiie divine element. Ecelesiaste?. y. The transfiguration of the world through love (as the Old Testament church was turned away from Solomon and his polygamy and mixed religion, to its New Testament friend). 4) The prophetic images or representations of the New Testament in the Old. a. The four great prophets, or the fundamental relations of the Messianio prophecy. 1. Isaiah. The personal Christ as prophet, priest, and king. The Apocalypse of Isaiah (ch. xl.-lxvi.). 2. Jeremiah. The prophetic Messianic kingdom (ch. xxx.-xxxiii.). The prophetic Martyrdom. The Apocalypse of Jeremiah (ch. xlv.-li.). The Lamentations. .1. Ezekiel. The priestly Messianic kingdom. The Apocalypse of Ezekiel. The death-valley of Israel, and that of Gog. The glorious life of Israel. The new temple, and the living stream issuing from it for the heathen world. 4 Daniel, Throughout Apocalyptic. The royal Messianic kingdom. The world-monarchies in the light side (ch. ii.), and in the dark side (ch. viL), Christ and the typical and final Antichrist. This and the other world. i. The twelve minor prophets, or the special relations of the future of the Messianic kingdom. 1, The portal of the prophetic period. The book of Jonah, or the raising of the universalisni above the particularism. i. The oppositions of the old sins and the new salvation. a. Hosea, or the marriage covenant broken by the people, and the new marriage between .Jehovah and his people. /S. Joel. The locust-march as an image of the march of the hosts of the Lord for the destruction of all the glory of flesh. The new blossoming of the world through the outpouring of the Spirit of God 68 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. y. Amos. The completed sins and the completed punishment upon tht old world, even upon the glory of the old temple, and the redemption and collecting of all the remnants fiom the Heathen and Jews, into the plain tabernacle of David. S. Micah. The judgment of God upon the mountains, and all the high places and things of the earth, and the appearance of the new Savioui and salvation out of little Bethlehem, for the exaltation of the lowly. 3. The visions of judgments. a. Obadiah. The judgment upon Edom — as the type of Antichrist — filled with envious joy over his fallen brother. yS. Nahum. The judgment upon Nineveh as the type of the fleshly Anti christ, the apostate world-power. ■y. Habakkuk. The judgment upon Babylon, as the type of the demoniac, self-deifying Antichrist. 8. Zephaniah. The day of anger upon the whole old world. The judg- ment of Judah, introducing the dawn of salvation. 1. The three prophets of the second temple, as the clearest revealers of the advent of the Messiah. o, Haggai. The glory of the second temple in contrast with that of the first. The coming of the Lord to his temple. The polluted people. The necessity for purification. p. Zechariah. The future of the Messiah in contrast with the duration of the world-kingdoms. 1. The Messianic kingdom in opposition to the kingdom of the world (ch. i.-viii. 2). The Messiah in his progress from his humiliation to his exaltation, ch. ix.-xiv. y. Malachi. The coming day of the Lord. The forerunner of the Mes- siah. The Messiah. His day a fiery oven for the godless. A sun of righteousness for the pious. The turning of Fathers to the Children, of Children to the Fathers ; the connection between the Old and New Covenant. APPENDIX. THE OLD TESTAMENT APOCRYPHA. 1) In relation to the canonical books of the Old Testament. Additions to the books of Chronicles : the book Judith, Tobiah, Baruch, the prayer of iNIanasseh. Additions to the book of Esther. Additions to the writings of Solomon: the wisdom of Solomon. Additions to .Toroniiali : the book Baruch. Additions to Daniel: history of Susannah, of the Bel at Babylon, of the Dra- gon at Babylon, the prayer of Azariah, the song of the three men in the furnace. Viewed as original writings through the claims of the Septuagint: the books of Maccab('(^<^, the wisdom of .Tesus Sirach. 2) In the opposition of Hebraism and Aicxaiidrianism. Hebraic : Judith. Hellenistic : Tlie wisdom of Solomon. The book Tobiah. The 2d book of Maccabees Jesua Sirach. APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 6il The 1st book of Maccabees. Additions to Esther. Additions to Daniel. Additions to the prayer of Manasseh. 8) In the division : historical books, didactic books, prophetic books. a. Historical books : the books of Maccabees. h. Poetical or didactic books : the book Judith, wisdom of Solomon, Tobiah, Jesus Sirach. Additions to Esther, to Daniel, the prayer of Manasseh. c. Prophetic books : elementary parts of Tobiah, the book Baruch. There was a complete disappearance of prophecy until its last point, John the Baptist. The repression of Messianic hopes was due to the eminence of the Macca- bean house of the tribe of Levi, in consequence of which the expectation of a Messiah out of the tribe of Judah was only a secret hope of the pious in the land. See the timid clause 1 Mace. xiv. 41. Compare the Introduction to the Old Testament, by Kichtib, LiBco, Gkelach, in the Calwer Handbook. FIFTH DIVISION. AN APPENDIX ON THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT, AS THE CEN TEAL POINTS OF THE GLORY OF THE OLD TES- TAMENT RELIGION* To the paragraph Archaeology (see § 14). The so-called difficulties in the Old Testament have been brought out with special distinctness in modern times by the Freethinkers and kindred opposers of the doctrine of revelation : these, namely, the acquisition of the Egyptian jewels, Balaam's ass, and the arresting of the sun by Joshua. Although the most renowned attacks upon these and similar places bear upon their face the character, partly of careless malevolence, partly of childish absurdity, still it cannot be denied that these difficulties lie as hindrances in the way of faith, to many cultivated persons, and even to many honest and scientific thinkers of our day. But these honest sceptics find themselves in a truly critical position. For, while on one side they are driven over into unbelief by hypercritics and witlings, there is offered them from the other side the helping hand of an apologetic exegesis which has created in many cases the very misconceptions from which it would free doubting spirits. Thus, on the one side, stand the sceptical investigator of nature, who brings the nebulie of the heavens and the strata of the earth as witnesses for the boundless antiquity of the world, in order that he may charge the Bible, even in its first line, with error in its computation of time ; the pan. theistic worldling, who finds in the human-like tongue of the biblical God the characteristic mark of childish tradition ; the deistic moralist, who, in the history of ths marriages of the patriarchs, and in the supposed robbery of the Egyptian treasures Kt the command of God, detects with boasting the original conflict of the Bible with * Taken from the dullior's article in *he German Journal for Christian Science and Chrlatiau Life for 1857. 70 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. pure morals; the infidel, who from of old has always taken his most cheerful ride upoc Balaam's ass; the swaggering skirmisher, who uses the arresting of the sun by Joshua in order that he may put the host of the Lord to flight. But, on the other side, the apologetic exegesis seeks in nearly all cases to rescue the assaulted positions only by the most modest defensive, while it brings into view now the incorrect exegetical understanding of the word, then the figurative allegorical expressions of the writer, then the natural side of the extraordinary events, and lastly the wonderful power ot God. It cannot be denied indeed that in this way very important aid has been gained to the clearing and justification of the Old Testament text. But neither can it be denied that these isolated processes leave the difficulties in their totality esser*ially un^ removed, while in many ways they contribute to them, and confirm them. We are very far from demanding that the Apologetics in this field should make the darkest secrets unobjectionable to the unbeliever, or plain and comprehensible to the sceptic. The oflfence of the cross of Christ will have its eternal significance for the ungodly world, even in these questionable places. But this isolated, disconnected method of defence can never bring into clear view, that it is the divine understanding of revelation itself which brings forward these very facts, at which the human understanding in its worldly direction must take ofience. The generic, that which is common in all these difficulties, and the divine reason and wisdom which appear distinctly in them — in a word, the positive glory of revelation is not sufficiently insisted upon. The studied way in which they (the apologists) only defend, but do not glorify them as the great proof of the work of God, the hurried joy with which they pass from them, the em- barrassment with which they gladly avoid the dark riddles, in that they rest in general upon the almighty miraculous strength of God, neither meets the necessities of inquir- iig spirits, nor the requirements of faith in the church, nor the necessities of knowledge .11 theology. It is only when the central point of the ofience at the Old Testament in our day, has been proved to be the central point of the glory of the Old Testament revelation, that we can satisfy the honest doubt, or the very end of the Old Testament. A glance at the most considerable difficulties in the New Testament will illustrate what has been said. Here truly we meet, first of all, the mir.acles of Christ, his super- natural birth, his resurrection, in a word the chief facts of his life, and the doctrines connected with them of his deity, the trinity, the atonement, and his coming to judg- ment, i. e., all the great mysteries which appear to the sceptic as pre-eminently an ofience and foolishness. The old apologists have limited themselves here generally to a discursive defence; they have taken refuge even here on one side in evasions and mere attempts to invalidate objections, and on the other side in the direct support of God, and for the most part passed as rapidly as possible, and at any price, by the great riddles which they should have solved. But the modern churchly theology has long since risen above this miserable defensive. It brings out the mysteries and those things full of mystery, at which men stumble, as the very heart of the history and doctrine of Christ; it shows that the very glory of the New Testament reveals itself in them. The same must be altogether true of the difficulties of the Old Testament. Bj how much more remarkable the phenomenon, darker the riddle, stronger the objection, by 80 much greater must be the significance of the fact in question, so much richei its revealed contents, so much more glorious its divine fulness of the spirit. The difficulties in the Old Testament are the central points of the glory of the Old Testament religion. Each difficulty marks a peculiar rejection of false heather APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 71 views of the world, through the very point of the difficulty, in which the true revealed view of the world is discloaed. We will endeavor, from this point of view, to sketch tliL- chief elements in the development of the Old Testament religion. The Account of the Creation. The Records of the pure idea of the Creation, of the pure idea of God, of the ideas of Nature and the World in opposition to the heathen view of the World, especially to the Theo gonislK, Cosmogonistic, Deistic, Naturalistic, Pantheistic, and Dualistic Assumptions (Gen. i.). The Pantheist takes offence here, because the record speaks of an eternally present God, and, over against the same, of a temporal world which the eternal God has called into being through his word ; the dualist stumbles at the assumption that even matter itself, the original substance of the world, has sprung from the creative power of God ; the deist, on the contrary, finds in the assumption that God, after the days' works were completed, had then rested, a childish dream, which ignores the idea of omnipotence ; the naturalist believes that with the co-working of omnipotence from moment to moment the idea of the natural orderly development of things is destroyed ; philosophy generally thinks that it is here dealing with a myth, which ia arranged partly through its orthodox positiveness, and partly through its sensuous pictures or images ; the modern sceptical natural philosoper makes it a matter of ridicule that the sun, moon, and stars should first be formed in the fourth creative day, and indeed that the whole universe is viewed as rendering a service to this little world ; that the heavenly light should have existed before the heavenly lights, but esjsecially that the original world should have arisen only 6000 years ago, and that its present form, for which millions of years are requisite, should have been attained in the brief period of six ordinary days. But the opponents who diffier most widely agree in this, that it is fabulous, that the Bible should make a perfectly accurate report of pre-historical things, with the most perfect assurance. We shall not enumerate the insufficient replies made from the stand-point of the earlier apologetics. It is worthy of remark, however, that the theology of the schools has here occasioned a circle of misconceptions, which the latest theology of the church has in great measure removed. The deciding word as to this first doctrinal portion of the Holy Scriptures has already been uttered long since in the epistle to the Hebrews. By faith we under- stand that the world was made (prepared) by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.* The record of creation is therefore a record of the very first act of faith, and then of the very first act of rev- elation, which, as such, lies at the foundation of all the following, and in its result reproduces itself in the region of faith, from the beginning on to the end of days. It is the monotheistic Christian creative word, the special watchword of the pure believ- ing view of the world. Ex ungue leonem. The first leaf of scripture goes at a single step across the great abyss of materialism into which the entire heathen view of he world had fallen, and which no philosophic system has known how to avoid, until * When Delitzech (Gen. p. 42) opposes to the view of Kurtz, that the account of the creation is the result of a circl< ftl visions, looking bacliwards, the assertion, that it is an liistorical tradition, flowing from divine instruction, Ihc qnet- tii.li ?till remains open, by what means that instruction was made available to man. We, with Delitwch, are her« •ppoeed to the vision. For in the vision there is a voluntary subjective state, wishing to see, when there should b« ■>nl7 a 8ubje«tivity oi possibility of sight. 72 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. perfected by this. Pantheism here meets its refutation in the word of the eternal personal God of creation, and the world established by his almighty word ; abstract ..heisra, in the production of the world out of the living word of God; dualism, in the doctrine that God has created matter itself; naturalism, in the clear evidence of the positive divine foundation of the world, in the origin of every new step in nature With the pure idea of God, we win at the same time the pure idea of the world, and with the pure idea of creation, the pure idea of nature. Creation goes through all nature, in so far as God, from one step in nature to another, ever produces in a crea- tive way the new and higher; at last man, after his bodily organic manifestation. On the other hand also the idea of nature runs through the whole idea of creation, in so far as God has endowed every creative principle which he has placed in the world with its own law of development, and with a conditioned independence ; to plants, to animals, and to man. The creation reaches its perfection and glory in the human spir- ituality, since in this it approaches or is a revelation of the divine life ; in his freedom nature is glorified, since its relative independence is here laised to the free blessed life of men in God. Just as the biblical idea of God is free from the heathen element of a passive deity, who suifers the world to flow out from himself, so the biblical idea of the world is free from the heathen assumption that the world is some magical transforma- tion of existing material, or even of a positive nonentity. And as the biblical idea of creation will not tolerate the absolutist's assumption of an abstract deified omnipo- tence, which neither limits nor communicates itself, so the biblical idea of nature cannot be reconciled with the naturalistic assumption, which derives all the forms in nature out of one general creative act, and holds that one step in nature produces another. We will not dwell upon the objections which the most illustrious and popular natural philosophers have raised against the work of the fourth creative day. That the light was before the light-bearers; that the appearance of the firmament to the earth was first manifested in the same day in which the earth was discovered to the firmament; that for man, from his stand-point, the eartli foruicd an inijiortant contrast with the vastness of the heavens ; this does not require many words. But the day- works and the age of the world? The Mosaic computation, it is said, allows about 6000 years for the history of man. For the entire universe there is then the higher antiquity of — an added week — -the six creative days. But these six days, the most recent scientific churchly exegesis * says, are symbolical days, i. e., six periods of the development of creation. The evenings, it is said further, mark the epochs of destruction, the revolutions of the world in its progress; on the other hand, the mornings mark the epochs of the new and higher structure of the world. The fact that, in the Hebrew designation, day often denotes a period of time, and that these days are here spoken of before the cosmical organization of the world into the planetary system, favors this view. To this we must add the prophetic biblical style of the nar- rative. Bearing this in mind, the defender of the pure sense of scripture can hear these natural philosophers speak of the thousands and millions of years of the earth's development with a serene smile, as an investigator of the Bible, n.amely : but whether B8 an investigator of nature is another question. For the recent natural philosophy ap • Baumgarten ludeei] atill holde ..o the ordinary dayn (Cora, upon the Pentateuch L 14). "The word day (cVl It primarily day and not period, and here thieword iH uai-d for the lirnt time." But we say that juet for this ver^ leaflon th<; word day must here deaignatc a period. Tlie ordinary day of the earth is not the original form of tile day, tjot llie day of God, the day of heaven. Thus even the liglil prccedeH the iight-bearers. Uow endleeely diversitiect tre the dayH in the universe I But the original form is the day of Qod. Compare also Dblitzsoh, GentsiSf p. 61.- But also Keil, in his Commentary uimn Oeneaia. — A. U.J AFPENDIX- THE So-GALLED DIFFICDLT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 73 pears extremely rash in surrounding itself with its millions of years, not in the spirit of nature, nor in accordance with its formation. The defender of the biblical text, as the friend of nature, may be allowed the word : We grant you wiUingly your thou sands of years for the formation of the earth and the world. But betliink yourselves well. According to the laws of present nature, it develops itself very rapidly in all the first effusions and stages of its life ; on the contrary, you require for the first glow ing seeds of life and living structures an endlessly slow lapse of time. In nature we see all subordinate things arise and disappear quickly ; jou require ffions for the first rudest fundamental forms of creation. If the spirit of scripture absolve you in this lavish use of millions of years for the cooling of the globes of gas, and the formation of primitive monsters, ask yourselves whether the spirit of nature will grant you absolution! But, from the records of creation, you can learn that nature rests upon the prin ciples of creation, unfolds itself in living contrasts, completes itself in ascending lines, and is glorified in man and his divine destination, i. «., in other words, that nature springs out from the miracle, through miraculous stages (new principles of creation), ascends from step to step, and in the miracle of the perfect image of God reaches its new birth. U. Paradise, or the Records of the original ideal state of the Earth and the Human Race. (Gen. h.^ Paradise, it is said, is a beautiful myth, growing out of mythical ideas of the earth which the oldest geographers entertained. Thus also the tree of knowledge of good and evil, the tree of life, and the serpent are regarded as mythical traditions. Thus the great theocratic element, which lies in the account of Paradise, is entirely lost. Of the first great historical type we have only left a fantastic philosophic hypothesis concerning the commencement of the race, and the origin of evil. The theology of the schools, which views the account of Paradise not only as throughout historical, but as barely historical, in opposition to its symbolical import, has here pre-eminently prepared the way for misconceptions and misinteri)retation. As the fourth stream of Paradise, the Euphrates and its source cannot be a myth, so neither can the four streams generally. And as the first man is not a myth, so neither is his first residence. But on the other side also the streams and trees of Paradise are just as little to be regarded as barely natural, or belonging to the nat- ural history of Paradise, or the mere individual forms, particularities, of the pre-histor- ical world. The significance of Paradise is this, that it declares the original ideal state of the earth and the human race, the unity of the particular and the general, the unity of spirit and nature, the unity of spiritual innocence and the physical harmony of nature, the unity of the fall and the disturbance of nature — lastly, the unity of facts and their symbolical meaning, which both the barely literal and mythical explanations of the record rend asunder. There was a paradise and it was local, but it was also the symbol of the idea] paradisiac earth. The same thing is true of the fom- streams. Whether the origi- nal source of the four streams is not marked by the stream in the midst of the garden may be lefl undecided; it is enough that it was actually one, and at the same lime the symbol of aU the fountains of blessing upon the earth. Whether the tree if fife was one physical plant, or rather the glorification of nature, with the definite 74 IXTRODUCTIOX TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. form of tlie manifestation of God in the garden, is a matter of question ; as a symbo it designates the total healing and living strength of nature under the revelation of the Spirit. The tree placed as a test of obedience existed in some one form, but with it all nature is in some measure designated as a test. But the serpent as a tempter of the other world is not only the type of temptation and of sin, but, as a primitive reptile, the type of its brutality, its degradation, and its subjection. A> iliL- ;icconnt of the creation declares the opposition and harmony between God uiiil the world, so the account of Paradise declares the opposition and the harmony bet weun the spirit and nature. Here you have the connection between the actual primitive man and tilt' ideal ni:in. hotween man and the earth, between the fact and the idea : the consecrated bodily nature, tlie consecrated senses, the consecrated, indeed sacramental, pleasure, and on the other side human talent, freedom, and responsibility. Break this golden band between spirit and nature, between the actual fact and the symbol, and you fall back into that old accursed opposition between spiritualism and materialism, which burdened the heathen world and will run through all your moral ascetic and philosophic ideas as a fatal clefl. nL Tfie First Human Pair : the Records of the ideal and actual Unity of the Human Race, and of the male and female Nature in the true Marriage (Gen. ii.). With a stroke or two of the pen, the biblical view of the world places itself abov«3 the aboriginal doctrines of every heathen people, and all national pride and haughti- ness, with the barbarism and hatred which are connected with it. In a few lines it records the equality by birth of the male and female sexes, the mystical iiature of true marriage, the sanctity of the married and domestic life, and condemns the hea- then degradation of woman, the sexual lawles.sness or lust, as also the theosophic and monkish contempt of the sexual nature. Weighed in this balance, Aristotle, Gregory VII. and Jacob Boelim have been found wanting. Strauss asserts that the generic varieties of the human race, as the foundation of the old aboriginal traditions, has now become anew the common doctrine of the natural philosopher, and philosophy. Then it would follow that Blumenbach, Cuvier, Shubert, Karl Von Raumer, John MuUer (the anatomist), and Alexander Von Humboldt, who Lave taught the generic unity of the human race, are not natural philosophers. rv. 7%e Full and Judpment, or the Records of the historical as opposed to the ideal and natural charactcf of the Sin of tlie Creature, of the Holiness of the Divine Judgment, and of the connection and oppo- aition between Sin and Evil (Gen. iii.). The record of the actual fall stands there as an eternal judgment upon the tlie- oretical fall, the human view of moral evil, especially upon the errors of Dualism and Manicheism, Pelagianism and Pantheism. This explains the numerous and strong objections which the nio.st diverse systems in old and modern times have raised against this record. The earthly origin of evil out of the abuse of freedom offends Dualism, which derives it from an evil leity, from dark matter, or from the suprem APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICrLT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 78 acy of sense. Although the serpent sustains the doctrine that, prior to the fall ol man, siu had existed in a sphere on the other side, working through demoniac agencj upon this (for the serpent was not created evil, Gen. i. 25, generally not even fitted for evil, and can only be regarded therefore as the organ of a far different evil power), yet the visible picture of the fall in this sphere, is a certain sign that the fall in that could only have risen through the abuse of the freedom of the creature. But, if wi observe the progress of sin from the first sin of Eve to the fratricide of Cain; if we view the opposition between Cain and Abel, and the intimation of the moral freedom of Cain himself, so the Augustini.an view, raising original sin to absolute original death, receives its illumination and its just limits. But how every Pelagian view of life falls before this record, as it brings into prominence the causal connection between the sin of the spirit world and that of man, between the sin of the woman and the man, between the sin of our first parents and their own sinfulness and the sinfulness of their posterity ! If we take into view the stages of the development of evil In the genesis of the first sin, how limited and vapid appears the modern view, which re- gards the senses as the prime starting point of evil ! But when Pantheism asserts the necessity of sin, or rather of the fall, as the necessary transition of men from the state of pure innocence to that of conscious freedom, the simple remark, that the ingenuousness of Adam would have been carried directly on in the proper way, if he had stood the test, just as Christ through his sinlessness has reached the knowl- edge of the true distinction between good and evil, and has actually shown that sin, notwithstanding its inweaving with human nature, does not belong to its very being, clearly refutes the assertion. But how clear is the explanation of evil, of punish- ment and of judgment, as it meets us in this account. That the natural evil does not belong to the moral, but, notwithstanding its inward connection with it, is still the divine counteracting force against it ; that punishment is to redeem and purify ; that from the very acme of the judgment breaks forth the promise and salvation ; these truths, which are far above every high anti-christian view of the world, make it apparent that the first judgment of God, as a type of the world-redeeming judgment of God. has found its completion in the death of Christ upon the cross. The Macrobioi, or the long-lived Fathers and Enoch, or the Revelation of the Difference between the ideal and historical Human Death. The long lives of the Fathers, the years of Methuselah, the translation of Enoch. are difficult riddles to the ordinary worldly view, which recognizes no distinction between the ideal death (i. e., the original form, resembling a metamorphism, of the transition from the first to the second human life), and the historical death. But this difference is here clearly made known in these facts. Originally, there was grant- ed to man a form of transition from the first to the second life, which is closed through the historical death, until it appears again in the glorification of the risen Christ and the declaration of the Apostles (l Cor. xv. ; 2 Cor. v.). With sin the historical death makes its inroads upon humanity. But it can only, slowly creeping from within outward, break through the strong resistance of the original physical human nature ; hence the long lives of the primitive fathers. Here the spiritual power of death has first gradually penetrated the physical nature ; this is the sig 7fi INTRODCJCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. nificance of the long lives of the antediluvians. The spiritual power of the life of Chiist, as it runs parallel with the old death in its progress from within outward, will at the last permeate the physical nature again ; and then will the long lives appear again. But, as the last Macrobioi shall attain the original form of the ideal death, the trans- lation, so in an exceptive way Enoch through his piety obtained it of old. Therefore he stands also as the citadel of immortality, of the victory over death, and of the ideal form of translation, in the midst of the death periods of the primitive fathers; in him- self alone a suflBcient voucher, that the Old Testament in its very first pages la stamped with these ideas. In these leaves also we possess the records of that idea of death by which the faith of revelation strides victoriously away from all the ordinary ideas of death 11 ancient or modern times. TL The Flood, and the Arl\ or the Glorification of all the great Judgments of God upon the World ; and of all the counter-working fonna of Salvation, aa they begin with the Ark and are comple ted in the Church (Gen. vL-viii.). The great water-flood is established, through the concurrent testimony of ancient people, as the great event of traditionary antiquity. But the deluge and the ark ! Let it be observed here, however, that just as the idea of punishment explains the undeniably existing natural evil, so the light of the deluge illuminates the wild waves of the great water-flood. And just as out of the first curse sprang the blessing of the promise, so salvation, the saving ark, was borne upon the waves of the first final judgment. In this light the deluge is the great type of all the judgments of God upon the earth, and therefore especially of baptism, which introduces the Christian into the communion of the completed redeeming judgment of God, the death of Christ upon the cross. The first general world judgment was introduced through the universal dominion, and the unshaken establishment, of human corruption. But this was brought about through the ungodly marriages, the misalliances between the sons of God and the daughters of men, i. e., the posterity of Seth and of Cain. It is evident, indeed, that the Alexandrian Exegesis and that of the earliest Church Fathers have introduced the difiiculty into the text, that the sons of God were angels. Kurtz still asserts that theBni Elohim are elsewhere only used of angels. But if the vicegerents of God on the earth (Ps. Ixxxii. 6) are called Elohim, and Bni Eljon, they may even much more be called Bni Elohim, in a position in which they should have defended the di- vine upon the earth, but ratlier betrayed it. The connection, according to which the fourth chapter treats of the descendants of Cain, and the fifth of those of Seth, author- izes us to expect that here both genealogies are united. After the history has shown how the curse of sin has spread itself with the human arts, in the line of Cain namely, even polygamy and murder glorified through the abuse of poetry, how on the contrary the blessing of the Lord advanced for a long time in the line ©f Seth, and with it the hope of redemption, it now shows how, through the misalliances referred to, the corruption became not only prevalent but giant-like and incurable. These false unions, based upon a principle of apostasy, .and which made evident the profound connection between idolatry and whoredom, produced a race of spiritual bastards, who turned tlie very spirituality inherited from their fathers int( APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. TJ Bin. To look away from the fabulous in the assumption of a marriage connection be- tween angels and men, it is inconceivable that the deception of the daughters of men through heavenly .angelic forms, should be stated .as a phenomenon of obduracy, and a cause of the flood. Here also the idea of apostasy, the yielding of the kingdom of God to the ungodly world, .and the judgment springing therefrom, was intro- duced in the first gre.at historical type ; a significant portent, for the history of Israel aa for the history of the Christian Church, to the end of the world. But that, in the very moment of the breaking forth of the judgment upon the world, .an election from all creatures should enter into the ark, furnishes an example of the fact, that with the election of humanity a pure kernel of the creature world should be carried through the last final judgment, into a higher order of things. It should be observed by th( way, that the three birds, the raven and two doves, must be regarded as the symbols of the three diiferent exodes from the external church, so soon as we view the ark itself as the symbol of the church of salvation. This significance is not far-fetched In the Roman Catholic view only ravens flee from the Church, in the assurance of antichristian spirits only doves, or the children of the Spirit. VU. TKe Tower of Babel, the Confusion of Tongues, and the Teleology of Heathenism (Gen. xi.). The monotonous Augustinian view of the hereditary relations of humanity finds already its correction in the opposition between Cain and Abel, and still more in that between the line of Seth and the line of Cain. We see, indeed, how de.ath reigns through sin, in the line of Seth, and how at last corruption, working in the ine of Cain, brought it to destruction. While, however, the typical saviour of the race and of the earth, Noah, came from the line of Seth, and out of its ruins, and while before him there was opposed only a line of blessing and of the curse (both moreover only in a relative degree), there is formed in the sons of Noah a threefold spiritual genealogy : the line of the curse, of which Ham or more definitely Canaan is the representative, stands opposed not only to a genealogy of divine blessing in Shem, but also of worldly blessings in Japheth. Still, both are girt around by the circle of sin and death. And as in the primitive race the earliest development appears in the line of Cain, so now in the new race in the line of Ham. Nimrod founds the old Babylonian kingdom. But the people assemble at Babel in order to found, in the tower reaching to heaven, the symbol of an all-embracing human world mon archy.* Beauty, lust, anarchy, brought the first race to destruction ; an enthusiastic civili- zation, lust of empire, glory, desire for display, and despotism threaten to destroy the second. And now Shem and Japheth are in danger of losing their blessing in the earliest development of the power of Ham, in the Hamitic phantom of human glory. Hence the dispersion of the people, which as truly springs out of the deep spiritual errors of the people, as it was positively sent from .above. Now Shem and Japheth could each in their own direction cultivate the blessing of spiritu.al piety which waa * Delitzsch says of Nimrod (p. 223). " through his name "11533 (from "ms, to rise up, ilisturb), he represents th< revotntion, ia his dominion the despotism. These two extremes, the monarchical stafe has never bt-en able Ic remove, from its impure beginning onwnrds." What he i-iiye, however, ;uailB only in its fall sense of the gret' vorld monarshies 1Q INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. their inheritance. And even within the race of Ham the curse of impiety was inter rupted through the mutual relations and influence in which it was placed with Shem and Japheth. Scattered around the tower, the people spread themselves into the world, according to their peculiarities, after the outline of the table (Gen. x.). The great value of this table has been recognized again in recent times. But this also must be kept in view, that in the dispersion of the people we have revealed the pecu- liar teleology of heathenism. It has a prevailingly admonitory, and yet preserving character. The people should not lose their peculiar character under the despotism of imperial uniformity. They should develop themselves according to all their peculiarities, in their different languages. Above all, the way was prepared for the development of Shem. vm. The Separation of Abraham, and of the Israelitish People in him ; the Teleology of Judaism (Gen. zii. ff )^ The mere worldly culture, down to the most recent times, has found great difficulty mth the biblical doctrine that God had chosen Abraham from among the people, and in him chosen the people of Israel to be an elect people, above all the most cultivated nations. Critics, who usually find no diificulties in the diversities of the nations, and praise beyond measure the peculiar prerogatives of the Greeks and Romans, will not see in these facts, that Israel was in Abraham the chosen people, in a religious point of view. But even here historical facts correspond to the divine purpose, and bear practical testimony to it. Israel has realized the blessing of its peculiar religious disposition in its revealed religion. But in this blessing the good pleasure of God to Abraham and his seed has been made known. The later Jews have indeed preverted their election into the caricature of phar- isaic particularism. And, in many cases, unbelief and doubt have been contending with this caricature, while they supposed that they were contending with the scripture doctrine itself But the word of the scripture runs thus : " In thee (Abraham) and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." (Ch. xii. 6.) That this pas- sage does not say : " In thee shall all the nations of the earth bless themselves, or wish themselves blessed," is evident from the preceding words : " I will bless them, that bless thee" (Ch. xii. 3 *). This then is the teleology of Judaism. As the heathen are scattered into all the world, in order, through their peculiar forms of culture, to prepare the vessels for the salvation of the Lord in Israel, so Isi-ael is separated from among the nations, to be a peculiar people of faith, in order to become the organ of salvation for all nations. IX. Jlu Offering of Itaac, or the Sanctifieatiou of the laraelitiah Sacrifice, and the Rejection of the Abomina- tion of the Heathen. We have here the most striking instance, in which the orthodox school theology, through its insufficient, narrow, literal explanation, has brought into the Bible difficul- ties at which even the noblest spirits have stumbled. The actual liislory of the offering of Isaac forms the peculiar stalling point of the Israelitish religion, the glorious portal of the theocracy, the division between the sanctified Jewisii sncritices •The hef> rejeeftfl explanation may ccrtai'ily be recnived where the Uitbpael of T^S i^t UMt^d. (Cb. \\\.. Jg uvi. 4.) APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IX THE OLD TESTAMENT. 71, in their nature Messianic, and fulfilled in the atoning death of Christ, and the abomination of the human sacrificial worship of the heathen. What has tht school theology made of this glorious history, the type of the whole Old Testament cultus? It has changed this in the highest sense isolated pecuUar remarkable fact, into a dark aud frightful riddle, which indeed appears like the heathen sacrifices, and through which already more than one has been betrayed into the path of fanatical sacri fices. The author here refers to the exegetical treatise of Hengstenbeig, who has the merit of establishing the correct interpretation of this passage in his explanation of Jephthah's vow.* Hengstenberg has in our view proved clearly that Jephthah did not kill his daughter, when he sacrificed her to the Lord, but devoted her entirely, under the usual consecration of a sacrifice, to perpetual temple service as a virgin, and he illustrates his method of proof through a reference to the sacrifice of Isaac.f The special proof lies in a reference to the fact, that the Hebrew cultus distinguishes between the spiritual consecration of man as a sacrifice, and the killing of a beast rep- resenting it. Thus, c. g., according to 1 Sam. i. 24, 25, the boy Samuel was brought by his parents to Eli tlie priest, and consecrated at the tabernacle, since the three bullocks were slain there as burnt offerings. The special grounds for the correct understanding of the sacrifice of Isaac are these : the root of the sacrifice, as to its nature, is the concession of the human will to the will of God (Ps. xl. 7-9) ; tallen man cannot make this pure concession, therefore he represents it in a symbolical and typical way in the outward sacrifice. He brings at first to the deity fruits ana animals. But a vague feeling assures him that Jehovah has claims upon the life of man itself Meanwhile, however, he has lost the spiritual idea of sacrifice. The no- tion of sacrifice, or consecration, has become one to him with that of to slay and burn. Hence he falls upon the literal human sacrifice which he must offer the deity as a personal substitute. But the Old Testament rejects this literal human sacrifice throughout as an abomination. The Canaanites were punished especially for this •abomination. This is not, as Ghillany thinks, that they themselves were offered to God as human sacrifices, as a punishment, because they had slain human sacrifices. The devotion of such idolaters to the curse and destruction, proves that the human sacrifice was the greatest abomination. Thus also the law treats this heathen cor- ruption. But this corruption is thus unquestionably great, because it is the demoniac distortion of that thought of light, that God requires the sacrifice of the human heart, and in default of this the spiritual sacrifice of the substituted life of the atoning priest, or of the first-born in Israel, at last the absolute atonement of the con- cession of a pure man for sinful humanity. Hence this thought of light must be rescued from its distortion, and through the sacred care for its fulfilment, be pre- served. The sacrifice of Isaac was destined to this end. God commanded Abraham: " Sacrifice to me thy son." Abraham, as to the kernel of his faith, is the first Israel- ite, but, as to his inherited religious ideas, he is still a heathen Chaldee, who knowa nothing else than that to offer, is to slay. But as he already, by his germ of faith, has distinguished the spiritual sacrifice from the abomination of the heathen, so in the critical moment he received the second revelation, which enlarges the first, sine* * HENOSTEKBEiia : Beitrdge, 3d vol. The moral and religioas life of the period of the :indge9, especially 02 j Jpb thah'B vow, p. 127 fif. t Delitzsch follows the traditionary view of the schools, and is not Inclined to fall ir with the modern cliurcMj •o»re^ti'-o of that view (p. 300). The objection of Kurtz is answered in the places quoted below 80 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. it prohibits the bodily killing of his son, with the declaration that he had already completed his spiritual sacrifice (Ch. xxii, 12). Nothing remains for him now, to meet his fullest religious necessities, than that he should enlarge and complete sym- bolically the spiritual sacrifice of his son through the coi'poreal sacrifice of the ram which the foresight of God had provided at hand {without commanding him to take its life). Now, the distinction and connection between the ideas of to sacrifice and to kill, which forms the peculiar consecration of the Israelitish sacrificial death, is m.ide perfect. In this sense the human sacrifice of Abraham runs through the whole Israelitish economy, down to the New Testament (Luke ii. 23, 24). And the distinc- tion between the holy saci-ifice of the people of God, and the sacrificial abominations of the heathen, is completed. In the crucifixion, these two sacrifices outwardly come together, while really and spiritually they are separated as widely as heaven and hell. Christ yields himself in perfect obedience to the will of the Father, in the judgment of the world. That is the fulfilling of the Israelitish sacrifice. Caiaphas will suffer the innocent to die for the good of the people (John xi. 50). and even Pilate yields him to the will of men (Luke xxiii. 25) ; this is the completion of the Moloch- sacrifice.* X. The Sexual Difficulties in the History of the Patriarchs, as they arise out of the Israelitish striving after the true ideal Marriage, and after the consecrated Theocratic Birth; in Revolt against the cruel service of Lust, and the unsanctified Sexual Unions and Conceptions in the Heathen World. In criticizing the known sexual difficulties also, it is the Israelitish rejection again of the heathen nature, on which one sits in judgment, with the modern view in- woven still with that of the heathen. But here the Apologists believe that they have fully met the demands of the case, when they remark, that we must not measure the life of the ancient saints by the standard of Christian morals. But that the germina- ting .-ieeds of the Christian ideal life and morals occasion these very difficulties, that we are thus here also dealing with the phenomena of Old Testament glory (which stands indeed far below the spiritual glory of the New Testament), this is evident from the very contrasts in which these facts are brought before us. The spirit of the Old Testament places the natural sexual desire in opposition to the unnatural ; the object of the sexual desire, procreation, in opposition to the pas sion for its own sake ; the true marriage — based upon the mind's choice, to the com- mon or even barely external union of the sexes ; the consecrated holy birth, in oppo- sition to the birth or conception " after the will of the flesh." In other words, it seeks the true sacred marriage, perfected indeed through its destination, the conception of the consecrated child of promise. It sanctifies the traditional marriage through the true sacred character of the higher union of soul, and the sexual desire through spiritual and conjugal consecration. Thus tlie espousal of Hagar into the life of Abraham, which indeed Sarah, the wife of Abraham, suggests, is explained by the unlimited desire for the heir promised by Jehovah. The fruitless marriage falls into an ideal error which is far above fiiithless- aess or lust, subordinated to the end of the union of the sexes, the attainment of the Deir. In this ethical thought we must uuderst.and the error of Sarah and Abraham. • For tho untunablencua of the ordinary view I refer to Hknostesbeho : Bdtragc ; Lahob : Poti iit Dogmalik, | 118. Compare also the Ic^iU Cattiulic Ctiurcti. p. no. APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DrFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 8> But then tlie Lord brings the true sacred marriage of Abraham with Sarah into op position with the transient sexual union of Abraliam with Hagar, when he opposes the consecrated spiritual fruit of the first union, to the wUd genial fruit of the last, Isaac to Ishmael. It is remarkable how Jacob under the dialectic form of the Israelitish principles obtains his four wives. He seeks the bride after the choice of his heart. Then was Leah put into the place of his beloved Rachel. Now he wins in Rachel bis second wife, his first peculiar elected bride. The idea of the bridal marriage leada him to his second wife. But now enters the still stronger idea of obtaining ctildren. Leah is fruitful, Rachel unfruitful, therefore she will establish her higher claims upon Jacob with the jewels of children. She imitates the example of Sarah and brings to him her own maid Bilhah. Then Leah appeals to the sense of justice in Jacob, and strengthens her side in that she enlarges it through Zilpah. The sin, the error, is here abundantly clear. But we must not overlook the tact that Jacob obtains his four wives under the impelling dialectic force of noble Israelitish motives misunder- stood. The first is the pure sacred marriage, the second the theocratic blessing of children. If now, we view the most serious difficulties, the incest of Lot with his daughters, of Judah with his daughter-in-law Tamar, we name as the first explana- tory principle element the overlooked facts, that in both cases the morally proscribed union of sexes stands opposed to the most unnatural and revolting crimes. The op- position to the sin of Lot was sodomy, which he shunned with holy horror ; in this respect he escaped the judgment, and is a saint. Thus also the act of Judah stands in opposition to the sin of his son Onan (Gen. xxxviii. 9). He was punished with death for his, even in a natural sense, abominable misdeed, just as in a similar way the people of Sodom were destroyed. But Judah and Lot live. And even in their error they defend the judgment of the Israelitish spirit over the sodomy and onanism and the like abominable lusts of the heathen world. Moreover, they were ignorant in both cases of the incest which they committed, although the one in drunkenness, and the other in the joyful exultation of the feast of shearing, fell into lewdness. But the fe- males, who in both cases knew of the incest and come into view as the chief figures, did not act from lust, but from fanatical error, under which lay the moral motive of the theocratic desire for children. Lot's daughters, after the destruction of their home, fell under the delusion that the world, at all events the theocratic race, was in danger of perishing. Tamar plainly fanatically seeks, under the noblest impulse, aa a heatheness, the house of Judah, and the promises which were given to him. Hence the unwearied perseverance with which she repeatedly, at last in the boldest form, pushes herself into this family. Finally, we may notice here still the well-known writ- ing of divorcement of Moses. According to the way in which the Romish church, or even the latest legal spirit in the evangelic church, identifies the churchly or conse- crated union of the sexes, with the perfect marriage, Moses, in the permission of divorce, comes very nearly into conflict with his own law, "Thou shalt not commit adultery." They say this law, minus the writing of divorce, constitutes marriaga The Bible on the other hand teaches that the theocratic marriage institution rests upon the seventh command, plus the ordinance for writings of divorce, under the permission of separation. That is, Moses knew a higher perfection of marriage than the barely legal and literal, and this he strove to attain, just as the whole Old Testament, with the higher spiritual marriage, strove also after a higher spiritual procreation. Under this spirit and its moral motives, the patriarchal families in succession fell into fanatical errors ; but in these errors the ethical spirit of the whole sexual life w re- Ii2 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. fleeted, which corrects the heathen disorderly sexual life, and its low view of the natort of conception. XI. 71l« Mosak System, the Giving of tte Law, the Threatening of the Curse, or the Glorification of all the Dl vine Education of Men, through the Teaching and Leading Power of the Free Religion of the Covenant. A very wide-spread prejudice, since the days of Marcion, confounds the Old Testa- ment religion of faith with the Mosaic giving of the law, and then caricatures this law-giving itself, since it regards it as a despotic or dictatorial bending of an unwilling people under absolute statutes, which were strengthened by intolerable curses which should pass over to children and cliildren's children {see Hegel: Philosophie der It& liffioH, ii. pp. 70 and 74). History and the scripture teach on the contrary: 1. that it is not the Mosaic giv- ing of the law, but the covenant of faith of Abraham with God, which is the founda- tion of the Old Testament religion (Gal. iii. 19) ; 2. the Mosaic law is not the first thing in the Mosaic system (viewing it as a stage of development of the Abrahamio religion, in its transition as a system of instruction and training to a neglected people), but the Mosaic typical redemption, the miraculous deliverance of Israel out of Egypt (Ex. XX. 2) ; 3. the Mosaic law-giving itself rests upon repeated free communication? between Jehovah and his people (Exodus xix. 8 ; xxiv. 3) ; 4. the Mosaic commands are not immediate abstract and positive statutes, but are mediate, as religious funda- mental commands, through the religious spirit, as moral, through the conscience ; 5. transgressions were not visited immediately with the curse, but so far as they were not bold and obstinate, were taken away through an atonement ; 6. to the curse which was spoken against the obstinate persistence in sin, stands opposed the super- abundant blessings which were promised to the well-behaved Israelite ; 7. the Mosaic system, with its own peculiar stages of development, proclaims its own goal, in the prophetic continuation and Messianic completion, and forms in its impelling strength the direct opposition to all laws of an absolute nature. " Moses wrote of Christ." As to the addition to the second command, which visits the misdeeds of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me (Ex. xx. 5), this threatening is opposed by the promise which extends the blessing of the pious to the thousandth of his successors. But in their violent passion over the threaten- ing, these ungracious humanists have overlooked that it is the same law of tragical connection between guilt and the curse, which the tragic poets of Greece, in a much more cruel form, have poetically glorified. Let them first come to an arrangement with the idea of the tragedists, they will then find, that even here the partially fatal- istic element of lieatlien tragedy, is laid aside, while its sad features are glorified. But the Mosaic system generally stands as the system of instruction and prepara tion for the religion of promise, as it trains an uninstructcd people to the culture of Christendom, and hence also as the glorification of all divine systems of preparatory instruction and training. XII. TTu Zff'/ptian Afiraden and Plagues, or the Typical Revelation of the Fact, that all the Visitations of God upon the Nations are for the Good of the People and Kingdom of God. Hengstenberg has shown in his thorough and learned work (Egypt and the book* APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 8> of Moses, pp. 93-129) that the Egyptian plagues and miracles are not to be regarded as absolute miraculous decrees of God, but as extraordinary divine leadings and judg- ments, conditioned and introduced through the nature of the land of Egypt. There was a natural foundation for the miracles, for the blood-red color of the Nile, the ap- pearance of the frogs, the plagues of flies, murrain, sores, the hail and thunderstorm, the locusts, the Egyptian darkness (the darkening of the air through the sandstorm), and the death of the first-born (the plague). This connection of natural events in an extraordinary succession, form, and extent, is not obscured but strengthened through their reference to the providence of Je- hovah, and the redemption of his people. Rather the dark events of the earth are explained and glorified in the idea of punishments, and the judicial punishment glori- fies itself in its purpose and goal to awaken and save. But in this form, the visitations of God upon Israel serve to bring out clearly the final end of all his judicial providence over the individual kingdoms of the world, ip their opposition to his church. XIII. 7%« Egyptian Treasuret, or the Inheritance of the Goods of this World by the Kingdom of God, at the culminating Points of the Redemption of his People. In the first place, as to the text, it does not say that the Israelites borrowed the gold and silver jewels of the Egyptians, but that they demanded or by entreaties ob- tained them.* In favor of this may be urged first the expression Schaal (istJi), which retains the same sense throughout the passage in question (Ex. iii. 22 ; xi. 2 ; xii. 35). The signification : to ask, demand, entreat, is the prevailing sense of the word. The signification : to borrow, is scarcely ever used. In the usual acceptation, indeed, the Hiphil of the word (nsibisui'i), in the sense, they lend to them, would seem to require the corresponding meaning of the Kal : they borrowed the jewels. And Baumgarten in this view calls (i. p. 473) Hengstenberg's explanation (Authentic, ii. p. 524) very arti- ficial f The word in question, in the mouth of Hannah (1 Sam. i. 28), cannot well mean : I lend him (the son prayed for) to the Lord for the whole of his life. The Hiphil, in its correspondence with the Kal, to entreat, must still mean to give richly or freely, to grant, especially to encourige the prayer. Moses, moreover, if he had been speaking of borrowing or of theft, would not have announced it so long before- h.and, as a prominent event in the freeing of the people (ch. iii. 22); and the attain- ing of the desire would scarcely be explained by the fact that the people found or should find favor in the eyes of the Egyptians (ch. iii. 21 ; xi. 3 ; xii. 36). Thus it can only be an entirely extraordinary asking which is here spoken of, and the expres- sion which records the result can consequently hardly be to steal. The term (bxj) points in its various forms rather to a strong and violent snatching than to a stealthy thefl.J And since in this case it cannot be violence which is spoken ol, so the term must express the intellectual ascendency of those who gained the inheritance, a mighty appropriation to themselves. • Compare HBKGaTEHBBRO : Authenticity of the Pentateuch, 2 vol. p. 507. t "The verb (bxiTJ), to desire, can only be in Hiphil to cause another to desire. It deslgnateB then a freely of fered gift, iu opposition to one which is given only from outward constraint, or only from shameless begging. Who- ever freely gives thereby invites the other to ask; he cannot ask too much, not enoagh indeed." This is snrely ic perfect accordance with the spirit of the language, if the Hiphil is explained according to the Kal. Baumgarten &v-i the traditionid exposition explain the Kal after an hypothetical HiphiL I Hengstenberg, p. 525 94 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. The situation itself is not in favor of lending. The first demand of Moses foi Israel was only for a brief journey into the wilderness, for the purpose of holding a feast (Ex. oh. v. 1) ; but afterward the demand increased in the same measure in which Pharaoh was hardened (ih. viii. 1 ; ix. 1 ; x. 2-t). But after the judgment upon the tirsl-born there is no need of any supposition that they would return, as indeed it had not been promised before. The Egyptians drove the Israelites out, because they, under the protection of their God, had become a terror to them. The reservation which Pharaoh could perhaps have made, he abandons immediately after- wards, since he pursues the Israelites, makes war upon them, and perishes. We pass in review the different explanations of this passage. The older, ex- tremely positive and favorite explanation, proceeds from the assumption that God suspended in that case the prohibition of theft and deceit. The Apologists do not spend much labor here in the defensive. They have a greater work ; they have the glory of this fearful moment to show, in which the despised slaves, the Jews, in the eyes of their proud oppressors, now humbled by God, pass into a people of God, or sons of God, who only need to ask, whether as a favor, or as a loan, or as a demand, for the gold and silver treasures, and they are cast before them as an acknowledg- ment of homage, a tribute of reverence and fear. Their sons and daughters are loaded and burdened with them. That Moses so long foresaw this moment marks th«> great prophet ; that Israel uses it shows not only his human prudence, but even his sacred right ; but that God brings about this result, reveals him as the protectoi of his people, who will provide for him, after his long sorrows and deprivations, the richest compensation, and at the very foundation of his kingdom appropriates with majesty the gold and silver of the world. Thus before this time Abraham had been blessed among the heathen, thus Jacob by Laban, and thus since the church of Christ, at the time of Constantine, after its victory over the Roman empire ; and in like manner the church of the middle ages, after the irruption of the barbarians. But at the end of days all the treasures of the world shall become serviceable to the kingdom of God, and civilization shall fall as an inheritance to the cultus. XTV. lioui the Prophet, and the Prophetic People of God in opposition to the Magicians of Egypt and Balaam, or the Spirit of Magic, and the Prophecy of Heathenism, as it involuntarily does homage to the Spirit of the Kingdom of God. Balaam's speaking Ass. We believe there is good ground for placing the magicians of Egypt in relation with the Aramaic seer Balaam. Just as the history of the magicians (Ex. vii. 11 ff.) records the victory of the theocratic prophets over the antagonistic position of real- istii! wisdom and magic, so the history of Balaam (Num. xxii.) proclaims the triumph of the theocratic people over the hostile position of that idealistic wisdom of the world, the worldly prophecy and poesy represented by Balaam. It would be dif- Scult to distinguish accurately between the symbolic and the purely actual elements in the account of the contest of Moses with the Egyptian conjurers. Moses was endowed with miraculous power for this contest, whc«e sign, in any case, wore a symbolical colorhig. Ilengstenberg regards it as the central point in this endow- ment, that he could thus meet and defeat the Egyptian serpent-charmers upon iheii own lield, in the region of their most cultivated magical art, and with higher meant APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT 8ft at his command.* Moses, with his miraculous rod, or staff, works in tlie three re gions of life miracles of punishment and salvation ; iu the region of elementarj nature (changing water into blood, bitter water into sweet) ; in the region of organic nature (making the rod to become a serpent, and the serpent a rod) ; in the region Df human life (calling Ibnh the leprosy and healing it). He can do this truly only m the service of the Lord, and therefore only in decisive preordained moments. But then he can do this with an evidence which puts to shame all magical art and worldly culture. Thus gradually, and step by step, the Egyptian conjurers were put to naught before him. The first distinction is, that they could only imitate what Moses did before them ; the second, that they could only do upon a small scale what Moses did upon a large ; the third, that they could imitate in the destructive miracles, not in those which delivered and saved ; the fourth, that they could not imitate the great destructive miracles; the last, that they themselves perished in the destructive miracles of Moses. At the very beginning, their rods were devoured by the terrible rod of Moses, and at the end they stand there without power, they themselves filled with sores, and their first-born given to death. Balaam undoubtedly represents the ideal character of the art and culture of the world ; f as it places and defines itself, in its common or ordinary life, as in the sphere of its conscious thought or piurpoxe, it opposes the people of God and his kingdom, and especially, by the device ot lustful and drinking banquets, it could work great injury to the church of God ; and yet must ever, in the sphere of it.t con- <:cious feeling, in the impetus of its inspiration through the Spirit of the Lord, be cai-- ried beyond itself, bless the people of the kingdom, and testify of its salvation and victory. This opposition between the purpose and the inspiration in the spheres of worldly genius and culture is world-historical, not less so than the fact that even the woi'ldly genius in its philosophic systems, with its poetical and artistic culture, prophesies of Christ and blesses his kingdom. But Balaam's ass is destined to portray the fact, that the ass itself must become a prophet, when the worldly prophet, who rides him, will become an ass. This grand irony, according to which Genius in its fallen state is more blind and dumb than the ass which it rides, according to which the prophet who rides the ass is changed into an ass who rides the prophet, does not stand there as a perplexity to the believer and a sport to the unbeliever. And it is truly the guilt of the apologetic school theology if it falls into distress about the ass of Balaam, when the free-thinkers lustily ride upon it. That the species of the horse, to which the ass, especially the oriental ass, be- longs, is inclined to be timid, and through ita fright can draw attention to bidden dangerous circumstances — indeed, that it has an inexplicable power to recognize ghost-like appearances, or even in its way to see spirits, all this is confirmed through the strangest things. More than once has the stumbling of a horse been an evil omen to his rider, and Napoleon played the part of Balaam on the other side of the Niemen. That the voice of an act or event, thus even of the mighty utterance of the animal loul, may become, in the plastic forming impulse of a visionary genius, a miracle of vision, and most easily the Jiath Kol, the voice, this needs no detailed explanation, J • The books o*" Moses, p. 71. t Especially the wisdom of the Chaldees upon the Eupbrutps, 5m Baumoarten, ii. p. 349. 1 We may not here think of a barely inward event. The way, however, in which Baumoarten, it p. 359, defendf 86 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. But that, finally, repeated terrors of conscience may awaken the inward life of the spirit and preserve it watchful, for the reception of the higher and clearer manifest- ations of the Spirit, thus in the prophetic region, even for angelic appearances, this •xperieuce teaches. Balaam's ass is no subject for ridicule; least of all in a time when the noblei animals have a sensorium more open to the signs of the invisible world than materialistic geniuses, whom the hostility to Christianity has raised to temporary honor. The Spirit of God has made this ass to be a standing irony upon the thought- lessness (to speak euphemistically) of the knights of free-thought, as they go upon the expedition to destroy Christianity.* XV. The Arretting of the Sun by Jothtia (Joshua i.). We will not speak here of the great exegetical history of this place. The papal chair, which esteems fish not to be flesh, and once rejected the doctrine of the anti- podes (according to which all the Jesuit missions in America rested upon a flagrant heresy), compelled, it is well known, the philosopher Galileo to forswear the theory, that the earth rolls round the sun. Modern Catholic theologians hold a modifica- tion of the old view, that Joshua arrested the earth in its course. The spiritual primate of Ireland (Cullen), however, has returned to the orthodox view, and quite recently some Protestant voices are heard, which even in this point will recall " the good old time." f The presupposition of the established exegesis is the hermeneutical principle thai the Bible throughout uses language in the same way only, in which it is used in ordinary records. In that case the symbolical contents of the record will be denied. It will be emptied of its true religious, indeed historical character. Thus here the peculiar triumphant feeling of Joshua will be entirely mistaken, since in that case they only find the thought that he, through an unheard-of astronomical and mechani- cal miracle, had arrosteil the rolling sun (or the rolling earth, as the case may be) for about a day (v. 13). They thus gain perhaps what they cannot use, indeed wherewith they are in the deepest trouble ; while on the contrary they lose the glorious typical event, which brings out into bold relief the fact, that all nature, the outward speaking of the ass against Hengstenbebo, appears to us without weight or importance. If it is allowed to the prophi't to apeak in his own dialect, then surely it may be to the ass. [• Hengslenberg holds that there is a real miracle, but that it is inward in the mind or vision of the prui)h6t, not oulw;ird i.i tlic ;ibs. He deft-nds his view— wliich is ctiunected with a general theory as to the nalure of prnpbecy or .he stale of the prophelw — with great ingenuity and aljility. But there are serious and insuperable objections to it. Bui even this view is preferable to that given above. Dr. Lange comes down here from the high vantage ground from which he ha--* dirtcusaed so al>ly the previously btated dltflcultu-s, aud stands very nearly upon a levL-1 with those who merely seek to explain the miracle. If there is nothing more here than the naturally limid disposition of the animal, and the working of a plastic fancy or g4'nius upon the bra\ing ot the frightened and refractory ass, leading the pro- phet to imagine that he soea spirits or angels, and awakeniUL' his moral and spiritual powers, then the whole narrative Is easily explained, but then the miracle is lost. It is vastly better to hold that the record narrates the fact literally, Nor Ih thi-re anything improbable in such a miracle, tliat the ass should really use the words of men, if we regard the clrcuro"'.anc*-s of the case, and the ends which were designed to he reached. It is a iitting way to rebuke this prophet, Hho had yielded Inraself ti> tlie blindntss and brtitatity of his sm, that the iynoriint brulc siniuld reprove him. And the 'iveiit thus view(-d, stands, as Lange shows, only with far greatt-r signitieaiu-e and lol-ce than it ca!: have upon bU heoi-y, as a perpetual rebuke to those who, with like hatred lo Ihe people of God, and with similal blindness, undel tte hrutalizinff i)Ower of sin, carry on their wai-fare against Cliristiauity. Tliose who would see this i cord vindicated, %Dd its real slgniflcance brought out fully, may consult Uaumqakten : C'omineniary. — A. U.J t For the different explanations compare Wink a, Artidr. Jnxliiui. APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMEXT. 8'. deaven, and earth, are in covenant with the people of God, and ever aid them tc victory in the wars of his liingdom. Although we do not share the view of those interpreters who think that we are only dealing here with a poetical and symbolical style of expression (which the papal exegesis could not use), which, in the sun of Gibeon and the moon of Ajalon, glorifies the sunniest and through midnight protracted, brightest day of victory, we would not deny the relation of the text to a song of victory. It has been overlooked perhaps, that in our history the storm of hail which terrifies and follows the hostile Amorites, is placed significantly over against the svm and moon of Joshua, which give light to the people of Israel. When the theocratic hero and conqueror, in the view of such a terrible storm of hail, on the part of heaven, utters the prophecy : we shall have the clearest sunshine upon our line of battle, and at the evening the light of the moon, that is a peculiar miracle, which is closely joined as to its stamp and character with the great Mosaic miracles of victory.* XVL ITte Old Testament TTieocratie Miracles of Salvation, as parallel Miracles, or as extraordinary Phenomena of Nature, which the Spirit of Prophecy recognizes, announces and uses as Saving Ordinances of God, and in which it proclaims the Truth, that the rniraculoug points in the Earth's Development, from the Flood on to the Final Grand Ciitastrophe at the End of the World, runs parallel with the Development of the Kingdom of God in its Great Eventful Moments, and promotes its Salvation and Glorification. That I may not unduly enlarge this essay, I remark that the above paragraph, while it may be regarded as clearly intelligible in the outline given, finds its de- tailed explanation in the work of the author upon miracles {Leben Jesit, 2 Bd.). In some particular Old Testament miraculous deeds, the signs of the New Testament miracles appear, i. e., the signs of the absolute victory of the theanthropic spirit over the human, natural world. xvn. Tlie Destruction of the CanaaniHsh People. This must be viewed as the symbol of the continuous destruction of malefactors in the Christian state. They were destroyed so far as they, as Ganaanites, that is here as the servants of Moloch, claimed the holy land, and would live under the establishment, or in defiance of the establishment of Israel. Two ways of escape were opened to them : the way of flight from the land, or the way of conversion to the Faith of Israel. The cunning of the Gibeonites found a third way (Josh, ix.). [ • The great Mosaic miracles were wrought indeed in connection with natural agencies or forces, but were none the less real miracles. The fact, that the storm was miraculous, does not meet the demands of the narrative of the arrest* 4ng of the sun and raoon. There are great difficultiei^, uuquestiunahly, involved in such a miracle as this, but difficul- ties are not a matter of great weight, ta any one who admits the miracle at all, and when therefore the question ia merely one of the power of God. Keil, who holds strongly that if the passage in question is to be taken as a part ♦f the hi-torical narrative, we are not to tie troubled by the difficulties supposed, contends with great ability, and aa a mere exegetifrJ question, that ttie passage must be regarded a-i a quotation from the pnc-tical book of Jasher, which is introduced into the narrative, -lot as a historical statement, but as a poetical description of ihe great victory. Sm Eeil The book nf Joshua. If, however, we may take the passage as historical, and then of course hold to the literal miracle, that the earth was stayed in its co"r-*e by the hand of Gud, how grandly it brings out the fact, as Lange stat«« lt» "that heaven and earth are in covenant with the people of God, and ever help them to victory in the wars of hii Ungdom.*'— A. G. " 98 IXTRUDUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT. XVIII. TOf Aseemion of Elijah in a Chariot of Hre, as the culminating Point of the consistent Developmjnt ol the Mosaic Law. Tlie consistent unfolding of the Mosaic law, in its judicial punitive righteous- ness, is completed in the form of the prophet Elijah. Hence the punitive miracle ia the prevailing type of his work. He punishes the people of Israel for its apostasy, with a three-years' drought and famine, he slays the priests of Baal, announces to the hou!~e of Ahab its destruction, and calls down fire from heaven upou the two captains of Ahaziah with their companies. In this consistent unfolding of the pro. photic judicial procedure, he is on the way to the final calling of the fires of the judgment upon the corrupt of the world. The third captain of fifty, sent by the king of Israel to bring the prophet, weeps and clings to his knees praying for mercy, and Elijah feels that he must arrest the judgment. But therewith he has the pre- sentiment that he is about to leave the earth. He can no more endure the earth, nor the earth bear him, and the fiery spirit is borne to heaven in a storm of fire. The first persecution by Ahab drove him into the loneliness of the heathen world ; the second by Jezebel, when she threatened him with death, drove him to Horeb, the cradle of the law, where he would willingly have died. In his fiery triumph over the officers of the third persecution, he appears already as a lofty Cherub with a flaming sword, who sends down from the mountain the fiery judgments of heaven. And still this is only the consistent fulfilling of his true Mosaic office. He has a tolerant heart, otherwise he could not have dwelt with a heathen widow and among a people that had given to his land the corrupt princess Jezebel as queen ; a loving heart, as is shown in his miraculous raising of the dead, a heart opened for the jwesent hnents of the gospel, which appears in his trembling and awe at the still small voice, in the feeling that Jehovah was now to appear, which he had not experienced in the storm, and earthquake, and fire; a merciftd heart, and therefoi'e he ])auses in the midst of his fiery judgments and takes his departure from the earth. But the Lord prepares for him a worthy end, when he permits him to vanish from the earth in a fiery sign from heaven. We cannot so paint this history for ourselves as that scliool which speaks even of the hoofs of these fiery horses. Had the friends of Elijah seen the hoofs of the horses, they would surely not have sent fifty men lor three days to search for the vanished prophet. But just as little are we to understand the nar- rative as a mere description of a disappearance in some peculiar storm. If we see, in this grand moment, a kind of end of the world, we shall also recognize in this chariot of fire the mystery of a primitive original phenomenon.* The opposition between Elijah and Elisha marks the turning point in the history of Israel, with which tlie judicial office and rank of the law retires into the back ground, and the providence of mercy comes into relief, out of which the prophecy of salvation unfolds itself. Elisha inherits a double portion of the spirit of Elijah, and this appears clearly, since he with his niirnclcs of liealing and salvation (in o])po- »ition to the punitive miracles of Elijah) forms the type of the coming gospel. The punitive miracle indeed still appears in his lite, but the essential and determining char icter of his work, forms a circle of helping, healing, and delivering miracles. Elijat enters the lustory as a glorified Moses, Elisha as the type of the Christ to come. [• That '«, perh.-ipii, the mvKtiTS of tlm Ideal demh or of the modu of transition to the higher life. Sti pp. 7» W -A. G • APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 8« XIX. 77i« T)/pes of the Nev 2'estamerU Miracles, and of the Victory of the New Testament Spirit. Book ol Daniel. Tliere appears very early in the Old Testament a definite kind of helping and Having miracles, which grows more distinct in the life of Elisha, and reaches its highest culture and perfection in the book of Daniel. Elisha appears as one who raises from the dead, in a greatly liigher measure than Elijah ; even his grave restores the corpse to life. He heals the fountains of bitter waters with salt, and the poisonous meal in the pot, makes the waters of Jordan a healing bath to Naaman the Syrian, raises the lost axe from the bottom of Jordan in a miraculous way, proves himself a spiritual reprover and saviour of Israel, triumphs over the hostile hosts who were besieging him, by the help of the hosts of the Lord, and sends away his enemies who fell into his hands, with mercy, to their homes. In the miracles of the book of Daniel, which bear more distinctly the character of the New Testament miracles, because they are the victorious miracles of suffering, the New Testament time, the victory of the kingdom of Christ over the monarchies of the world, is clearly announced. The three men in the fiery furnace, especially, pr& claim with the greatest clearness^ and in the grandest symbolism, tbe victory of the Christian martyrdom. GENESIS {tene^i^, n^irjNin); OB, THE FIEST BOOK OF M0SE3. INTRODUCTION. »1. GENEEAl INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS Ltenesis is the record of the creation of the material world, of the founding of the spimna. (world, or kingdom of God, and of general and special revelation ; as such it stands at the head of all Scripture as the authentic basis of the whole Bible. It is consequently, in the first place, I the basis for all the books of the Old and the New Testament in general, a root whose trunk • extends through all Scripture, and whose crown appears in the Apocalypse, the now Genesia, ■or the prophetic record of the completed new, spiritual world and city of God. In the special sense, then, it is the basis of the whole Old Testament; in the most special sense it is the basis of the Pentateuch. The Introduction to the Sacred Scriptures in general, we have already given in the "Commentary on Matthew." The Introduction to the Old Testament precedes the present exposition. We have yet to treat of the Introduction to the Pentateuch, or the Five Books of Moses. Observation. — Compare the beginning and the end of the Introduction of the " Commen- tary " of Delitzsoh. The author ha^ said many valuable things of the deep significance of Genesis. For example: "Genesis and Apocalypse, the Alpha and Omega of the canonical (vritings, correspond to each other. To the creation of the present heaven and the jiresent earth corresponds tlie creation of the new heaven and the new earth on the last pages of the Apocalypse. To the first creation, which has as its object the first man Adam, corresponds the new creation which has its outgoing from the second Adam. Thus the Holy Scriptures form a rounded, completed whole; a i)roof that not merely this or that book, but also the Canon, is ii work of the Hnly Spirit." But Delitzsch confound-^ here and elsewhere (as also Kurtz) the significance of the biblical book of Genesis, with the significance of the living Divine Revelation that thmnghout precedes the biblical liooks themselves and their historical covenant institutions. It might be going too far to say: "The edifice of our salvatiun reaching into eternity, rests accordingly on the pillars of this book." This edifice rests, indeed, on the living, personal Christ, although the faith in Him is efiected and ruled by the Holy Writ. In a similar manner it must appear one-sided, when the Pentateuch, as a book, is made the basis of the Old Covenant, or even of the New; although it is, on the other hand, quite as wrong if we do not count the records of divin* revelation within the sphere of revelation. LiTEEART Supplements to the Bible in general. — See Literary Catalogue in Hertwiq's Tabellen ; Kuetz: "History of the Old Covenant," Introduction; Kirohhofee: Bihelkvnde, pp. 1, 2, 19 fi". ; Winer, i. p. 75. Works on this subject by Griesinger, Cellerier, Kleuker. — Koppen: "The Bible, a Book of Divine Wisdom." Prideaux, Stockhonse, Lilienthal, etc Beam: "Surveys of Univers:il History," Strasburg, 18*'." : Bkrtsob: " History of the Old Coto nant and its People," Stuttgart, 18.57. tH DfTRODUCTION TO GENESIS. A. THE PENTATEUCH. » J. TILK rjs^iAXJSUCH, OB THE FIVE BOOKS OF MOSES— THE THORAn. OBGAJflO UNITr AMD AKRANGEMENT. Tlie Hebrew Thorah (i. «., doctrine, especially doctrine of the law, — law), or the record of the covenant religion of the Old Testament (t) TrnXnm SiadrjKrj, 2 Cor. iii. 14; 8i(i5i7kij = n''"ia), lias its real principle not so much in the Mosaic law as in the Abrahamic covenant of I'aith as effected by tlie first preparation of the kingdom of God in the creation of the world and of man (see Rom. iv. 1, ff. ; Gal. iii. 17). Genesis is, therefore, not the introduction to the five books of Moses, especially to the law giving portion, as Kurz supposes ("Compendium of sacred history," p. 94; it is true, with the restriction: "For the Israelitish standpoint the first book has only the import of an liistorical introduction "), for this would correspond to a specific and Judaistic view of the Old Testament ; but it is tlie zinirer.ml foundation for it ; i. «., for the temporary economic particularity of the patriarchal state and of the law-giving. Genesis is the special root of the Thorah, and the gen- eral root of the Holy Writ. Hence the Pentateuch, including this basis, is developed in five books; (Hebraice: m'inn ■'traiin niran. the five fifths of the law in rabbinical notation. Grece: r^ TifvTUTfvxoi sc' /3i/3A.,i-. ' Latin: liber Pentateuchus). 'I'he number five is the half number ten. Ten is the nninber of the perfect moral or historical development; five is the number of the hand, of action, of freedom, and so then also of their legal standard. The founding of the law in Genesis unfolds itself in the triple form of legislation. Exodus (liber Exodi; ij ?|oSof ; Hebrew: niiam) presents the prophetic side of the law throughout. Even the Tabernacle, whose construction is described from ch. xxxv.-xl., belongs not mainly on the side of the priestly service, but on that of the prophetic legislation of God, as the place of the living presence of the lawgiver, and of the law itself (in the ark of the Covenant ; hence : Ohel moed, Ohcl haeduth, tent of meeting, tent of testimony). Leviticus (Heb. : xnp»1 • Gr. : Xt kitikoi') embraces the priestly side of the law, the holy order of service for the Israelitish people, according to its symbolical and universal significance in its most comprehensive sense. The book of Numbers (Heb.: -i3"ia3, Gr. : d^iS^io/) is ruled throughout by the idea of the princely or royal encampment of the people of Israel as an array of divine warriors, in which are i)resented its preconditionings and its typically significant characteristics, revealing, as they do, by manifold disorder, that this people is not the actual people of God, but only the type of that people. These three fundamental forms of the symbolical Messianic law, namely the prophetic, the priestly, and the royal, are embraced in Deuteronomy (Heb.: c-ia"!, Gr. : hfVTfpmmti'inv), or In the siilemn free reproduction of the whole law again as a un ty. in order to point from the Bphero of the legal letter into the sphere of tlie inner prophetic, force of the law (ccim|)are Deut. iv. 25 ; ch. V. 15, 21— the ordering of house and wife ; ch. vi. 5 ; x. 18-19 ; xi. 1 ; xiv. 1 ; xviii. 16 ; ch. xxviii. ff. xxx. 6; xxx. 2-14; ch. xxxiii. 2-3). As in Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers, the historical period of Israel is opened, so Deuter- onomy jioints forward to the prophetic period. From the foregoing it appears that we can divide the Pentateuch into threi^ main divisions; namely, into Genesis as the universal foundation of tlie law, next into the particular law that lliows, with its Messianic, significimt, tri|ile division, the symliolical liackgrouml of its whole ^pcaranco (i. e., into the divisions Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers), and fin illy into Deuteronomy, In «hich, along with the intrinsic character, the universal import of the law again prophet. Icallj ajuiears. Obbkhvation 1. For the more genonal category. Historical books of the Old Testament, Kt the division in the general Introduction. In resiieot to the literature, see Literary Catalogue. g 2. THE PENTATEUCH, OR THE FIVE BOOKS OF MOSES. yg Observation 2. The present division into five books is considered l)y some (Borthold) !i» original and peculiar to the Hebrew coUectioi} ofihe Canon. According to others (Huvernick, Lengerke) it proceeds from the Ale.xaridrians. In lavor of the first view is the fact that Josephus, who retained the Hebrew cauon, was acqiiainti-d with this di\isioM {coidra A/non. i. 8, alsu Phih). De W tte seems also to incline to this opinion. Michaelis considered this division older than the Septnagint. bnt not original. According to Vaihinger {see the article Pentateucli in Heuzog's Real-LexiciiH), the division of ihe Pentateuch into five books was made before the captivity. But tlie s.irae L'arned aithority supposes it not lo have been made until afier thu division of the Proverbs of Solomon into four [larts, lieeause the conscious infiuence of symbol- ical numbers had not favored tlie innnber five until after that period, as with the division of the Psahus into five books, and the presentation of the five Megiiloth. We do not consiiler this argnment cimclusive against the earlier division of Moses into fiv« books. The Jew could distinguish a significant number lonr. and a significant number five, even according lo this numerical symbolism. In the l-'entateuch the number five seems to have been indicated from the beginning by the variety of the originals. That (iene>is is actually in contrast witli the following books, and that Deuterunomy is quite as specific, is evident. The fundamental ideas of the three middle books, do nut contrast less specifically with each other, as appears from our division. It serves even to a better appreciation of the import of the Tabernacle, when we consider "hat it is an annex of the Decalogue, and of the whole fundamental lawgiving connected there- with, and that, in accordance with this, it is repre ented in the second book as the [ilace where- in Jeh.ivah, as lawgiver, is present to his people. The contents of the fourth, again, are in strong contrast with Leviticus (as the book of the tribes). The ethical prophetical book of Exodus is especially the book of God and his prophet. Leviticus, or the book of the divine office, refers especially to the priests. Numbers, or the book of the tribes, more especially con- cerns the people in a theocratic, political sense. OBSEiiv.\TtoN 3. If we mark the number ten as the number of perfection, or completion, and con-^equently the number five as the number of half completion (Vaihinger), such classifica- tion seems nmoh too general and inilefinite, since the numbers three, seven, and twelve, are also numbers of perfection, or completion, each in its kind. It u ill be our duty to treat of symbol- ical numbers in Exudus. Here we will simply anticipate that clearly " the ten words " * indicate moral completion, or perfect develo])ment, and so also the ten virgins in the gospel parable. When, however, there appear five as foolish and five as prudent or wise, the number five may indeed mark the number of the freely chosen religious and moral development of life. Five books of Psalms indicate the moral and religious life-prime of the Old Testament, just as the five Megiiloth indicate five periods of the development of Israelitish life. The five fingers of the hand are the symbol of moral action, as the five senses symbolize the number of the moral reciprocity of man with nature. — Vaihinger rightly concludes from the significancy of the num- ber five, tfiat the Decalogue should not be divided into three and seven, but into five .'nd five. Observation -i. Our theological naming of the five books (Genesis, &c.) is the Alexandrian naming of the Septnagint, followed by the vulgate (only that the gender of Pentateuch and Exodus in Greek is feminine on account of ;ill:i\ns and 6Sdt, in Latin masculine on account of liber). The five books, which were comprised by the Jews under the above names: the five fifths of the law, were individually designated by them, according to the initial words: Breschith, &o., as this naming has passed into the Masoretic Bibles. But the Jews had ahso a designation for the five books, according to the contents, i. e., Genesis was called the book of the creation {see Vaihin"OEB in Herzog's Encyclopedia, Art. Pentateuch, p. 293). Observation 5. Vaihinger seeks fir the five books of Moses a second half, and finds it in the prophets (law and the prophets. Matt. xxii. 40). Thi^ division is interfered with by the inter- vention of the Kethubim. Then he finds the second half in the additional idea of the law aa promise in the New Te.stament. Without doubt, the New Testament is the converse of the Old; that, however, the number five, as such, requires a complement, becomes doubtful by the num- ber of the bo ika of the Psa'ms, unless we are to consider the writings of Solomon as the comple- ment of these five books of Psalms. It is true, a complement follows the five historical books, m the Apostolic writings of the New Testament. Observation 6. It has been maintained by Ewald, Bleek, Knobel, and others, that the basis of the Pentateuch was origiuidly connected with the book of Joshua, and that the work was iu six parts (see Vaihingek, p. 293; Keil, Introduction, § 42, p. 143). It is curious that the sam« criticism which on the one hand considers these books of Moses too Urge to have been original, un the other hand again thinks them dismembered out of larger, and comparatively modern historical writings. • |The Hebrew phrase for the ten commandments, Oi'ia'nn tTlCS. ExodUB xxav. 28.— T. L.] M INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS. I S. ORIGIN AND COMPOSITION OF THE PENTATEUCH. In the introductory paragraphs on the Old Testament criticism, it has been said. th«t ii treating the point in question, we neither feel dependent on tradition and the orthodox rale, tha' it is necessary for the belief of the canonical word of God to attribute to Moses all the fivt books of Moses iu the present form (except the report of his death), nor on the critical con- jectures which in various ways, through their false suppositions, their want of intelligence of the more profound relations of the word, and their great divergence from each olhtT, prove themselves unripe efforts. That one must adopt a canonical recension of the originals of Moses (i. e., a recension falling within the prophetic sphere of the Old Covenant), appears from the manifold indications o( criticism. To these indications belongs, above all, the account of the death of Moses ; the judg- ments on Moses, however, as of a third person, which is the object of the statement Ex. xi. 3 ; Num. xii. 3, seem to us to decide nothing. Then there is the great chasm of 38 years in the history of the wanderings of Israel through the desert (Num. xx.), as also other enigmatical obscurities (see Vaihinger). Farther, the manifold indicationi of the combination of variona originals in initial and concluding formulas; the marks of a later period (Gen. xii. 6; xiii. 7; xiv. 14 ; xxiii. 2, at that time the Canaanites were in the land ; Dan, Hebron, seem no conclusive characteristics) ; the presumption of a book of the wars of Jeliovah (Sum. xxi. 14) ; the great development of the genealogy of Edom carried even to the appearance of its kings (Gen. xxxv. 11). The arabiiuity of the expression •'■unto this day" (Gen. xix. 37; xxii. 14, ff.), is also noticed by Vaihinger. From many f;dse presumptions of criticism on the other hand, it is clear that we cannot yield to its past views. Here place especially the rationalistic starting-point of most critics, and their dogmatic prejudices. This is 1. the prejudice against supernatural revelation in general ; con sequently 2. against miracles ; and 3. against prophecies; through these many are impeUed to deny to the Pentateuch not only authenticity, but also its historical character. On this point tee Delitzsch, p. 4(5. Here belongs also the ignoring of the great contrast between the names Elohim and .Jehovah, which in its essential significance extends not only througl] the whole Old Testament (the Solomonic universalism, the Davidic theocratic Messiani^m), and through the whole New Testament (the Johannean doctrine of the Logos, the Petrine doctrine of the Messiah), but also through the whole Christinn church to the contests in the immediate present (ecclesias- tical confession and Christian humanism). At a later period we may s|ieak of some valuable references of Sack and Hengstenberg, to the contrast between Elohim and Jehovah. We also reckon here the supposition, that Moses, the lawgiver, on account of this his peculiar office, could not also, at the end of his career, and in his prophetic spirit, have given a deeper meaning to the law, as he looked out from the legal sphere and over into the prophetic, even as from the mountain Nebo he looked over into the proTnised land (see the quoted article of Vaihinger, p. 315 ff.). The office of John the Baptist was to preach repentance in the name of the coming Messiah; before his death, however, he became the pro]ihet of the atonement with reference to Christ: Behold the Lamb of (Jod which bears the sins of the world. It is everywhere wrong to assume that a law^'iver has known nothing higher than what he finds within his calling to announce in form of law, according to the degree of culture to which his people have advanced. After these remarks we give a survey of the various views of the origin and the composition of the Pentateuch, with reference to Bleek (p. 161 ff.). 1. The (dder supposition among Jews and Cliri'^tians, that Moses was the author of the entire Pentateucli. This is also the judgment of Philo and Josephus. Thus the Talmud: "Moses wrote liis book, the Pentateuch, with the exception of eight Pesukim, the last eight, which were Indited by Joshua. Philo and Josephus even assume that Moses wrote the section concerning is deatli in the spirit of |)rophccy. 2. The views of the Essenes, according to which the origmal theocratic revelation was falsi I 3 ORIGIN AND COMPOSITION OF THE PENTATEUCH. 95 fied bj later interpolations, passed naturally over to the gnostic writings of the Jews, and iL< Alexandrian gnostics. From this we may expLiin a similar account of Bleek, relative to the gnostic Valenrinus, the Nasnrffians (as given by Epiphanius and Damascenus), the Cleinentinei and Bogomiles. The source of these views is everywliere the same gentile, dualistic representa- tion. They also coincide with those judgments uf the gnostics, which in their various gradei are so inclined to throw away the Old Testament. 3. Doubts of certain Jewish authorities of the middle ages about the authorship of the whol« Pentateuch by Moses, Isaac, Ben Jasos, and Aben Esra. The commencement of a genuine crit' icism is seen with them. They accepted, however, only later additions in certain passages, i. e. Gen. xxxvi. 31. 4. The first critical doubts after the reformation, 16th century: Cablstadt: De canonicU icripturis, Moses non fuisse scriptorem quinque lihrorum. Andreas Masics: "The Pentateuch in its present form is the work of Ezra or another inspired man." — 17th century: Hobbes in his Leviathan: "The Pentateuch a work ahout Moses, not hy Moses, yet based on originals by the hand of Moses." So also Isaac Petreeitts, at first a reformed divine, then Roman and Jesuit : Systema theologicmn ex Prxadimitorum hypnf.hesi,\6f)b. Spinoza in his Tractatm theologico- politiciis: "Ezra is the author of the Pentateuch and of the remaining liistorical books in their present form." Richard Simon : " Critical History of the Old Testament " : " Moses wrote the laws ; the history of his time he had written hy annalists, from which followed the later com- position of the Pentateuch." Cleekhjs, in his Sentimens, went still further, though in his " Com meiitary on Genesis" he took it mostly back, holding that only a few additions are Post Mosaic. Anton Van Dale, Menonite : " The Pentateuch was written by Ezra on the basis of the Mosaic book of the law, and other historical documents." — 18th century: At first a long-contiuued reaction in favor of genuineness : Carpzov, Michaelis, Eichhorn (Introduction, 1-3). Then fol- lowed renewed attacks: Hasse, Professor at Konigsberg: "Prospects of Future Solutions of the Old Testament," 1785 ; at the time of the exile the Pentateuch was composed from old rec- ords." Later retractations (following the example of Clericus), according to which he accepted only additions to the documentary Pentateuch. Fulda, whose conjectures are like Bleek's; Corrodi, Nachtigall (pseudonym, Otmar), whose sweeping assertions were modified by Ecker- man, Bauer, aud others. — 19th century : To great lengths now went Severin the father, and De Wette; these then were variously opposed under the confession of adduions and interpolations by Kelle, Fritzsche, Jahn, Eosenmiiller, Pustkuchen, Kanne, Hug, Sack, and others. Reconcil- ing or medium views were presented by Herbst, Bertholdt, Volney, and Eichhorn, 4th Edition. We then have the investigations of Bleek : " A few aphoristic supplements to the investigations of the Pentateuch" (in Rosenmijllee's Bepertorium, 1822). Later: "Supplements to the Investigations of the Pentateuch " (Studies and Criticisms, 1831). The proof that a great number of the laws, songs, and similar pieces, were originally Mosaic, was not recognized by Hartman, von Bohlen, Vatke, and George. Bleek wrote against von Bohlen : De libri Oene«eo» Origine, &c., Bonn, 1836. The complete Mosaic composition of the Pentateuch was on the contrary again maintained by Ranke, Hengstenberg, Dreohsler, Huvernick, Wette. Keil, and Ludwig Konig. Movers and Bertheau here follow with peculiar investigations and views. Tuch, in his com- mentary on Genesis, follows in all material respects tlie views of Bleek, who also designates the labors of Stiihelin, De Wette, Ewald, and von Lengerke, as the latest investigations of the Pen- tateuch. The latter is eclectic, leaning on Bleek, Tnrh, Stiihelin, Ewald, and de Wette. Stiihelin passes over the authorship of Moses himself, and makes as tlie basis of the Pen- tateuch and the following books an older writing, which extends from the creation to the occupa- tion of the land of Canaan. The recension of the day falls in the time of king Saul, and may have been by Samuel or one of his pupils. De Wette, in the edition of his Introduction, 5 and 6. supposes a threefold recension of th whole work, at the same time with the book of Joshua, 1. the Elohistic, 2. the Jehovistic, B. Deuteronomistic. The latter made at the time of Isaiah. The sources of the first treatise nould have been partly Mosaic, though it is questionable if in the present farm. Ewald (History of the People of Israel) : "by Moses, originally, there was but little — merelj 9S INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS. the tables of the law and a few other short utterances." Bases of the present form of the Pen tateiich : four or five books involved in each other. See below the treatises on Genesis. Ktktz, in the ''History of the Old Covenant." in the supplement to Delitzscli, has taken th« view that Moses did not write the Pentateuch, but only tlie passages in the middle books where something is expressly given as written by him, and besides that, Deuteronomy, ch. i.-xxxii. the Pentateuch, however, was written partly under Moses, and partly under Joshua, or not long after Joslnia.* Bleek (pp. 183 If.) has given very interesting and evident proof of genuine Mosaic originals in Leviticus, Numbers, and Exodus. At first it is shown of the sacrificial law, Leviticus i.-vii., tliat it comports in its literal acceptance only with the relations in the wilderness, as appears from the contrast expressed in such phrases as "in camp and outside the camp," "Aaron and his Bons," " heads of their fathers' houses " (Ex. vi. 14), &c. In Leviticus xvi. it is commanded that one of the goats shall be sent into the wilderness. Similar indications of originality are found Lev. xiii., xiv., &c. Bleek judges in the same way concerning the relations of the camp in Num- bers, ch. i. ff. Here may be added single songs, viz., the three songs. Num. xxi. — Then are quoted, however, many signs as traces of the later composition of the whole : Gen. xii. 6 : " and the Cauaanite was then in the land" (comp. Gen. xiii. 7). Gen. xxsvi. 31 : "and these are the kings that reigned in the land of Edom, before there reigned any king over the children of Israel" Gen. xl. 15, Joseph says: "I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews." In Gen. xiii. 18, the city of Hebron is mentioned. According to Joshua xiv. 15; xv. 13, the city was formerly called Kirjath Arba (com|i- Gen. xxii. 2 ; xxxv. 7 ; see also the note on Hengsten- berg's declaration, according to which it is possible that Hebron was the oldest name of the city). In Gen. xiv. 14, the city is called Dan, on the contrary we read Judges xviii. 29 : " The Dauites gave to the city of Laish the name Dan." Ex. xvi. 35 ; Num. xv. 32, 36 ; Deut. i. 1 ; ii- 12; iii. 2, &c. Bleek counts here also the law respecting the king, Deut. xvii. 14-20. Again, laws in Deuteronomy, which seem to anticipate the sojourn in Canaan: Deut. xix. 14; ch. 20. Besides these the repetitions: Ex. xxxiv. 17-26; comp. ch. 21-23; Ex. xvi. 12, comp. Num. xi. &c. Then there are apparent disagreements, such as Num. iv. : " Period of service of the Levites from the 30th year to the 50th ;" —again, ch. viii. 23-'i6: "From the 25th to the 50th year." Still further : " unnatural position of separate sections," e. g., Ex. vi. 14-27. Also the chasm in the account from Num. xx. 1-20, where a space of 37-38 years is omitted. Finally, the im- probal)ility that Moses would leave behind an historical wortc of such extent. "We have already, in the (ieneral Introduction, given the results of Bleek's investigations, which we cite as fruit of tlie untiring diligence of an honest, acute, and pious investigator, without considering them absolutely evident fnamely, what concerns those parts where the force of th« prophetic predic- tion seems ignored, or where the acceiitance of repetitions and contradictions might be the result of a want of insight into the construction of the books). The article Pentateuch, by Vai- niNOEE, in Heiizog's Real-Encyclopedia, appears to us very noteworthy in a critical point of view. With respect to the present cimdition of the discussions in question, we refer to the aforesaid labors of Bleek in his Iniroduction, to the article by Vaihinger, to the supplements by Hengsten- berg, to the Introduction to the Old Testament by Keil, and to the Introduction to Genesis by Delitzsch. A carefully prepared tabular pnisentation of the various views, may be found in Hertwig's " Tables to the Introduction to the Old Testament," p. 26 S. After the above general remarks, we might, for the present, here come to a close, since we have again to treat of the separate books of the Pentateuch in the proper place. One consider- ation, however, which seems to us of special importance, and which might not receive its full attention, is the internal truth of the religious i)erioda of development, as ecclesiastical theology has long shown it in the outline*. That the Jewish religion does not begin with the Mosaic legislation, but with the Abrahamitic promise, is presupposed in the New Testament, and is »l80 based upon the nature of the case. The patriarchal religion is characterized as tlie original • Wo make curwry mention of the oritiobm of SSronBon, who, with his Commentary on Qenesis, forms a partDel to the fiBKJrtionn of Bruno Bauer on the gospels of the New Testament. See Kohtz : HUtory f Solomon. The same is true of the strong and zealous words against those who mislead to apostasy. If we adhered to this point of view we might set Deuteronomy beside the Song of Solomon and the 45th Psalm (v. 11). On the other hand, it is hardly credible that a Jewish author, after the apost.-isy of the ten tribes, should have invented such a superabundant blessing on Joseph as we find pronounced in Dent, xxxiii. 13.* Moreover, it is also not easily credible that a theocratic spirit which, toward the end of the period of the Judges, compOed the originals of the lawgiver Moses, should not also have compiled the Deuteronomic originals of his later days. On the ancient character and Egyptian recollections of Deuteronomy, see Delitzsch, pp. 23 ff. At the time of Jesus Sirach (180-130 b. o.) the Old Testament was extant in its tripartite form as a closed canon (Preface, ch. 7). At the time of Nehemiah (444 b. o.) Deuteronomy was already compiled, also the constituent parts of the Pentateuch (Neh. xiii. 1 ; 2 Mace. ii. 13, speak only of a collection of holy books on the part, of Nehemiah). At the time of Ezra (468 B. o.) there was developed a documentary learning, which extended to the law, i. «., to the legal writings of Moses (Ezra vii. 6-10). For this reason tradition has placed the closing of the canon in the time of Ezra and Nehemiah. At the time of Josiah (639-609 B. o.) Deuteronomy was again found in the temple as a law- book of an older period (2 Kings xxii. 8; 2 Chron. xxxiv. 14). It is not at all improbable that just this book, with its emphatic curses of idolatry, was the one tliat was forgotten or concealed in the depths of the temple at tlie time of the idolatrous king Manasseh (comp. ch. xxxiii 7). The various conjectures which modern criticism has connected with this circumstance proceed from the nimriiv \|^€i"8of that the Old Testament theocrats were at tliat time hierarchs in the medieval sense, and might have permitted a pia fraiis. And so, according to Vatke, must the law have been made about this time. At the time of the king llezekiah (726 ff.) "his men" collected tlie addenda to tlie proverbs of Solomon (ch. xxv. 1) ; thi.s, however, was not its beginning. Such a culloction of the proverbs of Solomon presupposes far earlier * (This remark, and the thought with which it is prcRiiant, are ahundantly sufficient to do away all the reasons pre- MQted just above for assitniinK the book of Deuteronomy to the literature of the Sohunonic peiiod. What is said atwnt the cojjnection of Deut. 12th with the founding of Solomon's temple, and of Deut. 17lh with the law respectinK the royal office, and other thinffa of a similar kind, would, if true, show something more than a mere recension with oc- casional scholia. The remark of Lango, that Moses towards the close of his life wrote an'l spoVo in the prophetic spirit, which, wheO_er real or imagined, is most evident from the style of the last part of iJeutcronomy, fully accounts for all this to one who receives the Bible as containing the prophetic and supernatural. What is said, too (p. 97), of the absence of Meiwianic allusions in Deuteronomy, though intended to prove, as it does most conclusively, that the writing of it could not have been as late as the express prophetic period, would also exclude it from the Davidic or Solomonic. That the Mo<*,ianic idea had then come in is evident from such passages as 2 Sam. vii. 13-16, the last words of David, 2 Sam. xxiii. t, together with 1 Kings ii. 4, 2:1. It was, at least, the idea of a Jlessinnic kingdom and of a never-emlii^ royal snccee- ■Ion. If the book of Deuteronomy had been written, or even compiled and corrected, in the time if Solomon, or 'atflr •Qr.h an idea would never have been omitted, or left without any trace. — T. L.l g 4. THE PENTATEUCH 01: THE SAMARITANS. i>| «ollectioD8 with respect to the Psalms and the books of the law. Hence Isaiah can about thii time go bacli witli his prophecy to the predictions of Uemeronomy. With the wonderful dis- appeaniiKe of Elijah (89ij B. o.) is in realir.y the purely legal period closed. His shower nf fire prefiguring the end of the world, is followed by the pniphetio period, which ihe vision of Elijah on Horeb, and much more the labors of Elisha in his healing miracles, had presignMlled. Elijah looks backwards as the fin;d landmark of the death-bringing and destroying influence of tht law; Elisha looks forwards %vith evangelical omens which the evangelizing words of the Messi anic prophets must soon follow. When David was departing this life (1015 B. c), he couli already lay to the heart of his sun Solomon, the law of Mooes as a written one (1 Kings ii. 3) The promise of the typical Messiah-king (2 Sam. vii.) presup|joses already the promise of the typ- ical Messiah-prophet (Deut. sviii. 15), and the promise of the Messiah-priest (Deut. sxxiii. 8 If.), i. e., determinate originals of Deuteronomy ; since the prophets and priests are present in Israo' before the kings. Opseevation. It is not with entire justice that Kurtz remarks (History of the Old Covenant, 1, p. 46) : •' It is an historical fact that stands more firmly than any other fact of antiquity that the Pentateuch is the living foundation, and the necessary presumption, (jf the whole Old Testa- meut history, not less than of the entire Old Testament literature. Both of these, and with them Christendom, as their fruit and completion, would resemble a tree without roots, if the composi tion of the Pentateuch were transferred to a Later period of Israelitish history." • Doe^ th< Old Testament theocracy rest then on the completed compilation of scriptural books, or, indeed, on writings at all, or does it n 't rather rest on the living, aoiual revelation of God, which pre- ceded all writings? And now all Christendom! The church also rests, indeed, nut on the authenticity of the New Testament books, but on the living revelation of God in Christ, although it is regulated by the canon of the New Testament. Moreover, it is well verified that the Pen- tateuch, as the earlier foundation, is attested by nil the followin-j; scriptural books. The inter- nal testimony of the Pentateuch to the written compositions of Moses, to which Kurz, after Delitzsch, refers, is also of great import. He has also justly remarked that the canonical charac- ter of the scriptural books would stand firmly, even if Ezra were to be regarded as their com piler. The whole of the present question is largely influenced by the distinction between the re' ords of Elohim and Jehovah, to which we must return in the introduction to Genesis. 5 4. THE PENTATETJCH OF THE SAMARITANS. It is a fact that the Samaritans (see article in question in Herzog, Winer, &c.) distinguished themselves from the Jews by having a Pentateuch different from theirs in many particulars, * [The importance of this remark cannot be overrated. The Old Testament is a unity of designed &lsehood through- cut, or it is a unity of historicjil truth. The patched-up legendary view of mingled traditions, subjective fancies, pure 1 errors, and later compilations made from them, cannot account for it. Tlie idea of an entire and continued forgery might I theoretically explain its existence, were it not for one thing, namely, its utter incredibility beyond any of the marvellous contained in it. It would require a superhuman power of inventive falsehood. The supposition of a forged Pentateuch, j at whatever time made, demands a forged history following it, a forged representation of a consistent national life growing I out of it, a forged poetry commemorative of it and deriving from it its most constant and vivid imagery, a forged ethics grounded upon it, a forged series of prophecy continually referring to it, and making it the basis of its most solemn warn- ings. There must have been a speciiic forgery of an incredible number of minste events, episodes, incidental occun'ences, having every appearance of historical truth, of countless proper names of men and places, far too many to be carried down by any tradition, — a forgery of proverbs, national songs, memorials, apothegms, oath-forms, judicial and religious observ- ances, &c., &c., all made to suit. It is incredible. No human mind, or minds, were ever capable of this. Th.^re is no place for It to begin or end, unless we come square up to an admitted time of an existing, historical, well-known people, for whom all this is forged, and who are expected to receive it, and who do receive it. as their own true, veritable history, antiquity, and national life-development, although they had never before known or heard of it. The idea of compilations from the legendary jind the mythical explains well those early fabulous, indefinite, and unchrouological accounts of other nations, which are .^ontctimes spoken of as parallel to what is called the mythici»l, of the Hebrews. Nothing, however, could show a greater overlooking of what is most peculiar in the Hebrew Scriptures. The rtatistical and strictly chronological character of the Old Testament utterly forbids the parallel. It shuts us up to the ar>nclusion of its entire forgery, or its entire truthfulness and authenticity. If the first is incredible, as even the Rational irts are compelled to acknowledge, the second must be true. There may be points, here and there, where such a general view may be supposed to be assailable, but the mind that once fairly receives it in its most general aspect, must find in it a power of conTictionthat cannot easily be disturbed. It compels us to receive what may be called the natural facts o1 the Bible history, and then the supernatural cannot be kept out. Such a people and such a book lying in the very het./* ^f history, and regarded in its pure human aspect, or simply in its natural and historical-marvellous, demands the «upci ostuial as its most fitting and we mav even s.ay, it.s me^' natural, accomp.animent and explanation. — T. L.l 100 INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS. and that tliey possessed, and still possess this, regarding it as the only Holy Writ (other neparat* writings, e. g., a Samaritan book of Joshua, difter'snt from the canonical, are of no special im- portance). This is to be mentioned here for the reason that the existence of this Pent.iteuch might, rn tiie one hand, support the authority o'" our canonical Pentateuch, and on the other hand might also create a prejudice against it. The earlier composition of the Pentateuch has been inferred from tlie circumstance that th« Samaritans had a Pentateuch in common with the Jews. The Samaritans, it was supposed, received their Holy Writ as a relic of the Israelites of the ten tribes, whose remains mingled with theirs ; this explains why they possess only the Pentateuch. The Israelites, as separated from the kingdom of Judah, accepted from the Jews no otl\er sacred writings, in consequence of their national hatred. Therefore the Pentateuch must ha?e been extant before the separation of the two kingdoms (Jahn). If now Vaihinger is of opinior that this demonstration is contradicted by the proof of Ilengstenberg that tlie Samaritans pro ceeded solely t'rum heathen colonists, and not from a mixture of Jews and heathen, the argument itself is not duly established; for this matter compare the article "Samaritans" in Winer. Again^ the circumstance that the Samaritan Pentateuch contains elements which are intended for the glorification of their mountain Garizim, does not oblige us, with Petermann {see article "Sama- ria " in Hekzog's Real-Encyclopddie), to transfer the whole present compilation of the Pentateuch to the time of the separation of the Samaritans from the Jews, that is, between Nehemiah and Alexander. If we presuppose among the Samaritans a far earlier existence of the Pentateuch, according to its present entirety, nevertheless the paganizing character of the people, which vacUlate* between overstrained jutlaistic institutions and a heathen fondness for fables, would prefer the interpolations which are peculiar to their versions. On the other hand, it is not easy to per- ceive why the ten tribes, on the separation from Judah, should have been in possession only of the Pentateuch. Moreover, the great harmony of the Samaritan Pentateuch with the Septuagint, permits the inference of earlier Jewish revisions, which would make the old text more pleasant to the pagan culture of the period, by avoiding anthropomorphisms and anthrt)popathisni8. Therefore Vaihinger assumes that the Samaritans first received their Pentateuch through Ma- nasseh, son of the high-priest, as Josephus calls him (Arcbwology xi. 7, 2 ; comp. xiii. 9, 1), wlio fled to them and drew many Jews with him to apostasy. Welte also assumes {see tlie article "Samaritan Pentateuch" in the Church-Lexicon of Catholic Theology, by Wetzeu and Welte), that the Samaritans first received their Pentateuch through that Jewish priest, who (according to the account of Nehemiali), went over to them as the son of the high-priest Jehoiada, and be- came the first higli-priest of their newly-erected worship on the mountain of Garizim. At the time of this priest, or later, a more acceptable, falsified compilation of the Pentateuch might easily have crowded out a purer and more ancient one ; for it is neitlier historical that the Samaritans until then had been pagans, nor probable tliat they, as worshippers of Jehovah, had remained without a book of the law. The Israelitish priest, sent to instruct them in the religion of the land, might also have taken charge of the Hebrew service under the form of image and calf- worship. So much, however, is certainly clear, that the careful perseverance of the Samaritans in tlie legal stage, even after the coming in of an imperfect hope of the Messiah, their want of a living development under the influence of a prophetic spiritual life and prophetic writings, with tlieir careful reverence for the Pentateuch, is very significant testimony that the Pentateuch belongs essentiiilly to a legal period that far preceded the prophetic one. That tlie deviations of the Samaritan Pentateucli cannot injure tlie authority of the Jewish masoretic one, appears from their manifold harmony witli the Septuagint, from their moderniz- ing character, as well as, finally, from the manifest falsifications, which have not spared even the Decalogue. For further particulars in reference to this subject, see the articles in the Reah Encyclo]jedia» of Uehzoo, and of Wetzeh and Welte; also the article " Samaritans" by Winer which latter refers especialiv to GisENirs : Be Psntuteuchi Samaritani origine, indole et aucto- ritaU. Halle, 1846. § 6. THE CHABACTER OF GENESIS. 10) i 6. THEOLOGICAL AND HOMILETICAL LITERATURE ON THE PENTATEUCH. See Waloh, Biblioth. theol. iv. p. 444 ff. The Universal Worterbuch, by Danz, under the article " Pentateuch," p. 754 ; also the suppl* ment^ p. 81. — Winer, Theol. Literature i., p. 196 tf . ; Supplement, p. 31 ft'. — Kufiz, History of the Old Covenant, pp. 22 and 53. A survey uf the writings on the Old Testament in Keil's In troduotion (p. 61) to the Peutateuoh, p. 64. — Separate works: Glerici Cominentariug in J/osit Prophetce libros r., Tiibingen, 1733. MoLDENnAUER, Translation and Erplanntiom of the Boolct of Moses, Quedlinburg, 1774 to 1775. Jerusdlem, "Letters on the Mosaic writings aud Philoso- phy," 3J ed., Braunschweig, 1783. Hess, "History of the Israelites, and Moses in particular," tee Danz, p. 675. Vater, "Commentary" (1802-1805), 3 vols. Ranke, "Investigations of the Pentateuch," 2 vols., 1834-1840. Henostenberg, "Authenticity of the Pentateuch," 1836-1889 The same: " The most important and difficult sections of the Pentateuch explained," 1 vol "History of Balaam and his Prophecy," Berlin, 1838. The same: "The Books of Moses and Egypt," with supplement ; " Manetho and the Hyksos," Berlin, 1841. E. Bertheau, " The seven Groups of Mosaic Laws in the three middle books of the Pentateuch," Gotdngen, 1840 (tlie writings of George, Bruno Bauer, The Religion of the Old Testament. Vatke). Baumgaeten, " Theolog. Commentary on the Old Testament," 2 vols., Kiel, 1843. Kurz, " History of the Old Covenant," 1 and 2 vols., 2d Ed., Berlin, 1853. Bahr, '■^Symbolik of the Mosaic worship," Heidelberg, 1837. Also other works to be hereafter named, referring to the Mosaic worship. Knobel, " Genesis, Exodus, and Leviticus ;" also " Xumbers, Deuteronomy, and Joshua ; " " Con cise Manual," Leipzig, 1861. Delitzsoh and Keil, " Biblical Commentary on the Old Testa raent," 1st vol. " Genesis and Exodus," Leipzig, 1861 ; 2d vol. " Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuter onomy," Mecklenburg. Scriptura ac Traditio, Covimentarius perpetuus in Pentateuchum, Leip zig, 1839. Schuscftan Eduth, i. e., "Exposition of the five books of Moses," Heb. and German, with notes by Abnheim. — Herzheimer, 1853-1854. Thorath Emeth, "The five books of Moses," by Hbinemann, Berlin, 1853. The works on "Church History," by Natalis Alexander, aud many other older theologians, especially of the refoi'med church ; also Lutheran, Buddeus, &c. ; Catholic, StoUberg, &c. — Homiletieal, see Winer, ii. p. 115 ft'. "Sermons," by IIohn-baum, Bal- DAUF, Sailer, &c. Zinzendorf, Extracts from his "Discourses on the five books of Moses and the four Evangelists." Published by Clemens, 9 vols., 1763. Beyer, "History of the Israelites in Sermons," 2 vols. Erfurt, 1811. G. D. Krummaohee, "The Wanderings of Israel through the Wilderness," Elberfeld, 1828. Metjeer, "Moses, the servant of God. Spiritual Discourses," Leipzig, 1836. Appuhn, "Moses, the servant of God," Magdeburg, 1845. Oosterzee, "Moses, 12 Sermons," Bielefeld, 1860. Treatises on the Doctrine of Immortality of the Old Testament, especially that of Moses, and on the separate books, wUl be mentioned in their respectiv* places. B. a SPECIAL VIEW OF GENESIS. I 6. THE CHARACTER OF GENESIS. If we can regard as the conclusive mark of the genuine canonicity of the scriptural books, the fact that the spirit of divine revelation (which in the historical sphere has gradually entered into human nature until the perfect union of the Godhead and humanity) has appeared, and that this spirit, consistently progressing, has entered into human writing belonging to revelation then it appears quite in accordance with nature that such a spirit of revelation has, in Genesis, anitcd with the very earliest and most cliihllike form of human authorship, and that it does not manifest itself as a completed sacred work of art of theocratic Christian authorship, until the end of the whole biblical literature in the Apocalypse. The accounts of Genesis, taken in their human aspect, seem like Inosely arranged and simple narratives of childlike sjeech, in con- trast with that perfect symbolical composition of the Apocalypse, whose deep significan:e surpasses the comprehension of the most celebrated judges. But though Genesis forms a self 102 INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS. Inclusive and connected whole, which sheds a bright, divine, infallible light over all begicuingi of primitive time (see § IJ, we nevertheless see therein the fact that here the living God has, in •he moat emphatic sense, prepared liis praise "out of the mouth of babes and sucklings." At the same time this fact gives us a satisfactory solution of the character of inspiration; how at every ijeriod it is perfect in the sense, that on tlie divine side it is continually the voice of the same divine spirit (and in truth of a spirit wliich cimipletely commanded, in their respective tasks, those human minds that were apprehended and held by its influence), whilst, on the human side, it was to proceed from the imperfection of childlike, pious utterance and story through a series of degrees, until it had reached the full adult age in the new covenant; and all this the more so, as on the line of its chosen ones it had continually to break through the opposi tinn of human sinfulness, which ever surrounded its nucleus of liglit witli colored borders and shadows. With respect to what is centrally fundamental in the Old Testament books, it ma^ be said, that one Godlike thought, or thought of God, ranges itself on the other, in proportion to the degree of divine revelation, or to that of human development. As regards the outer circle of these writings, we may find them burdened with all kinds of human imperfections, if we will judge them according to the New Testament, or draw them on the model of practical historical writing, or of natural science, &o. We must then, however, at the same time, well understand that those supposed imperfeotione are controlled by the principle of revelation in the books, and that, in our criticism of the style of revelation, we toil towards heterogeneous points of view. Such a process has a relative justification only in presence of an orthodoxy which emphasizes the said literal meanings in order to make from them abstract history, geography, natural science, &c., for the authoritative belief. Genesis corresponds now to its design, according to which it is the revelation of God con- cerning the origin of the world, of mankind, of the fall, of the judgment, and the redemption. Not only that it presents these origins purely in their ethical idea and physical development, in accordance with the monotheistic principle, but also that whilst on the one side it clearly brings out the periods in the economy of the preparatory redemption (Adam, Seth, Enoch, Noah, Bhem, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph), and connects these |ieriods with persons, uholl-" in ac- . cordance with the principle of personality in the kingdom of God (according to which estch par ticuhir form of religion is the form of a covenant between the personal God ;ind the personal man) ; it also presents practically, on the other side, the great contrast between nuive"'salism according to which God is Eluhim for all the world and all mankind, and theocratic particular- ism, according to which He is Jehovah for His chosen ones. His covenant people, and Hip king- dom of salvation, in its full redemptory historical significance. Thus the history of Genesis passes through a series of contra-ts, in which that particularism, which in the second book of Moses becomes legal, appears ever more defined, whilst, at the same time, there is seen more clearly the mutuality of this economic particularity and of the teleological universalism as it rests on principial universalism (Genesis, i.-iii.). Thus the promised seed of woman, ch. iii., confronts the fall of the human race. Then the line of Cain with its God-forsaken, worldly culture (ch. iv.) is confronted by the line of Seth with its sacred worship, elevating the duration of life (ch. v.). The line of Seth was to become a salvation to the line of Cain, but the former conduces to the perdition of the hitter through its overhasty carnal and spiritual intercoursf (ch. vi.). The house of Noah in the ark forms then a contrast to the mass of mankind sinking in the flood; but even to these the saving of the ideal humanity in Noah's house was to be of advantage, acc^ording to 1 Peter, iii. 19, 20. A new and twofold contrast is then formed amonf the sons of Noah ; to the contrast of piety, and pious culture, and barbarism (Shem and Japhetb as opposed to Ilam), is presented now the contrast of a one-sided wcrship (Shem) blest of God and nf II one-sided culture, also blest of God (Jaiihoth). The culture of Japheth is no longei accursed, as that of C'ain ; after its |iropagation in the world, it is to return to the tents of Shem •lid be bnjught into unity with the perfected faith of revelation (ch. ix.). Thus is the forma- lion of the contrast between tlieocracy and heathendom introduced, as it is unfolded on th« basis of the universal genealogical table (ch. .\.). With tlie develojiment of heathendom (ch. li.) is contrasted the founding of theocracy (ch. xii.). That, however, the contrast thus opened § 6. THE CHARACTER OF GENESIS. 108 is no absolutely hostile one, appears not merely from the preventive thought of the dispersioB of nations (Gen. -\i. 6-7), but rather from the whole series of antitheses against heathendom, ot heatlienish characteristics, which now runs througli the life of Abraham. The first antithesis is formed between Abraham and his father's house, witli its heathenish indecision in respect t< tlie true faith (ch. xii.). His father, Terah, was already on tlie way to Canaan ; but he let him- self be detained by tlie fertile Mesopotamia. The secotid antithesis of Abraham is Pharaoh in Egypt and heathen despotic caprice (ch. xii.). The third antithesis is Lot and heathen selfish ness and worldliness (ch. xiii.). In the fourth, Abraham meets the heathenish, robber-like wai fare, with the liberating holy war of freedom, and, in consequence of this, is greeted by the prince of lieathen piety, Melchisedek, as the prince of the theocratic faith (ch. siv.). Then the antithesis enters into the very house of Abraham himself. Not the son of his faitliful servant Eleazer s'lall be his heir (ch. xv.), not the son of his body begotten of Hagar the maid (ch. svi.), not even his posterity itself in unconsecrated birth ; no, — circumcision must distinguish between the consecrated and the unconsecrated in his own life and race (ch. xvii.). So far the contrast be- tween Abraham and the heathen world is clearly softened through the light of peace, as he, in deed, has been separated from the heathen world, in order that in his seed all races of the earth may be blest (ch. xii.). Pharaoh and Lot, and the men allied to him in war, were no godless heathen ; Melcliisedek could even surpass him in certain respects. But now the contrast opens between Abraham and a Sodom ripe for judgment. Abraham, the highly favored confidant and friend of God, pleads fii- Sodom in an extremely persistent manner. His intercession shows in what sense he is chosen, and at least profits Lot and liis daughters (ch. xix. xx.). The position ol Abraham in lespect to Abimelech of Gerar is again no contrast between bright day and dark night; the weakness of Abraham in the duty of protecting his wife, is contrasted with the ar- bitrariness of Abimelech in matters of sex (ch. xx.). In what a mild light, however, appear Ishmael and Abimelech (ch. xxi.), and Hagar, to whom also the angel of the Lord as such ap- peared at an earlier period in her great necessity (ch. xvi.)! And later, Abraham must distinguish between the human sacrifice, as otfered in the heathenish spirit, and the theocratic devotion of the soul (ch. xxii.), as he was previously obliged to distinguish between unconsecrated and con- secrated connection of sex, generation, and birth. The manner in which Abraham buries Sarah is not the heathen manner of interment; and so also his seeking a wife for his son has its the- i>cTatic traits (ch. xxiii. xxiv.). The antipathy against heathendom, together with a friendly relation to the heathen themselves, runs throughout the life of Abraham, as this meets us finally in the children of his second marriage. Here follows now the great contra-^t between Isaac and Ishmael. Ishmael cannot be the theocratic heir; he has his inheritance, however, and also his blessing. The same may be said of the contrast between Jacob and Esau. The latter is only rejected under the point of view of the theocratic hereditary power ; he also has his blessing. Finally, a contrast is even formed between Joseph and his brethren. And then also between Joseph and Judah ; and Judah becomes inferior to -Joseph the very moment he gives liimself up as security for Benjamin (ch. xliv. 18 ff.). Thus in Genesis throughout there is presented the relation between theocratic particularism and heathendom. The heathen element is rejected, what is noble and pious in the heathen is acknowledged. The bond of humanity in relation to the heathen is retained in illustration of real sympathy, just reception, and kindly treatment But where the economic particularism, ordered by God, tends to become a human or inhuman, pharasaical fanaticism (as in the crime of the brothers Simeon and Levi at Shechem), there the spirit of revelation pronounces through the mouth of the patriarch a verdict of decided con- demnation (ch. xxxiv. 30 ; xlix. o-T). Already, therefore, does Genesis constitute an economic and conditional contrast between ludaism and Heathendom, and consequently also a religion which is at the same time theocratic la its particularism and human in its universalism, resting, as it does, on a self-revelation ol God, according to which he is, on the one hand, the God of the whole world and all nations ; on the other hand, the God of the chosen ones, the God of Israel, of his covenant people, of hia /■ kingdom. The simplicity with which Genesis presents the whole history of antiquity in biographica." / 104 IKTRODUCTIOX TO GENESIS. forms, is, at the same time, its sublimity. Its God is a personal God, and its world and historj do not consist of persons who are puppet imatjes of impersonal things, but of personalities fron; whose reciprocal action with God are de%'eloped the real relations. Thus is unfolded that his- tory of the heroic acis of faith, with which the did heroes of the faith introduce the revelation, piece by piece, into the world, according to Heb. xi. The faith of Adam and of all primeva' mankind in the creation, is followed by Abel's faith in sacrifice, Enoch's faith in immortality Noah's faith in judgment and deliverance, Abraham and Sarah's faith in promise, the faith ol A.braham in a resurrection, and the faith in hope and blessing of the patriarchs in general. Abraham, however, is especially the father of the faithful, because he not only believed for hira- Belf, as Melchi>edek did, but also for his race (Rom. iv.). He is, consequently, at the same time the man of active obedience to the faith, the man of deed or doing. Isaac, on the contrary, is the type of all sufferers or waiters in faith. In the life of Jacob finally, acting and suffering in the faith alternate in the most manifold style, i. «., he is preeminently the faith fighter, or one who fights the fight of faith ; his name Israel implies this. In the wonderful story of providence which expresses itself in the history of .Joseph, we meet, more decidedly than in the life of Jacob, the type oi humiliation and exaltation, which hereafter continues to be tlie basis of the conduct of the faithful, and which finds, therefore, its last and highest fulfilment in Christ. The characters of the twelve sons of Jacob are individually presented to us in such firm and practical features, that we receive the decided impression that we have everywhere to do with persons, not with personifications. Those critics who will transfer the personifications of heathen mythology to patriarchal history (Nork, Redslob, &c.), overlook the great world-histor- ical contrast, according to which the heathen consciousness has lost itself in the impersonal, the material, the worldly ; whilst the history of theocratic consciousness is the history of the religious spirit raising itself above nature, or of the self-comprehension of significant personalities in the commnnion of the personal God. For this consciousness, the remembrance of great per- to-ng was more indelible than that of great masses of people ; the remembrance of great personal e.xperience of faith, andof deeds of faith, more important than that of great events. As the mono- theistic faith was peculiar, so also was the monotheistic memory. The faith of the patriarchs could not have become the religion of the future, had it not struck correspondingly strong roots in the past. Their faith in the futore went beyond the end of the world ; their faith remindiugs were, therefore, obliged to go back beyoneu5 c/ernj7a/is. "vb" 5X CEl Elion), Dens altissimus — irairoKpaTiij^ •-«paTi(rfo9, aiotvuKf vi^KTTo?. Our terms infinite, absolute, &c., add nothing to these in idea, though modem scienof »lay be said (and yet even that may be doubted) to have enlarged the attending conceptions of the sense or tb« fanagination. For the derivations of Allah by Arabic writers and philologists, see Spbexoer : ** Leben und Lehre des Mohammed,' »ol i. p. 286.- T. I..1 no INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS. El. — El Elion •"■'bs, svperior, suprenius, v\j/LtTTos; El Schadai, •'flf potentissimvs. Plur. Excell a Tr , rad. -[-iw, Septuaginta^ Trai>rnKp:iTu>p. Vnlgate, omnipotens. Elohim Zebaoth, r"s:s Singular n3S . 1. The host of heaven, the angels, 1 Kings xxii. 19; 2. Sun, moon, and stars, Deut. iv. 19 ff . ; 3. generally all beings. Gen. ii. 1; Neh. ix. 2. God can make all things hit hosts. Elohim Zebaoth is in so far the must universal designation of God. 2. Theocratic: Jehovah, Jah, El Schadai, Adonai (Maleaoh Jehovah), i^!'^' • a The pronouncing the name: the very sacred name of God as the covenant God ol Israel. Through superstitious fear, the Jews early began to avoid pronouncing this name Such a motive seems to be the ground of the translation of the Septuagiiit (ni/pios foi Jehovah). Subsequently a prohibition of the utterance of this name was, by false exposition, supposed to be found in the Commandments, Ex. xx. 7, and Lev. xxiv. 11 (Philo, Vita llosis, torn. iii.). Thence they designated this name as Tetragrammaton, as o'ii simply, or as a^ssn cuJ and read in place of it -;-ix . Hence also the Masorites punctuated the text-name rr.n^ with the vowels of Adonai, whereby the compounded Sohewa became, according to the rules of Hebrew gram- mar, a simple Schewa. On the combination, however, of the word with prefixes, the A-sound again appeared. Instead of Jehovah the Samaritans said Schiniah, that is Schem (namp). But where Adonai Jehovah occurs in the text, there they read Adonai Elohim. In conseq lence of thus avoiding the utterance of this name, the original pronunciation of it has been called in question. On this point compare the lexicons (Diodorus on the word Jao ; the Samaritans, ac- cording to Theodoret, Jahe; Jao in Clemens Alex. ; in Michaelis and Hiilemann Jehovah, Relan^ Jahve) and Delitz^ch, p. 68. According to Caspari (on Micha the Morathite) one has the choice between nin;^ {^'^i'.) "ja: ("".H-)- Delitzsch decides for Jahavah. b. Origin of the name. For its derivations from foreign religious names, compare Gesenius, Delitzscli, but especially Tholuck: "Miscellaneous Writings," 1 vol. p. 377. — Here the deriva- tion of the name from foreisrn names of gods is distinctly denied. But the origin of the name, as the full development of its significance, coincides clearly with the origin of the theocratic consciousness. 3. Etymological signification of the name. The verb lying at the bottom of it is an ancient one, but subsequently became prominent again, mn = niJi. Delitzsch asserts that hig word does not signify hvai but yiyi/fo-Sut, Jehovah, tlierefore, him " whose Ego is an ever self-continuing one." Is then this the signification of yi'-yxftrSai? And might not a future of yiyvtiT^nt contain the progressive idea of an ever becoming God ? But the future of mn cannot exactly indicate the existing one (Henpstenberg). It indicates one who is ever to be or to live; who is ever going to be or live. With the future, in eftect, its present is at the same lime fixed, as in Elijeh ascher Ehjeh (Ex. iii. 14). And this then also refers back to a corresponding past. Hence the true realistic interpretation of Revel.ition i. 4, 8: 6 &iv Koi 6 ^r Kni 6 f'pxdiJifvoi (a cor- lespondence with the inscription of the temple at Sais: ('yti dfii to yeyorar Km w khI ((T6fi€viw). In earlier times some were disposed to find the three tenses in the form of the word itself; but this was an ignoring of the grammar. 4. Theocratic signification of the word. We have already observed above, that the name Jahavali expresses the theoeratic relation of God (as the God of revelation and the covenant) to his people, in contrast with tlie universalistic designation of the name Elohim. For more on this head, see below. — pii abridged from nin^ or proceeding from an older, or aliridged pronunciation of the word nrf . It occurs espe"i illy in the poetic and solemn style, hence Hallelu-Jah. Besides. Jah, like EI is found in many proper names. ^inx Lord. In this form it is used only of God, while the human possessor or lord is called •jins (from --s allied to "ti). The form Adonai is explained by many as Pluralis majeatatu, by others as a sullix of the plural : my lords = my lord, and further lord absolutely, which explana- tion Gesenius prefers, for weighty reasons. The word especially occurs 1. m addresses of God, 2. in self-presentations of God, 3. in treating of God generally, and, indeed, frequently with the »ddition of Jahavah or Elohim. — About the phrase ~j'^? T*^'? tee the proper place. 3. Thflocratic universalistic designations. JEitovAti Ei.otiiM, Jkhovaii Zkbaotii, Fatiieh. lehovah Eloljirn imlicates the covenant God of Israel as Giid of all the world (i Kings xviii 91\. From thp *ignification of Jehovah it is plainly evident that Elohim is also Jehovah. Oorapt § 7. SOURCES AND COMPOSITION OF GENESIS. Ill Ex. vi. 3, Jehovah Zebiioth. When the God of the kingdom of salvation summons the hosts of heaven and of earth to realize his judgments and the aims of redemption, he is called Jehovah Zebaoth. — :s Isa. Ixiii. 16 ; xiv. 7, &c., God as the source of the spiritual existence of Israel, especially of its spiritual life. D. Elohju and Jebotab. The scholastics of the middle ages were mainly of opinion that the Trinity was indicated in the name of Elohim, i. e., the idea of the God of revelation (Petrus Lombardus, espeoialh). Th« Jewish author of the book "Oosri" Rabbi JehudaHallevi, of the twelfth century, taught, on the contrary, that the name Elohim had a relation antithetical to the heathen plurality of Gods which had arisen because the heathen made a God of every appearance of godlike power in the world). The name Elohim was thus tlie most general name of the Godhead ; Jehovah, on the contrary, the covenant God. Tiiis distinction has been brought back again in our time by K. H. Sack : De uati nominum dei n^nbs et n'n"' in libra Gene^eoa, in his Commeiitationes ad theologicam kistoricam, Bonn, 1821. — To this may be added the treatise of Hengstenberg in his work : " Contributions to the Introduction to the Old Testament," vol. 2d, entitled : " The Names of God in the Pentateuch," p. 181. Uengstenberg makes the word Jehovah, as future form, Jahve from the Hebrew mn=n-'n . But that this future shall have only the signification " tfit Being " does not appear from the examples connected with it, Jacob, Israel, Jabin.* Ratlier do these examples give to the future here the significance of the being which is continually realiz- ing itself, consequently of the being who is going to be, and thus also the passage, Eev. i. 4, interprets the name. Jehovah is the God who becomes man in his covenant-faith- i'ulnes^, or that which is, and which was, and which is to he. Accordingly then as the name Elohim (not as plural, but as denoting intense fulness) expresses the truth that is found in heatliendom, or the concrete primeval monotheism, whilst Jehovah, on the contrary, expresses the peculiarity of the Jewish religion, whose God, in the power of his being ever re- maining the same with itself (that is his truthfulness) enters into the absolute future form in the becoming man, so again does the name Jehovah Elohim embrace in its higher unity both Judaism and heathenism, whilst it so far represents Christianity as already budding in the Old Testament fLANGE: "Positive Dogmatics," p. 56). The plural t Elohim has been variously explained. 1. BAtrMGARTEN (Eichers) : It is numerical • [The names to whioh Dr. Lange here refers are all Hebrew fatures in form, 3p5^, bsi^"*, '^2^, but it is not eaay *o see how any inference could be drawn from them in respect to the divine name. The letter ^ in some cf them may be merely prosthetic— in others it may merely indicate something hopeful or prophetic in the naming. — T. L.] t [There may be a question whether it is strictly a plural at all, as thxis frequently used, and not a very early euphonic abbreviation of the construct phrase a^nbi<~b5<, as we find it occurring in all its emphatic fulness, Ps. 1. ,"11 H^ D^il jN bx God of Gods Jehovah (El-Elohim Jehovah) God of all superhuman powers, or of all that may be called Gods. The easy doubling of the b, of which the Hebrew furnishes such plain examples, and its being, from its peculiar liquidity, pro- nounced as one, would be in favor of such an idea. It is thus in the word ^'l~^bb^, which is pronounced hallelujah, if we give to the 3 its double sound, though it is written rT^'lbbn, as though it were to be pronounced ha-lelu-jah. The regular piel-form would be ibsH hal-le-lu. An analogous case is furnished by the manner in which the divine name has come to be written and pronounced in the Arabic. It is in full 2U jf f Al-elah or Al-alah, with the article, and so it is un- derstood etymologically, whilst it is not only pronounced, but written, gju\ Allah. So D^H'bx bs El-Elohim, by vowel changes easily explained, might come to be pronounced rapidly D^H'bi X El-llo-him, then El-lo-him, and finally Elohim, •o as to become identical in appearance with the simple plural form of H'pX . We are reminded here of that unusually eolemn invocation Josh. ixii. 22, twice repeated, mfl^ O^nbs bs. El Elohim Jehovah— El Elohim Jehovah. The qu>.'sti('n is whether the two first are to be taken as septirate, or to be read together as one name, Deus deorum. Kaschi and IKimchi take the latter view, though Michaelis thinl£i) it is forbidden by the accent pisik, which is very slightly disjunctive. We need not, however, pay much attention to it when it is thus disregarded by the best Jewish commentators. This wal he solemn pionunciation, resorted to on very solemn occasions ; but this does not forbid (it i,ither iavois) the idea, thai the ordinary pronunciation was but a rapid abridgment of the formula. The name ^^^bs bx El-Elion might have Buffered the same abridginent, but for two reasons : it is much less common, and the more indelible guttural 3 stands in the way. There is something like it in the joining of H^ with n^PI^ or H^n^j so as to make it Jah-jah-vah, as we find it in a few places of more solemi and emphatic import. The fact that plural verbs or plural adjectives, as in Josh. xsdv. 19, are in a few cases joined with D^nbx, where il undoubtedly danotes the One God, does not militate seriously against this view. The phrase by such abbreviation hav. 112 INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS. or collective, and denotes originally God, including the angels, or God in as far as te reveali himself and works through a plurality of spiritual heings. The first definition has a sense dif ferent frum the second and sounds almost polytheistic. 2. Hofman, partly opposed and partly agreeing : The plural is abstractive, neutral ; it is the Godhead including a s|)iritual plurality aa the media of an immundane efficacy. 3. Aben Ezra : An original designation of the angeis, then Plur. majestaticiui as a designation of God. 4. Origin.-il designations of the Gods, then designa- tion of God (Herder). 5. Delitzsoh : Plural of intensity. God as he who in his one person unites all the fulness divided among the Gods of the heathen. Finally, Delitzsch again approaches Petrua Lomhardus: One cannot say, without effacing the distinction of both Testa- ments, that r-'nbx is Pluralis trinitatis; but it may be said with perfect correctness, "the Tri- nitaa is the plurality of Elohim which becomes manifest in the New Testament " {see Delitzsch : Genesis, p. 66 ff.). We assume, on the contrary, that Elohim relates to the circumferential rev- elation of God in the world and its powers (Isa. xl. 28), as Jehovah relates to the central rev- elation of God in Christ. — -Concerning the name .Jehovah, Delitzsch declares: " I am, notwith standing Ilengslenberg (Revelation, i. p. 8<)) and Holemann (Bible Studies, vol. i. p. 59), still of the opinion, that mni indicates not so much the becoming as the being (this should read : not 80 much the heing as the beco/ning), or naturally nut him whose existence, but whose revelation of existence, is still in the process of becoming." According to Baumgarten and Kurtz, Elohim designates the God of the beginning and the end, Jehovali the God of the middle, i. e., of the development moving from the beginning to the end. Delitzsch coincides : " The creation is the beginning and the completion of everything created, according to its idea, is the end. The kingdom of power is to become the kingdom of glory. In the midst lies the kingdom of grace, whose essential content is the redemption, n^n^ is the God who mediates between middle and end in the course of this history, in one word, the Redeemer." And yet the name moreover of the unfolded trinitas ? How then could Jehovah, he who was, is, and is to be, be analogous to Jesus Christ, yesterday, to-day, and in eternity ? Jehovah is also in the beginning of things and from eternity (see Ev. John, i. 1), as also at the end of days (Ehje ascher Elije, Ex. 3) ; Elohim reigns also through the whole course of universal historj'. We repeat it: the pure and harmoni- ous cnntrast of Elohim and Jehovah will be recognized only in the contrast of the universalistio and the theocratic revelation of God and idea of religion, — only in the combination of ilelchise. dek and Abraham, of human culture and theocracy, civilization and churchdom (not civilization and Christianity, because Christianity embraces both, just as the religious consciousness of faith in the Old Covenant). Therefore it is worth the while to follow the change of the two names through the Old Testament beyond Exodus, vi. 3. We can only give hints for this. It is to be expected, accord- ing to our distinction, that the nniversalistic books, Koheleth, D.iniel, Jonah, have Elohim almost exclusively. And also that the strong theocratic historical books, Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, have mainly Jehovah. In the Proverbs of Solomon the wisdom of God is represented as tending from the founding of the world to tlieocracy {see ch. ix.) and to the founding of a right tlR-iicj-atic deportment; hence we find Jehovah. Also the book of Job, in its prosaio introduction, proceeds from the basis of the Jehovah faith ; it becomes, however, in its poeiio element nniversalistic with the name El Eloah. The change in the Psalms is remarkable. De- litzsch remarks on this point, p. 33 (comp. also Gesenius, Thesaurus) : " We meet in the Psalter with a similar appearance as discussed in my Syrnhnlm ad Psalmos illnstrandus (1846). The Psalter is divided into two halves, into Elohim-Psalms (Ps. 42-84), which mainly, and almost exclusively, use the name cnbt* and besides are fond of compound names of God, and into Je- hovah-Psalms, whith include these, and with few exeptions use the name Jehovah. To infer ing got the form and mnu>\ of a plural, grummatical euphony might, in a few cases, produce its syntactical connectioi with a plural verb or adjective. The idea of there hoing anythint? polytheistic in this common use of Elohim, even if we regard it aa a plural, is not only at war with the whole spirit of Genesis, but also with the inference to bo derived from all the Shemitic lanpruages. AUah in the Arabic, Kloha in the Syriac, are fdngular, like the Hebrew Eloah, aniy Mohatnmed, is not more monotheistic than as given tl. rough th*- Hebrew by the author of tlenesis. — T T..1 § 7. SOURCES AND COMPOSITION OF GENESIS. 113 different authors from the use of Elohim or Jeliovah, would here be an error; for though th« Asapli-Psahns are all Eluhim-Psaliiis, we have from David and the Korahites Psalms of Jeho- rah as well as of Elohim. One and the same autlior at one time (?) pleased himself in the use of the divine name Elohim and at another time in the use of the divine name Jehovah. Thia cannot be explained from any inner groimds lying in the contents of the Psalms. Ilengsten- berg explains the use of Elohim in the Psalms from this, namely, that in the Davidical-Solo> monian times, when the honoring of Jehovah was predominent in Israel, the absoluteness of ''ehovah wiis made prominent as against tlie heathen ; whereas in a later time (when even in Isruei itself the honoring of the heathen Elohim was pressing in), even the divine name Elohim became distasteful to the worshippers uf Jehovah. But this does not explain hciw just such and guoh psalms have the name Elohim." The Elohistic Psalms extend from the beginning of the second book of Psalms (xlii.) till towards the end of the third book (Ps. Ixxxiv. ; the end ia Ixxxix.). If we examine the Elohistic Psalms more closely, the universalistic feature of them soon meets us in manifold ways. Longing for the living God, Ps. xlii.; xliii. The contrast of the people's God with the heathen, Ps. xliv. ; xlv. ; xlvi. The calling of the heathen, Ps. xlvii., and the victory over their resistance, Ps. xlviii. ; xlix. A lesson for all nations in the fall of the godless, &c. That the love of both sacred names has induced the writers alternately to honor God under both, and to adorn themselves with both, as Delitzsch maintains, is not confirmed by the pas- sages quoted by him. For example: Gen. vii. 16 : They went in (into the ark) as Elohim (the God of prominent natural events) had commanded him, and Jehovah (the God of the covenant faithfulness, or of the yet to be delivered kingdom of God) shut him in. Genesis, xxvii. 27: " The smell of my son is as the siiiell of a field which Jehovah (the God of the theocratic inheritance) has blessed." Therefore "Elohim" (the God of every universal blessing of heaven and the world) " give thee of the dew of heaven, and the fatness of earth," &c. " Nations must serve thee." Ex. iii. 4 : " Then Jehovah (the covenant God founding the holy awe in Israel) saw that he turned aside to see, and Elohim (the God of the world-fice in the bush Israel) called unto him out of the midst of the bush." Still more clear is the distinction between the protect- ing Jeliovah and Elohim as ruling in the dispensations of nature. The temple is Jehovah's, the ark of the covenant Elohim's (the moral law embracing all mankind). 1 Kings, iii. 5 : The Lord appeared to Solomon; and God said, "Ask what I shall give thee; " because it is permitted hiia to ask for worldly things. The passage Ps. xlvii. 6 is explained by Ps. xlvii. 7. We would observe as especially significant, that Eve in her enthusiastic hope on the birth of Cain names Jehovah, but in her depression at the birth of Seth, Elohim, the God of the universal human blessing. In this spirit also Rachel speaks, oh. xxx., of Elohim's blessing the birth, while it ii Jehovah, the God of the theocratic blessing, who gives Leah her first theocratic sons. At Bethel, however, Jacob exclaims : Jehovah is in this place, meaning he who appears as the covenant God ; here is the house of God (Beth-El), and the gate of heaven. With the consciousness and significance of the distinction between the two names, is then also naturally connected the consciousness and significance of their combinations a& they so frequently occur in the Psalms and the Prophets. Moreover it must be remarked that the distinction of a twofold record in Genesis favors the originality of the Mosaic tradition rather than the supposition of a direct composition of it, in which naturally, along with the other indices of later additions, the recoidg lying at the base are also removed from their original sphere. But the question also arises on the distinction of the records, or in how far the same author at a later period of his life can have assumed modifica- tions of style which were not found in him at an earlier date. This transition of style to new oTraj 'kfyojj.fva in the process of composition, is mainly to be noticed in the letters of Paul. A relation similar with that which exists between Isa. i. ff. and Isa. xl. ff. could obtain between the Mosaic records before and after those appearings of Jehovah which form a turning-point in the life of Moses. In their respective places we will treat of the oTibx "ija (1 Mos. vi.) and the i.vba ,-n,-i' (oh. xvi. 7). 114 miRODDCTION TO GENESIS. B. The Cetticai. Tbsatises oh the Elohim axd Jebotah Sections in Genesis ahd at the BsoQfNnio or BxoDCt The Compodtion of Genesis. Various hypotheses: 1. The documentary hypothesis. Astbuo, physician of Louis XIV., published m Brussels, 1753, an article entitled: Conjectures sur les memoires originaui dont il parait que Mo'iae s'est servi pour composer le Here Oinese. He sought to prove that Moses Rirmed Genesis from an Elohim record and a Jehovah record, with the aid of ten Bmaller memoirs. Representatives of this view, under various modifications, were EicLhorn, Jlgen, Gramberg, Stiilielin (''Criticnl Investigations of Genesis," Basle, 1830), Hupfeld, Bohmer. 2. The fragmentary hypothesis. The basis of Genesis was nothing but single, small frag- mentary pieces. Michaelis, Jahn, Vater, Hartmann, Griinde. Various superscriptions, conclud- ing formulas, repetitions, and varieties of style. 3. The complementary hypothesis. The author of the Pentateuch, the Jehovist, had before him an older document, extending from the creation of the world to the death of Joshua, that of the Elohist, and remodeled and extended it. Ewald, de Wette (later view), Bleek, von Boh- len, Stahelin (later view), Tuch, &c. 4. Ewald's developed hypothesis. Designated by Delitzsch, as the crystallization hypothesis. Four constituent parts form mainly the basis of tlie Pentateuch: 1. the book of the covenant, written at the time of Samson ; 2. the book of the origins (Tholedoth), composed at the time of Solomon; 3. a prophetic narrator of the earliest histories, a citizen of the kingdom of Israel at the time of Elias or Joel ; 4. a second prophetic narrator from the period between 800 and 750. Ewald distinguishes two Elohists and two Jehovists. The fourth narrator divides him- self again into a fourth and fifth, and his compilation of the earlier books receives yet material additions at the time of the Jewish king Manasseh, and of the Jewish exile. It must be ob- served, that in comparison with these the critical hypotheses on the New Testament are always quite simple in their appearance, and that this has decidedly the character of a book-making hypothesis. 5. The hypothesis of original unity of Genesis (and of the books of the Pentateuch in com- mon). The Rabbins and the older theolojjians (with exception of Vitringa, Clericus, Richard Simon). Ewald: "The composition of Genesis," Braunschweig, 1823. Retracted since 1831 (see Bleek, p. 232). Sack, in the work previously quoted. Hengstenberc. : "The Antljenticity of the Pentateuch," 1S36 to 1839. Havernick, Ranke, Drechsler, Baumgarten, Welte, Kurtz (at an earlier date), Keil. 6. Modified complementary hypothesis. A middle standpoint between the older complementary hypothesis and the unity hypothesis has been taken by DelitzsDh, and after him by Kurtz (Vol. ii. of the history of the Old Covenant, p. 1855). According to the view of Delitzsch, the author of the Elo- hi.stio sections composed these first, and avoided, or at least seddom used, the name of Jehovali, until the passage Exodus vi. 2, where Jehovah declares that he was known to the fathers under the name of El Schailai, not under the name Jehovah. The name El Schadai formed in these sections a con- necting link between the name Elohim and Jehovah. The Elohistic parts are distinguished, however, from the later appearing Jehovistic ones, not merely by the diversity of their mmjCB of (Jod, but also through a series of otherwise peculiar expressions (.lee Delitzsch, p. 37). Ac- cording to this there is formed the following presentation : The nucleus of the Pentateuch is the scroll of the covenant. Exodus, xix.-xxiv , written by Moses himself. The remaining laws of the wilderness Moses gave orally, but they were written down by priests in whose calling it lay (Deut. xvii. 11 ; xxiv. 8; xxxiii. 10; Lev. x. 11 ; xv. 31). These parts were codified soon after the posHCBsion of the Holy Land. A man like Eleazer, llie son of Aaron, (Num. xxvi. 1: xxxi. 21), wrote the great work beginning with N-3 n'^tax^a, in which he took up the scroll of the covenant, and perliaps made hut a short report ot'thc last speeches of Moses, because Moses had written thein with his own hand. A second, as Joshua (iJeut. xxxii. 44; Jos. xxiv. 2G ; comp I Sam. X. 2.'5J, or one of those Elders on whom rested the spirit of Moses, comnleted this worb g 8. THEOLOGICAL AND HOMILETICAL LITERATURE OF GENESIS. lit and embodied in it the whole of Duuterouoray, which Moses bad mainly written himself, and •ndeed a Jehovistic recension of the whole (p 23), p. 38. The adherents of the complementary hypothesis lie under manifold imputations of having abandoned the presumption of Mosaic originals ; the adherents of the unity hypotliesis arf chargeable with permitting the canonical authorship to commence at the beginning withouD th« originals forming the basis. The hypothesis of Delitzsch is injured by tho improbable assiimp- tion that Deuteronomy is to be attributed to Moses iu great part, and amch more early and literally than the preceding books. On the contrary, we can by no means set aside the supposi- tion of the representatives of the unity hypothesis, that the names Elohim and Jehovah alter- nate with each other in consequence of their internal significance. We believe rather that this significance will receive new importance when we more clearly appreciate the contrast between the univerealistic and the theocratic designation of the Old Testament covenant God, of the covenant and the spirit. Without this contrast, the significant names yet want their substruc- tion. Delitzsch distinguishes thus : " This only is true, that the two narrators brin^' out diverse, yet equally authorized sides of the one truth of revelation. The Jehovist seizes with preference whatever brings out the world-historical position ami destiny of Israel, its mediating calling in the midst of the nations of the world, and the universalistic (!) tendency of revelation. He notes just those patriarchal promises of God, which extend beyond the possession of Canaan, and pronuunoe the blessing of all nations through the mediation of the patriarchs and their seed (ch. sii. 3, &c.). On the contrary all the promises of God, that kings will descend from the patriarchs, belong to the report of the Elohist (ch. xvii. 6, &c.). He has more to do with the priestly royal glory, which Israel has in itself, &c." This apyiears to us to be just about the opposite of the real state of the case. The universalistic relation is the relation of God to the Logos in the whole world, to the Sophia, to the godlike in the foundation of humanity and the creation, the circumferential form of revelation. The theocratic relation is the central form of revelation, its relation to the covenants, the theocracy, the historical api>earance of the kingdom of God. We leave it undecided, how far this contrast here also, separately taken, might give an insight into the dilference between the Elohistic and the Jehovistic Psalms. If Moses, as a learned man, according to the Egyptian cultivation of his time, and familiar with the art of writing, could write down the basis of his legislation, or could cause it to be written down (according to Bleek), then we may confidently distinguish two perinds iu the writing of Mo-es, the composition of Elohistic memorabilia before the new period of revelati.m (Gen. vi. 3), and Jehovistic memorabilia and laws after it. By considering the effect of Egyptian culture, we can easily explain how (apart from its great significance in itself) the memorabilin of the life of Joseph, on whose life-history reposed the origin of the nation in Egypt, and all right and title :il.el. >rainz, 1861. Niebuhr- Babylon 120 KTRODUCTION TO CEXESIS. Heathendom. Dollinger: Heathendom. Stiefelliagen. Writings of Lasanlx, Nfigelsbach. Wnttke, Mohler, and others. See Kurtz, p. 91. Fabri : The Rise of Heatljendom and th« Problem of Heathen Missions, Barmen, 1859, Lubker: Lectures on Civilization and Christian- ity, Hamburg, 1863. TWELFTH TO THIRTY-SIXTH CHAPTER OF GENESIS. THE BISTORT OF THE PATEIAE0H8. See Kurtz, pp. 104 and 116, especially 119 an J 129. Heidegger: Be historia sacra Patriar eharum, Eiercitationes selectae, Amsterdam, 1667. J. J. Hess: History of the Patriarchs, with maps, 2 vols. Zurich, 1776. Mel: The Life of the Patriarchs, 2 parts, Frankfort, 1714 (on the last Chapters of Genesis). A. Abraham. See Danz : Abraham, p. 14. Winer: Scrtptnral ffeal-leTicon. Biblical Dictionary, oy Zel- ler. Herzog : Theological Encyclopedia. So also tlie following names. Uoos: Footsteps of the Faith of Abraham in the Description-; of the Life of the Patriarchs and the Prophets. Newly published, Tubingen, 1837. Bachmann : Sermons on the History of Abraham. Passavant: Abraliam and Abraham's Children. By the author fif N.ienian, 2d ed. Basle, 1861. W. Heu- ser: Abraham's Doings, in 12 sermons. A parting Gift, Barmen, 1861. Boswinkel: Fourteen Sermons on the Life of Abraham, Barmen, Bertelsman. Bram : Traits of the Domestic Life of Abrah.im, Neukirchen and Solingen, 1855. — On the angel of the Lord. Knrtz, p. 144, and the treatise in its respective place. Ishmael. See Kurtz, p. 203. B. Isaac. See Kurtz, p. 203 ff. The Talmud accounts of him in Otho : Lexicon Talmud. Passages of the Koran in Hottinger's Biblioth. Orient. C. Jacob. The Blemng of Jacob. See Danz, p. 315. Jacob's History, by Seeger (in Klaiber's Studies i. iii. 60-81). G. D. Krummacher: Jacob's Contest and Victory, 4th ed. Elberfeld, 1857. Alting Schilo, Franeker, 1660. Chr. Schmidt, Giessen, 1793. Friedrich. Hoffmann (Andreas Wilhelm), Stahelin. Wer- lin, Zirkel, Petersen (see Danz: Genesis, and Winer i. p. 199). Diestel: The Blessing of Jacob, Braunschweig, Schwetsche, 1853. D. Joseph. See Danz, p. 815 and p. 4713. Winer: Biblical Dictionary. Zeller: Biblical Dictionary. Herzog. Felix Herder: The History of Joseph in Sermons, Zurich, 1784. Teachings from the History of Joseph. First part, Frankfurt on the Main, 1S16. i 9. THE FUNDAMENTAL THOUGHT AND DIVISION OF GENESIS. Under the univergo-cosmica! point of view, Genesis is divided into two main divisions: the listory of the primeval world before the flood (ch. i.-viii.) and the history of the theocrati wimeval period .iftcr the flood (ch. viii.-l.). Heidegger: Encliiridion; 1. J/istoria originis rerum omnium, ch. i. 11. 2. Historia miind% prioris, ch. iii.-viii. 8. Historia posteriorls mundi, ch. ix.-l. Delitzscli: "If we divide all biatory into the two great halves of a liistory of primeval time and a history of tiie mid-world, •eparated by the beginning of sin and the i)lan of redemption going into effect (Cocceius), Genesis embraces the complete hist'^ry of the early world (ch. i.-iii.). It also follows the history of th« g it. THB FUNDAMENTAL THOUGUT AND DIVISION UK UKXESIS. 121 after-world through three periods, whose first extends from the Fall to the Flood (ch. iv.-viii 14), the second from the covenant with Noah to the dispersion of the human race in nations and languages (oh. viii. 15-ch. xi.), the third from the choosing of Abraham to tlie settlement of the family of Jacob in Egypt (ch. xii.-l.). These first three periods are the first three stages of th« history of salvation, into which, through divine mercy, the world and the history of nations i» shaped " In the mean while the theocratic point of view predominates, and under it also Genesil appeiirs to fall firstly into two halves: The history of primal religion, from ch. i.-xi., and the history of the patriarchs, ch. xii.-l. Thus Kirohofer: Bibliology, p. 16 : " Genesis is consequently divided into general and special history." If wo look however more closely, there are three main divisions in contrast with each other 1. The history of the primeval world and earliest period of the human race, a« the history of the primal religion (or the Tholedoth of heaven and earth (Gen. ii. 4), and the Tholedoth of Adam (ch. V. 1) until the development of heathendom (ch. xii.)). 2. The history of the patriarchal faith or the religion of promise, or the Tholedoth of Shem, &c., to the Tholedoth of Jacob, from ch. xii.-ch. xxxvi. 43. 3. The history of the Genesis of the people of Israel in Egypt out of the twelve tribes of Israel: from the Thuledoti of Jacob, ch. xxxvii., to the death of Joseph in Egypt, under the prophetic iirospect of the return of Israel to Canaan (ch. 1. 26). Schneider: Oompendiuni of the Christian religion (Bielefeld, 1860): "We would divide Gen- esis most simply according to its five heroes: Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, did it not contain in itself a decimal division (the ten Tholedoth)." If we keep in view their ditferent relapses into sin and their turning again to redemption, it may be appropriate to d'stinguish : a. the foundation-laying in creation, ch. i. and ii. ; b. the gen- eral fall of man, ch. iii.-v. ; c. the fall of the first human race, ch. vi.-x. ; d. the building of the tower of Babel (heathendom and the patriarchal state), ch. xi.-xxxvi. ; e. tlie sin of the brothers of Joseph and its event, ch. xxxvii.-l. (Isaac's error and its event, an episode, ch. xxviii. -xxxvi.) The name Genesis, referring to the initial word of the book (r''":3S"'2) and to its foundation, may indicate in the first place the origin of the world and the human race. But we can also conclude from the frequent headings ■•Tholedoth" (p-nbir) which mark individual sections, that it is especially chosen in reference to the contents of the entire book, or the human origins in general (origin of sin, of judgment, salvation, final judgment, renewal of the world, heathen- dom, covenant religion, and the Israelitish nation). Hence Vaihinger (in Herzog's Beat- Lex icon) and Delitzsch in his Commentary have divided Genesis according to the separate Tholedoth. Delitzsch counts ten Tholedoth. 1. Tlioledoth of heaven and earth, ch. i. 1-ch. iv. 26 ; 2. Tho- ledoth of Adam, ch. v.-ch. vi. 8; 3. Tholedoth of Noah, ch. vi. 9-ch. ix. 29; 4. Tholedoth of the sons of Noah, ch. x. 1-ch. xi. 9; 5. Tholedoth of Shem, ch. xi 10-26; 6. Tholedolli of Terah, ch. xi. 27-ch. xxv. 11 ; 7. Tholedoth of Ishmael, ch. xxv. 12-18 ; 8. Tholedoth of Isaac, oh. xxv. 19-ch. XXXV. 29; 9. Tholedoth of Esau, ch. xxxvi. 10; 10. Tholedoth of Jacob, ch. xxxvii.-l. Besides the headings Tholedoth, ch. ii. 3 ; v. 1 ; vi. 9, &c., the fact, that the Bible tn. jughout has the point of view of the personal life, and that the Tholedoth as generations seem to cor- respond to it, would especially favor this divisicm. But in that case we should not, at least, speak of the Tholedoth of heaven and earth before the Tholedoth of Adam, as Delitzsch does. And it is just this Genesis of heaven and earth, which cannot properly be designated by the word Tholedoth, that has, nevertheless, mainly given to the book its name. We ought also to distinguish between the documentary genealogical foundations of Genesis, its ideal unitary com- position, and the ideal construction which proceeds from it. Therefore we seek sucn a divigioi, of Genesis as results from the actual distinction of its principal periods, and the essential arrange ments of these periods. 122 INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS. FIRST PEB.IOD. History of the primeval world, of the earliest period of the human race as history of the earliest religion till the development of lieathendom and its contrast in the budding patriarch- dom, ch. i.-xi. I. DIVISION. The Genesis of the world, of the contrast between heaven and earth, and of th« first man, ch. i. and ii. 1«< Section. Heaven, earth, and man. The physico-genetical creation and world development, ch. i.-ch. ii. 3. '2d Section. Man, Paradise, tlie pair, and the institutions of Paradise. The reversed principial development, proceeding from man. The symbol of the Tree of Life, ch. ii. 4r-25. II. DIVISION. The Genesis of the world-history, of the temptation, of the sin of man, of the judgment, of death, of salvation, of the contrast between a divine and worldly direc- tion in humanity, of the common ruin. The anomism of antediluvian sin, cli. iii. 1-ch. vi. r. \8t Section. The Lost Paradise, ch. iii. 2, Eph. iii. 9, Kan/fjTiVSdt, Heb. xi. 3) as the peculiar work of the Logos, or Word, which gives form and life, and, in this sense, its higher or more real being, to this conceptionless first matter, or first force. This was the great work, if we may judge by the importance the Scripture attaches to it ; this was pre-eminently the work of creation as carried on by the artistic Wisdom, Prov. viii. 22-.'?2 ; and to this well corresponds what is said, John i. 3, 4, according to the old patris- tic division and interpretatior of the passage, o yiynviv in nvna fw^ t'l/, " that which was made (or orii^mated) in Him was life "—became life in Him. It is easy to see what is prominent in the Bible. It is not God the first motion, or the first force, or the first cause, or even as the oriRin- PART I.— ESSENTUL IDEAS Of CREATION 12W ator of force and matter, but God the Great Arcliitect; this is the idea which the Scriptnr* languaiie aims to impress so as to make it a living and controlling power in the soul, fiiving life and value to the otiier ideas, and preventing them from becoming mere scientific abstractions on the one hand, or dead naturalistic or pantheistic notions on the other. The abstract notioa is ever assumed in the Bible as included in its creative representations, whilst it makes vivid the other and greater thought as the quickening [lower of all personal theistio conceptions. The only notion we can form of matter in its lowest or primal entity is that of resistance i space, or the furnishing bare sensation to a supposed sentiency, without anything beyond it, either as form for the intellect, or iis qualifying variety for the sense. The manner of putting thia forth, we may not know, but that does not give it the higher rank. Taken as a fact it is th« lowest thing in the scale of the divine works, if we may be allowed to make any relative com- parisons among tljem. It is simply an exercise of the divine strength. On the other hand, the giving form to matter, which is so clearly and sublimely revealed as the true creative stage, is the work of the Divine Wisdom, and might be supposed worthy of God, as an exercise of his infinite intelligence, even if it had no other than an artistic end. The carrying these forms into the region of the moral, or the impressing moral designs upon them — in other words, building the world as the abode of life and the residence of moral and spiritual beings capable of witness ing and declaring the glory of the Creator — is the work of the divine Love. In reversing this scale of dignities, the actually lower work comes to be regarded as the higher and the greater merely because it is the more remote from us. Nothing but some such feeling as this could have led to the strong desire, in modern times, of finding here a revelation of the metaphysical, as though this alone were creation proper, or as though the divine power and wisdom were not even more sublimely manifested in the creative evolution and formation of the physical. The painting is a much greater and Iiigher creation than the canvas, even though the making of both were admitted as belonging to the same artist. In discussing these questions exegetically much also depends on the correct interpretation of ihe substantive verb nir'n (and was) in the second verse. Does it denote a time cotemporaneoua with the verb x-ia in the first verse, or does it denote something succeeding, either as state or event, — namely, that the earth and heaven which had been created by a distinct and separate act there related, was afterwards (whether as having been left so, or as having become so by some cause or causes not mentioned) tohu and bohu ? Or does it mean (as the .Jewish authorities maintain) that this condition, whose time is denoted by nn-'n, was the beginning of the creation described, or the clironological d.ite when this creation (called the Mosaic) began ? In other words, can the expression nrr'n •,—xm denote, grammatically, a succeeding instead of a cotemporaneous event? Certainly the far more usual form, if an after event, or an after state, had been intended, wou^d have been Tin^, with "i conversive, as in all the steps following, each distinctly marking succession, or one event coming out of and after another, as -^n^' hnz^^ — • SI""" — XT'! — "Jjr^l — iBX-'i and so throughout. The usage in this very chapter is sufficient to establish the rule, even if it were not so common everywhere else when a series of successive acts iire thus laid down. Another question arises. Was all the creation that Moses intends to describe intra sex dies, within six days, or was that part mentioned in the first verse extra dies, as it must be if the six days chronologically began in the evening, that is, in the tohu and bohu, or when darkness was npon the face of the deep ? But such exclusion would seem to be in the face of the express declaration in the fourth commandment : '" in six days (within six dnys) God created the heavens and the eartli." If, then, there was anything extra dies, or before the chronological beginning of the first day, which is so distinctly marked by its evening, it could not be intended here as part of this account; for, from the time God began this creative work (wh.ntever it might include) until he rested in the evening after the sixth, there were six days, be they long or short, and no more. The reasoning is plain. The six days began with the evening of the tohu, followed by the ^^s-', or command for the shining of the light, which was the first act in the formation of the heavens and tlie earth afterwards described. If, then, the first verse denotes a beginning before thb. it mast have been extra sex dies. If we would bring it within, then it must ht 9 130 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS. legarded as caption to the whole account, or as a summary of the process afterwards in detail se* forth. If it is without, then what is meant by the heavens and the earth (especially the eartli( therein mentioned? Or it might be asked (and it would be very difficult to answer the question) 'vhat part of the first day, or how are we to get any part of the first day, or first night, betweer the x-i: of the first verse and the nrr'n of the second ? Again — in the expression nn"'n r-xm, it is to be noted that the subject stands befr^e the Terb, which makes it empharic, or is designed to call atteutiun to it as being the very same earti Inentiiined before, and whose creation is now going to be more particularly described : and a for the earth (or, but as for the earth, as there is abundant authority for rendering the particle 1), it was so and so, — in such a condition, as tliough to separate it from the heavens (the earth heavens) which is not created, th?t is, divided from the general mass, until the second day, when God first named it historically by calling the firmament heaven. But can we conclusively rest on such a grammatical exegesis ? Certainly not. The usual law of the Hebrew tenses, though strongly favoring it (aided as it is by the other considerations mentioned), is not sufficiently fixed and without exceptions, seeming or real, to warrant any inter- preter in speaking positively from such data alone; hut certainly this applies with still greater force to those who would be dogmatically positive in ni:iintaiaingtlie other view. Grammatical exegesis, even when most thoroughly pursued, may fail of reaching the absolute trutli, fur that truth may be in itself ineftable. It is, liowever, the true way, and the only way, of getting at the order of the conceptions as they existed, or as they arose, in tlie mind of the writer ; and this is of the utmost value, even though it may have to be determined by the bare collocation of a word or a particle. Still, the conception is itself but a species of language representing the idea even as it is itself represented by the words. It is the last thing in language to which we can reach, and we must take it as standing most immediately, if not most infallibly, for the truth that lies still behind it. "And darkness was upon the face of the deep," the niiin, or formless waste. Darkness is nothing of itself, yet still it denotes something more than a mere negation, or a mere absence. It indicates rather the obstruction of something that already /«. As its Hebrew name implies (with the slightest etymological variation ^ian for "i'rn), it is a holding back, like the Latin tene- brm from teneo (the m in vnibrce, e?nbrcB, being phonetically lost in its kindred labial b, as in lambda, labda), and the Greek (tkoVos with the same ultimate radix (8K=nsK). This darkness was chronologically the first or commencmg night of the Uexaemeron, just as the light that follows is, beyond all question, the first morning of the first day. It was even then the shadow of some- thing coming (its skadus, Gothic, or shade, same as Greek sk, o-kotos). During all this night it was the obstruction of a power, or the sign of such obstruction, until the brooding spirit loosed its a-fipiti (6(t>nv, or "chains of darkness" (2 Pet. ii. 4), and the voice of the Word was heard com- manding that power to come forth. Nothing is more certain than that in the Mosaic account tlie light there mentioned comes phenomenally, and historically, after the darkness, and even after the water of the teliom, whether we regard it as gas-form or liquid-form, that is, water proper, according to Lange's distinction. What a most serious difficulty is this for those who say that the Mosaic account in its first mention of light has respect to its primal original, or first being, — whetlier it be the material or dynamical entity merely, or that glorious fo)-m of power which is called God's garment (Ps. civ. 2), and in whicli he is said to dwell (1 Tim. vi. 16) as in an element most real yet unajiproachablo by human vision ! Can we doubt that light was even then a latent power in the tehom liefore it was commanded " to .shine out of darkness," ik ays, are mere vicissitudines coeli, mere changes in the positions of the heavenly bodies, and not spatia morarum or evolutions in nature belonging to a higher chronology, and marking their epochs by a law of inward change instead of incidental outward measurements. As to how long or how short they were he gives no opinion, but contents himself with maintaining that day is not a name of duration ; the evenings and the mornings are to be regarded not so much in respect to the passing of time (temporis prmteritioneni), as to their marking the boundaries of a period- ical work or evolution, per queruiam terminum quo intelligitur quovsque sit natural propriut modus, ei unde sit naturae alterins exordium. This is not a metaphorical, but the real and proper sense ot the word day — the most real and proper sense, the original sense, in fact, inasmuch as it conuins the essential idea of cyclicity or rounded periodicity, or self-completed time, without any ot the mere accidents that belong to the outwardly measured sohir or planetary epochs, be they lodger or shorter: ac sic unus est dies (one day, a day by itself) non istorum dierum intel ligendijij quos videmus eircuitu solis determinari atque numerari, sed alio quodam modo. It is sometimes said, if Moses did not intend the common solar day here, why did he not give us some intimation to that effect? The devout, scripture-loving and scripture-revering Augustine saw SUCH intimations in abundance, saw them nn the verv face of the account. There wa>^ no doubt-raising science then, nor anything in jihilosophy, that drove this most profound yet most humble and truth-seeking mind to such conclusions. He could not read the first of Genesis and 'iiink of ordinary days. It was the wondrous style of the narrative tliat affected him, the wondrous nature of the events and times narrated ; it was the impression of strangeness, of vast- ness, as boming directly from the account itself, but which so escapes the notice of unthinking, ordinary i-eaders. Wonderful things are told out of the common use of language, and therefore common rurms are to be taken in their widest compass, and in their essentinl instead of tlieir accidental laea. It is the same feeling that affects us when we contemplate the language of prophecy, or that which is applied to the closing period, or great day of the world's eschatcilogy. No better term could be used for the creative mnrce, pauses, or successive natures, as Augustine styles them; and so no better words than evening and morning could be used for the antithetical vicissitudes through which these successions were introduced. See Augustine wherever the iubject comes up, in his books De Genesi ad Literam, Contra ilanichceos. and De Ciritate Dei. Carrying along with us thes? thoughts of the great father, we get a mode of exegesis which IB most satisfactory in itself, and which need not fear the assaults of any science. It transcend* icience ; it cannot possibly have any collision with it, and can, therefore, never have any need of what is called reconciliation. It treats of origins or beginnings in nature, — things to which science cai. never reach. It is a mode of exegesis most satisfactory as being most exclusive,--that is. 132 SPEOUL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENhSlS. from the very nature of the things related, based directly on the account itaelf as mainly aa< lecessarily self-interpreting. Notions in science, notions in philosophy or in theology, tliat stand outside of it, and even etymologies or modes of naming that become fixed in language at later periods, may suggest ideas, but they are not to control tlie interpretation of a document 10 isolated from all other writings and of such exceeding antiquity. As with the account as a whole, so is it, in great measure, with each part. It interprets itself Thns in the first day : each name is so connected with the others as to present little cr no difBculty in determining their general meaning in such relation, though on a scale which, of itself, separates them f om their ordinary use in other applications. Keep within the account and there is light; the obscurity and the difficulty increase when we res(irt to helps outside of it. If we seek for the meanings of yom, ereb, bo(ier, day, evening, and morning, we tind them in the very order, and mutually interpreting significance, of the facts presented. These are clew as facts, however ineffable in theii' comparative magnitude and evolving causalities. "And the earth was tohu and bohu." What was that? It was the opposite of the form- assuming conditions and evolutions immediately afterwards described. !inn occurs, besides this, eighteen times in the Old Testament, but the general idea, to which we are led by the context and contrasts here, furnishes the best exposition of their special applications elsewhere. It is a striking illustration of what may seem a paradox to some minds, but which is, nevertheless, s fundamental law of language, that the general precedes tlie particular in the naming of things. Tlie word is applied to a desolate city, Isai. xxiv. 10; xxxiv. 11, to a desert in which the waters evaporate and disappear. Job vi. 18, to a wilderness in which there is no way, -\-n xb inn, Job xii. 2i, Psalms cvii. 40, to the earth and heavens going back to ruin, as seen in the prophetic vision, Jerem. iv. 23: "I saw the mountains, and they were trembling, and all the hills were moving fast ; I looked and behold there was no man, and all the birds of the heavens were gone ; 1 beheld the earth, it was tohu and holm ; I looked to the heavens, there was no light." Hence its moral applications, Isaiah xli. 29; xxix. 21 ; and especially Isaiah xliv. 9; idolatry is moral con- fusion, an obliteration of all moral forms and distinctions. These places, instead of being necessary to explain Gen. i. 2, get their meaning from it. The first is lexically the key passage. The words, however, that immediately follow are, to some extent, an exegesis of these names. And dark- ness was npon the face of the deep. It was formlessness in its two modes of invisibility and indivisibleness. It was an undistinguishable wasteness. There was no liglit whereby to see, and there was a want of that division and separation into distinct objects, without which there is no true visibility, even if the light were present. Hence the LXX. well renders ■rn^'i inn lioparof Kn\ attnTao-itf I'aoTor, invisible and unfirmed. Next, we have the first mention of the separating, fonn- giving power. — "The Ruah Elohim, the Spirit of God, was brooding upon the waters." Then comes tlie Word, and morning breaks. Light is the first separation. It is divided/wOT the darkness, which ^hows that it had before existed in the tohu, and in combination with it. And (Jod calls it day whilst the former state he calls night. It is his own naming, and we must take it as uur guide in the interpretation of the words. It is not any duration, but the phenomenon, the appearing itself, that is first called day. Then the term is used for a period, to denote the whole event, or the whole first cycle of events, with its two great antithetical parts. And there was an evening and there was a mnrniny, one day. We hiok into the account to see what corresponds to this naming. What was the niglit? Certainly tlie darkness on the face of the waters. What was the morning? Certainly the light that followed the brooding spirit and the comiiianding word. How long was the day? IIow long the night, or the darkness? The account tells us nothing about it. There is something on its face which seems to repel any such question. The whole spirit and style of the account are at war with tlie narrowness and arbitrariness of any such computation. Wliere are we to get twelve liours for this first night? Where is the point of commenceinent, when darkness heijan to he on the face of the waters? All is vast, sublime, vmrneasurable. The time is as formless as the material. It has indeed a chronology, but on (.iiother scale than ttiat which was afterwards appointed (v. 14) to regulate the history of 8 Cfjmpleted world with its sky-gazing human inhabitant. One who thinks seriously on the diffi •vAtj of accommodating this first great day t^ p twenty-four hours, as we now measure them, needs PART II.— THE HEXAEMEKO.N, uK THE CREATIVE DaYS. 13? ao other argument. And yet the decision iiere settles the whole question. This first day is th« model, in this respect, for all tlie rest. There is certainly no determined time here, unless wt assume that a fixed duration, as now measured by the sun, is not merely an incident, but th€ essential .ind unchangeable idea of the word day, never departing from it, whatever may be the condition and circumstances to which it is applied. And for this, neither the essential laws of language, nor the usages of language, give us any authority, whilst everything looks tlie otlier way. All is indefinite except the fact of the great separation accomplished, « ith its two con- trasted states and one completed period, to which the names ereb, hoqer, yom, evening, morning, day, are respectively given. Our English translation of the closing formula is deficient. It fails to present the reason of its own introduction, and the relation it bears to what preceded: "And t/ie evening and the morning were,^' — there is no article to justify this; there is no mention of evening and morning before to which it might be supposed to refer. The evening ami the morning may indeed be said to have made the day quantitively, but that is not what is here expressed; otherwise the verb should liave been plural, as in ch. ii. 24, nns "'r:b i^n, " tliey shall be one flesh." Neither is day the predicate after inii, but stands by itself as the time when. The Hebrew, to correspond to the English as given in our version, would be ■irx ST' ~p:m mrn 1•'r\^^. The true rendering is: ''and there was an evening, and there was a morning, the first day." So theSyriac and the Septuagint: xai lyiveTo ia-nepn rai f'yfi'ero npwi. In like manner Maimoiiides: "and there was an evening and there was a morning of the first day." But why is the assertion made here, and what is its force ? It is not a mere tautology, such as our English version would seem to make it. It is exegetical ; it is designed to give ua an intimation of something strange and peculiar in the language, and to explain its application. This ante-solar day, marked by no sunrising or sunsetting, or any astronomical measurement, and without any oomputetl duration, had still an evening and a morning of its own, and might, therefore, be justly called a day. What this evening and morning were, is left for the reader t( discover in the account itself. As applied to a supposed ordinary day, the assertion, especially as it reads in our version, would have little or no discoverable force. On the other supposition, it has a most emphatic meaning, and this we may regard as the reason of its formal utterance, and its solemn repetition at the close of each similar period. In a similar manner they all had an evening and a morning, however strange it might seem, without a shining sun. Each is marked by tlie same great antithetical distinction; each has a new appearing; but as this is somewhat dift'erent in each creative stage, so is there a demand in each for the same essential announce- ment. And there was an evening, and there was a morning, second day, — third day, — fourth day, and so on. The clear apprehension of the first day opens up all the rest. The same exegesis would bear repetition in every one. " And God said : ' Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters^ and led it be a dividing between the waters and the w.aters, &c. ; ' and it was so ; and Gud Cidled the firmament heaven ; and there was an evening, and there was a morning, day second." We look back to find them. Where was the morning here? It was this second dividing and the appearing of this new glory as its result. It is the sky, the atmosphere, with its auroral light. It is the causality represented in this purely phenomenal language by which Moses describes it, according to the onceptions he had of it, and whicli no more guarantees any vulgar notion, than it dnes any science or philosophy, perfect or imperfect, that might be brought to explain it. The more cle.ar determines that which is less so. The new appearing of the firmament being the morning, that from which it had been divided, or that preceding state in which the earth had been left after the separation of the light, and in which the fluid masses of air and water yet remained in their chaotic formations, is the night. And so, as the formula seems to imply, each time it is repeated ; in this way there wsis also an evening and there was a morning, second day, — in this way, or the only way that exegesis will allow ; for there was no visible sunrising or sunsetting, no astronomical measurements to make a morning and an evening of any other kind. The ap])earing of the dry land as it rose out of the waters, and the quick growth of bloom- mg vegetation that covered it, was the third morning. And then that scene of glory, the first appearing of the sun, moon, and stars in the firmament, now prepared for their revelation, —thit 134 SPECIAL INTRODUOTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER Of GENESIS. was the fourth great morning to which the name is given, and not to any particular rising of th» BUD in the east as the beginning of a common day. As there had been a commencement of light of life, so now there is a commencement of astronomical time with its subordinate ])eriods of sun-divided days, not to be confounded, as Augustine says, with the great God-divided days of ■vhich the fourth was one as well as the rest. Life moving in the waters, and soaring in the air, this was the fifth appearing; and so, according to tbe ever-preserved analogy, the fifth great oiorning of the world. Ag;iin a solemn pause, with nature left to its repose, how long or short is not revealed, and the sixth morning brealis. It is the latter portion of the sixth day. Now man appears, whether in its earlier or later stage. He is snrrounded by the animal world, over which he is to exercise his more immediate doujiuion. The seventh is the morning of the divine rest. The evening that precedes is not named in the first chapter, but perhaps we may find it in the supplementary account of the second, where there are mentioned two remarkable evolutions that seem to have no other period to which they can be assigned. They are the naming of things, or the divine aiding the human in the development of language, and that mysterious sleep of humanity (was it long or short?) in which by a process most concisely symbolized, but utterly inefiable in respect to the manner, the female human is brought out as the closing work, and man awakes complete in the likeness of God. " In the image of God created he him ; male and female created he them.'''' It may be said that such a representation seems to make the days run into each other. This may be admitted without regarding it as any valid objection. The darkness still left is the remains, gradually diminishing, of the primeval chaos. Each night is a daughter of the ancient Nos, whilst each new morning is a rising into a higher light. In other words, the evening to each day, though still a disorder and a darkness, is a diminution of the darkness that went before, whilst the positive light of each new morning continues on, adding its glory to the mornings that follow, and " shining more and more unto the ci^n •psj, the perfect day," or perfection of the day (Prov. iv. 18), tlie finished and finishing day — the all-including day, mentioned Gen. ii. 4, as the day wlien God made the heavens and the earth. And so, as Lange observes (and it is a most important remark, both for the scientific and scriptural view), each is " a glory that ex- celleth," but still a building on, and a carrying on, the energies that preceded. Each is a new swell of the mighty organ, combining all the former tones, and raising them to a higher and still higher chorus, until The diapason closes full on man. Each day is a new beginning, bringing out a new state of things to be blessed, or called good but it is not nece-.?arily a finishing of that work until the "heavens and earth are finished with all their hosts," and there is pronounced that closing benediction (tx's z^:;, all good, " very good ") which ushers in the sabliath. Each day, as a beginning by itself, contains the incipient powers and elements of its peculiar work, but does not exhaust those energies. The light ia still evolving in the second day ; tlie fluids are still parting in the third ; the firmament, though having its auroral light before, is becoming still brighter in the fourth ; vegetable and aninial life are coming to still greater perfection in the fifth and sixth. May not the same be said of man? On the sixth day, his "bringing into the kosmos" be- comes complete ; the divine allocution, " Let us make man," receives its accomplishment, and the process Ijy which his material and physical structure is educed from the earth is finished; but may we not suppose that the preparation for this last and crowning work, and so the work itself, runs through all the previous cycles? " Thine eyes did see my substance yet unfinished, and in thy book all my {members) were written, the days they were fashioned, when there was not one in them," Ps. cxxxix. 16. This remarkable passage may apply primarily to the individual genera- tion ; it doubtless includes it ; and yet there is something about it which seems to indicate a widei and a deeper application to the origin of our generic physical humanity, and to its first germ ci material, as it lay in the formlessness of the cliaos. ^ne Septuagint has rendered ^oba (Ps. cxxxix. 16) by a word very similar to that by which il PART m.— ALLUSIONS TO THE SIX DAYS IN OTHER PARTS OF THE UIBLE 13: describes the tohu, dKaTtpyaaniv IJ.UV, my unformed or unwrought— Vulgate: imper/eetum meum. my unmade. i5ut the most striking resemblance is suggested by the ca"', the days, which oni translators have rendered 'in continuance," thereby greatly impairing the furoe and significanc* of the language. " Thine eyes saw it then unfinished," during all the days in which it was receiv- ing formal ion, 1131 o^a", when ihey were being formed, or written down in thy book, ona injt xb\ These last words liave puzzled all the commentators. If the passage may be referred to the primal formation of humanity, then it would be, not only a fair view, but even the most legitimate one, grammatically, to refer nnx, as also the pronoun in ona to o^v just preceding — '■^during the days they were formed, and even when there was no one (no first day) among them." "Even before the day" (compare Isaiah xliii. 13) God was writing or preparing this book of the human record ; it dates from the very foundation of the world — Epii. i. 4, Heb. iv. 3, Rev. xiii. 8. The full formation of man in the sixth day does not oppose the idea that the powers and evolutions of matter that were finally sublimated into the imperishable germ of the human body, and the types from lower forms that finally went into the human physical constitution, were being prepared during all the days. This was his being farmed out of the earth, that is, out of nature in its evolving series. Here, too, it may be said (though with the difiidence that becomes every exegetioal attempt to penetrate these creative mysteries), we have some liglit upon that dark and puzzling language, '' when I was made in secret and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth," Ps. cxxxix. 15 — i/i. inferioribus terr(e, — in profundissimia naturce. The common explanation that refers this language to the maternal womb does not satisfy, and it has no exegetioal authority in any similar use of such a metaphor in the Bible Hebrew. It becomes more easy, if we regard it as the womb of nature, the earth out of which the Lord God formed man. In the language, too, of the thirteenth verse "'JSon (compare Ezek. xxviii. 14, 16 — 21"id nsion — eVio-Kiao-fi, Luke i. 35), "thou didst overshadow me in my mother's womb," there is a striking resemblance to the image of the spirit brooding or hovering over the formless tehom. It is not strange that the author of this most sublime Psalm should have had in view, either primarily or suggestively, this remoter generation. Man, generically, in his appointment to dominion, is clearly the subject of Psalm viii. 4, 5, 6; why should his generic origination be thought too remote an idea for the profound and contemplative cxxxixth? PART III. ALLUSIONS TO THE SIX DAYS IN OTHER PARTS OF THE BIBLE. The most clear and direct is found in the Fourth Commandment, Exod. xx. 11 : "Six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work, for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth." This language is held to be conclusive evidence of the latter having been ordinary days. They are of the same kind, it is said, or they would not have been put in such immediate connection. There could not be such a sudden change or rise in the meaning. This looks plausible, but a careful study shows that there is something more than first strikes us. It might be replied that there is uo ditference of radical idea — which is essentially preserved, and without any metaphor in both uses — but a vast difference in the scale. There is, however, a more definite answer furnished specially by the text itself, and suggested immediately by the objectors' own method of reasoning. God's days of working, it is said, must be the same with man's days of working, because they are mentioned in such close connection. Then God's work and man's work must »lso be the same, or on the same grade for a similar reason. The Hebrew word is the same for both: "In six days shalt thou labor and do (r''r~) aU thy «iort; for in six days the Lord made -r" made, wrought) heaven and earth." Is tliere uo transition here to a higher idea? And «o of the resting : "The seventh shall be to thee a sabbath (r:o, a rest), for the Lord thy God rested (njii) on the seventh day," — words of the same general import, but the less solemn ot more human term here applied to Deity. What a difference there must have been between God'r 136 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS. trork anil man's work, — above all, between God's ineffable repose and the rest demanded fi>i human weariness. Must we not carry the same difference into the times, and make a similai 'Jiefiable distinction between the divine working-days and the human working-days, — the God divided days, as Augustine calls them, and " the sun-divided days," afterwards appointed to us for " signs, and for seasons, and for days, and for years," of our lower chronology? Such a point- ing *D a higher scale is also represented in the septennial sabbath, and in the great jubilee period of seve7i times seven. They expand upwards and outwards like a series of concentric circles, but the greatest of them is still a sign of something greater ; and how would they all collapse, and lose their sublime import, if we regard their antitype as less than themselves, or, in fact, no greater than their least ! The other analogy, instead of being forced, has in it the highest reason. It is the true and effective order of contemplation. The lower, or earthly, day is mado a memorial of the higher. "We are called to remember by it. In six (human) days do all thy work ; for in six (divine) days the Lord made heaven and earth. The juxtaposition of the words, and tlie graduated correspondence which the mind is compelled to make, aid the reminiscence of the higlier idea. An arc of a degree on tlie small eartldy circle represents a vastly wider arc as measured on the celestial sphere. A sign of our swiftly passing times corresponds to one inetiably greater in the higher chronology of world-movements, where one day is a thousand years, and the years are reckoned from 01am to 01am (Ps. xc. 2), whilst the Olams themselvep become units of measurement (aiii/es riov nlavav) to tlie Malcuth col Olamini,* or •' kingdom of all eternities," Psalm cxlv. 18, and 1 Tim. i. 17. There is a harmony in this which is not only sublimely rational, but truly Biblical. It is the manner ui the Scriptures thus to make times and things on earth representatives, or under-types, of things in the heavens, — uTroSfi'-y/juTn rav fV Ttiii uvjiai'uU, Heb. ix. 23. Viewed from such a standpoint these parallelisms in the language of the Fourth Commandment suggest of themselves a vast difference between the divine and the human days, even if it were the only argument the Bible furnished for that purpose. As the work to the worli, as the rest to the rest, so are the times to the times. But what was the impression on the ancient Jewish mind? It is important to understand this, if we can. Had the Jews commonly conceived of these creative days as being of the ordinary kind, could the fact have been so utterly uanoiiced in the frequent references we find to the account of creation, and the frequent use of its imagery, in the Ilebrev poetry. Almost all the other wonders of the narrative are alluded to in Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Isaiah, Amos, and such passages in the historical books as Nehemiali ix. G. Every other striking feature of the account is dwelt upon but this wondrous brevity, the greatest marvel of them all, as it would impress itself upon the mere human imagination picturing it on its sense-scale. All creation begun and finished in six solar days! The earth, the air and seas, with all their swarming splieres of life, the hosts of heaven, sun, moon, and stars, angels and men, all called from non-existence, from nothingness we may say, and their evolution completed in one week, such weeks as those that are now so rapidly passing away! — a week measured, as to extent, by our present time-scale, though the index of that scale — and this adils still to the wonder— had not yet been set in its commencing stages. It is hard to believe this. Not the fact itself, we mean, of such a creation, — for there is nothing repugnant to reason cither in its shortness or its instantaneousness, if God had so willed it — out the utter silence respecting such a wonder in every other part of tlie Bible. There must have been something in the most ancient conceptions of time, especially of seonicor world-times, that led to this. It is shown by their use of the great Olamic plurals before referred to, and the transfer of tlie same usage to the aaoiis of the New Testament. Our most modern thought of eternity is that of blank, undivided duration, ante-mundane and po^t-mnndane, with only a short week (measured, too, on the scale of the thing yet uncreated), and the brief secular human history intervening like a narrow istlimus between two unmeasured and iiiimeasur ible oceans. Without our saying which is the true view, it may with great confidence be mair- tained that a mode of thinking and conceiving, so blank in the one aspect, and so narrow in the * C"iwb> bD r"::bT3. Ps. cxlv. 13. Our translators have rendered this, cuer/asiin^ ftm^dom. It is a spocimen ol th« (Qunuor in which these mighty Hehrew pluralities are covered up, and their vast significance obscured by vague and coo *epti?&l0i8 temu. FART 111.— AlXaSIONS TO THE .SIX DAYS IN OTHER PARTS OK THE BIBLE. l;{', otLer, would never have given rise to such an Olaiuio language (if we may call it so) as w« actually find in our Hebrew Bible, even in its most ancient parts. The very fact that oui modern translation everywhere avoids expressing, or covers up these Olamic and £Bouio plurals shows the change in the modern conception. Our authorized version is more detective her« than the old WicklifFe, which being made irom the Vulgate, resembles more in this the old versions. The Jewish mind, prophetical, contemplative, and poetical, seems always to liave conceived of creation as va^t, indefinite, and most ancient. We see this especially in that sublime passage Prov. viii. 22 : " The Lord possessed me," says the eternal Logos, or Wisdo.n, ym iv^p-Q " from the antiquities of the earth," — as though tliat, instead of being abnut three thousand years and one week over, were the remotest conception to which the human mind could reach. I was with Hiin, cv — ni',— day — day — day after day, even with "the Ancient of d&ys,'' bi-fore each of his '• works of old." Before the tehom, before the springing of the fountains, before the mountains were settled, before the hills arose, before the b:n n"lES ITX", or prime\ al dust of the world, — when be was preparing the lieavens, when he was setting a compass upon the face of the deep, wlien he made the rakia, or established the clouds to stand above, when he made strong the fountains of the deep, and put his law upon the sea; during all this time I was there, yom, yum ; I was tlie Architect (the Mediator, 6 KaTapria-Tiip, as yo}t should be rendered, aee Heb. xi. 3), rejoicing always before Him. But the greatest joy of the Logos was in the human creation, "My delight was in the Sons of Ada'ii," — he "loved us before the foundatiims of the world." How it fills the mind to overflowing with its ever-ascending, ever-expanding climaxes, Its mighty preparations, and preparations for preparations! How it goes continually back to the more and more remote! How it seems ti) tax language to convey a conception of vast and ineffable antiquities! What a chain of sequences! If we would fix it still more impressively on the mind, in one all-embracing declaration, turn to Hebrews si. 3 : " By faith we understand that the worlds were formed {KarripTiaZai. rovs alojvai) by the Word of God." How has it escaped 80 many commentators here, that the word f jr worlds is not Knirpovs, worlds of space, and never used thus in the plural, but alwvas, corresponding to the Hebrew n^'abs, and presenting an idea unknown to its classical usage, or worlds in time? "By faith we understand tiiat the ages, the eternities, the sfecula, or great world-time)^ were mediated (KarT/pTiVSji), or put in order, by the Word of God." There is an allusion to the creative days in Micah v. 1, although it is unnecessarily obscured in our Engish version: "And thou Bethlehem Epbratah, — out of thee shall He come forth whose goings forth have been of old,/roni the days of eternity" — or "from the days of the world " : obis ^O'la, dn-' np^^s e'^ fifj.epati aiMi/os, Vulg. : egressus ejiis ah initio, a diebus eternitatis. Both of these expressions, nip^ and obis ■'•o'^, may denote an ancient time generall.v in the history of the earth, or of the chosen people, as in Isaiah Ixiii. 9, 11, Micah vii. 20; but here, if the passage refers to the Logos, as it is understood by all Christian commentators, tlie reference to the still greater antiquity of the creative times, or the creative days, is unmistakable. It is the contrast between the humble going forth at Bethlehem, and those ancient outgoings of the Word, which are recorded each day in the First of Genesis, from the first emphatic ■nos"'! of ve". 3, until the crowning one, ver. 26, where the plural is used in the solemn allocution mx narj oTibs -iiax", " and God siid. Let us make man." Thus regarded, the parallelism between it and Prov. viii. and Hebrews xi. 3, seems very clear. We need only revert to the (vell-known fact, that the ancient Targumists or paraphrasts explain the the impression is not one of brevity. There is order here, succession and evolution on a vast ■cale ; but no intimation of a crowding into times out of harmony with the conception of the works, or the scale of duration which the conceptual truthfulness of the picture demands. If we had nothing but this passage, no one would think of solar days in connection with its great transitions. Now, what we want to get at is the thought of the writer, the subjective state out of which arose such language and such a mode of conceivvng. We study him as a very old interpreter of Gen. i., who is the best witness to us of the ancient feeling. Rationalizing com- mentators rec ignize here the creative days, but they somehow fail to see that the writer's con- ception of the work, and his manner of setting forth the vastness and sublimity of its successions, are not easily reconciled with the notion of common solar days, — a meaning these commentators are determined to fasten on Gen. i., for the obvious reason that it discredits the account, and seems to give them some gr,)und tor calling it a myth. It was a similar blindness that led Rosen- miiller to derive the Bible cosmogony from the Persians, whilst at the same time contending for the interpretation of short 24-hour days. According to his own showing the Persians (Zen- davesta) held that the world was generated in s\x periods (sex temporibus), or times, left altogether indefinite. If the Mosaic account must be traced to a Persian paternity, let it at least have the Persian width. There is the same grandeur of i)o\ver and causality in the creation-pictures we find in the latter part of Job; and if we had nothing ab extra to give us a different thought there would be the same impression of vastness in the times. How utterly different this early style from the later Talmudic and Mohammedan trifling about the times and imagined incidents of creation I The o'd impression had been lost, and there took its place the petty wonder which grows out of the narrow conception ; just as in modern times every kind of fanciful hypothesis has been resorted to to account for the first three days, and their morning and eveninj; phenomena, so puzzling, so inexplicable, it may be said, on the supposition of their being ordinary solar days. There is nothing of tiiis trifling in Job. In a style of highest poetry it gives us ideas and sug- gestions that yet transcend any discoveries in science: "Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? Who appointed its measures, and stretched the line upon it? Upon what are its piUars settled, and who laid the corner-stone thereof? when the stars of the morn- ing sang together, and all the sous of God shouted for joy. Or who shut up the sea with doors in its gushing forth, when it issued from the womb? when I made the darkness its robe, and thick darkness its swaddling-band ; when I brake * upon it my law, and set bars and doors, and gaid, Here shalt thou come, and no farther, and here shalt thou stop in the swelling of thy waves. Hast thou given command to the morning? hast thou caused the dawn to know its place j Knowest thou the way where light dwelleth? Dnderstandest thou the path to its house? Hast thou entered into the treasures of the snow or the hail? Hath the rain a father? and who hath begotten the drops of the dew?" Job xxxviii. Ancient as these challenges are, science has not yet answered them, probably never will fully answer them. Congelation is not yet understood in its essential mystery; there is a store of unrevealed science in the snow-drop, and as for light, though it has been shining on us for 6000 years, we do not yet "know the path to its house." We stand in awe of such language ; we recognize it as superhuman speaking. There are no narrow computations here, no petty fancies, or ingenious hypotheses. Neither is there any filling up of what is left blank in the great outline given by Moses, except that we have occa- sionally the intimation of a law or process when the other gives us only the bare fact ex[)ressed in the plainest phenomenal language which was adapted to be the vehicle of its conception. Thus also in another passage. Job xxviii. 25, 26, God is represented as determining the quantity and • SoiLe would give "IS^rs here the sense of appointment or decision merely, as that idea, in most langruages, u eoondary to that of cutting. But ^3^ is never so used in Hebrew, although such general idea suits the passage. Tht Itrength of the word, and the vividness of the imagery, are lost in what is after all bu t a smooth tautology. There is in- dicated a conflict of forces. There was a terrible disturbance in the old nature of the lehom before the sea became obedient, md the watera quietly settled to their established bound. "There is something hard about it," says Umbreit, " if we giv* it the usual Hebrew sense ; '* but this is the very reason for preferring the literal image. The word is emphatic, and their la an importance m its choice as showing the real conception in the mind of the writer. 140 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESln. force of the elenii ntal powers, and appointing the method of their physical action. It is anothei of the Scriptural allusions to the Creative Wisdom : " God knew the place thereof when he made for the winds their weight, and fixed for the waters their measure, when he made a law for the rain, and a way for the thunder flames: " Vulgate: mam procellia sonantibus, a passage for tht founding storms. In this connection no portion of Scripture is more worthy of attention than Psalm xc. It is especially important as being, on the best authority, ascribed to that same Moses who gives us, vhether through direct aiithor.shi[i or tradition, the account of creation: "O Lord, thou hast been our dwelling-place in all generations." The words -m ti- here cvidi.ntly refer to old his- torical times upon the eartli, but it is equally clear that what lollows carries us back to the creative or ante-creative periods. He was "his people's dwelHng-place," they were 'chosen in Him before the foundations of tlie world." "Before the mountains were horn, before the earth and the tebel were Irrought forth bs nrx Dbis nsi cbira, from 01am to 01am, from world * to world, thou art God," or " thou art, 0 God." bbinn here is wrongly rendered by the second per- son. It is the third feminine, and li.as for its collective subject iani 'J'tn, earth and tlie world, or earth and the orhU terrarum. Both •nb"' and bb-rir denote a generative process,- — both words, as remarked in another place, presenting the siime radical etymological conceptions of birth, growth, parturition, with the Latin natus, natura, and the Greek <^iw, c^urju, ycwaui, ylva- y.ai, -ye'i'fcris.t For this parturitive sense of sb^nn see such passages as Isaiah li. 2, Job xv. 7, Prov. viii. 25, Ps. li. 7, Isaiali Ixvi. 8, where this word (in Ilophal) and ibi come together nns cs'E ■'15 ■ibT' OS IPS m^3 ■j'lSt bm^n, numquid partiiriet terra, the Vulgate renders it; but it is passive, "shall earth be brought forth in a day, shall a nation be born at one time?" It is used of one of the common generative processes of nature, as Prov. xxv. 23, "the north- wind generates (bbinn) rain" (verb in the active conjugation)- It is applied to Deity, Deut. xxxii. 18, and in connection again with nb-^ : " Wilt thou forget, "[nbi t'S, the Rock that begat thee" (Deum qui te genuit. Vt'lg.) ibbTna bx, who bore thee, literally who travailed with thee in birt!i. The expression may seem a harsh one, but it denotes the tender love and care mani- fested in the formation and culture of the divine people. So when applied, in its more literal sense to natural or creative movements, it denotes a travailing in nature, strong processes, indic- ative of convulsions, violence, and opposition, in passing from one form of matter, or from one stage of life, to another. We dwell upon this, because the power and significance of such words have been so slighted in our translation, and are, therefore, so overlooked by the leader. It amounts to nothing to say that they are figures, even if this were true. Tkey are certainly not fancy figures or rhetorical figures merely, but used because no other language could so well convey their vast and tremendous import. When the Scriptures use poetry it is not for the sake of ornament, but from necessity; it is because all other language fails. But it may be said that the poetry here is in the style and in the collocation of ideas. The words themselves meet un in their most literal etymological conceptions; just as such words, and such primitive concep- tions have formed the roots of all philosophical and scientific language, as it has been developed in otlier tongues. • The sense loortd, Riven to this wont abl!?, it is said, belonps to the later Hebrew, but there are quite a number of passages in the Old Testament, besides Eccles. iii. 11, where this sense is the most apposite (see Ps. cxlv. 13, cvi. 48), and the later nsage (if it may be so called, for it ia undoubtedly most ancient in the Syiiac ^ V^V x 1 jp-ows directly out of the primitive conception. The Rabbinical usage differs in this, that it is employed for space-worlds (wdcr/ios) aud thus pei^ vcrt«d from that original idea of a timt-morld which it has friven to the New Testament aiii>v, t Hence, from "tb^ the noun p^tblr , used in Gen. ii. 4, of "the ^pn^ra/ions C-yet-ftrei?, wn/uraf) of the heavens and the earth.*' The idea of Ae earth at^ a gr'iwlh, hirth, or gerifriiUun, did not shock either the Jewish or Patristic feeling 13 is shown by the reception of the LXX. word Genesis as a name for the first book of Moses. Gen. i. abounds in this ■ind of guteration lanpuaRe. The earth brings foTlh TsS'n), the waters hrt'^O (^3E1UJJ (swarm with life), the grast fei-minatn (XwTP), and the trees and plants seminuh {v'''''['0\ each after its gtuus or species (I^B). which is the result of the generative law or process. Nature is everywhere, but Gud over all, the Logos in all, commencing a new nature, thanging, modifying, or elevating an old one. The Hebrew writers employ such terms without scruple, and without any ixdiiA of naturalism, 'i'he natural and supernatural were not so t-harply drawn as in modem times. Nature had its super, natural, and the supernatural showed itself in nature. These are the /i7er«/ meanings; but they would have ~«eD tbi KCnns et a philosophical and scientific tankage had the Hebrew been ever so developed. PAKT ni.— ALLUSIO-'^S TO THE SIX DAYS IN OTHER PARTS OF THE BlfiLE. U, "Before the mountains were born, and the earth brought forth," — before creation was fin- ished, and brought to its full birth, — obis n;"! nbij'a "from 01am to Olara, from world to world, an-o Toil luaii'os kiu emt rnv mtivus Qi itecnlo et usque in swculum), thou nrt, 0 Mighty El." ijns in the first verse is the name uf administration; bs is the older name of power and causality "From everlasting unto everlistiiig," sa.vs can- translation, as tliougli both expressions made merelj a general phrase for eternal duration, regarded as blank continuity, to the entire neglect of th« plurality and the transition. Some might fancy it tiie idea of a past and a future eternity, but this past had its divisions. It was before the creation, or before the completion of tha creation, that El existed thus from 01am to 01am, from £eon to teon, a sceculo in sceculum, from world to world; ju-^t as our word world is used as a time- word in the oldest English. Set Wicklitfe's translation of 1 Tim. i. 17 " kynge of worldis, fiumXevs tuu aloivav.'^ It is intended here to mark most emphatically the contrast between God's times and our times, the brevity of which is so atFectingly set forth in verses 9 and 10 below: "The days of our years are three- score years and ten." We live fmm year to year; God lives from Olam ti) 01am.* The times of oar history are reckoned as annual, centennial, millennial ; God's times are Olamic or seonian, . — ald)i/Lo< being an adjective whose unit of measurement is alav (i. e., time mea-^ured by feons), just as annual is time measured by years. The divine life-time (not in itself, but as given to oar conceptions) i* reckoned by worlds, and worlds of worlds, until, tlir(jugli their mighty reduplications, rather than by any couceptionless abstract or negative terms, we approach, as near as the human imaging faculty can approach, to tlje thought of an absolute eternity. All this if confirmed, as sober and rational exegesis, by that remarkable declaration in this Psalm (ver. 4), which furnishes the key of interpretation for all passages that speak of the greiiter chronology, whether it be the immense jiast; as intimated in the phiralities of the Old Testament, cr the unknown periods of the Olamic eschatology as referred to in the New (see 2 Pet. iii. 8, 2 Thess. ii. 2, Heb. x. 37): "For a thousand years in tliine eyes are as a day (D'-'S), as yesterday when it is past, and a-s a watch in the night." t How slow to us, and yet how sublimely the faith of this D''nbx li"}*, or man of God, waits and watches for the day (ver. 14) : '• O satisfy ue (-pan) ill the morning with thy mercy." npn here may very easily mean an ordinary morning, if one s contented with it, or chooses to render it adverbially (as our translation does: "O satisfy us ""''.'/,") but certainly there is much in (his wonderful Psalm, and iu the general scale of its language, that points to the higher idea and to the higlier day. The most careless reader can hardly fail to sec that it abounds in great contrasts : " We spend our years as a sigh," % but tlmn art from Olam to Olam." "Our life is as a watch iu the night compared with tby millennial day." " We are as a sleep." " O satisfy us in the morning with thy mercy ; " then " make us glad acc'irding to the days wherein thou hast afflicted us, the years wherein we have seen evil." Si> '.ii another place, Ps. xxx. 6: "Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy (nj-i a shout of jubilee) Cometh in. tlie morning.'''' "I shall behold thy face in righteousness, I siiall be satisfied when 1 awake, with thy likeness," Ps. xvii. 15. Tbe rationalist may interpret all these on the lower scale and give consistent reasons for his philology. Let him be content witb it, but there is * Whether such language is used of mundane, ante-mund.ane, or post-mundane ages, or of all together, must be deter- oiincd by the context ; the word obl? being in itself wholly indefinite. It is distinguished simiply froin ordinary astix)- comically computed time. Here, in Ps. xc. 2, it can have no other than a creative or ante-creative referenco. In Ps. ciii, 17, however, the primary thought would be Olams of thi.i present Olam, or what would be called mundane ages ; ob'SJ ISI cbin3 nin^ IDH. "the mercy of Jehovah is from Olam to Olam upon them that fear him." Though «J7en here it will be according to the reader's faith. TliLs precious promise may take in the atatca? toii* alutviaVf the ages of the ages, the eternities of the eternities, to come. There is the same contrast in Ps. ciii. 17, as in Ps. xc. 2 — our deeting days and the duration of Him who liveth from Olam to Olam. See the verses above. t The idea is found in the Koran, and is applied to creation. See Surat sxsii. 4, " the day whose length is a thousand ^ears such as ye reckon." Compare also Surat Ixx. 3, 4, "the degrees by which the angels and the Spirit ascend to Him, each a day in which there is 50,000 years. They are the intervals between the going forth ot the word (the ruah or si irit, toil is called) in creation." There is no reason for supposing that Mohammed got this notion from tbe Scriptures. It belonged to the ancient oriental thinking, and seems to have come down, in its own way, from the earliest ages, when mea had little science or knowledge of worlds in space, but vast conceptions of times. : T^^T^ 1^3. Like a low murmuring sound, — like a long-drawn sigh, commencing with th»} first inhalation and end. mg with the last gasp of the departing breath. So the ?>iiac "I—, ca.^ .^1 as tt should be pointed aik ffu-wo-gOf likf t groan, like a murmur. 142 SPECIAL IiNTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS. nothing to prevent, there is mnob to favor, that higher and wider view which the ever-asceaii ing style of Scripture (even wlien it teems to speak of temponil things) and the ever-expanding power of Hebrew words, otfer to the spiritual mind. Again, tliere is "the morning (Ps. slix. 15) in whicli the righteous shall liave the d' ■minion." Uuw frigid is tlie comment of the rational isthcre! and iiow far it falls short of all the ideas suggested by the context I " npab, max subito,''^ Bays Rosenmiiller ; and then he refers to Ps. xlvi. 6 (God shall help her, the Church, the civita* Itei. rp2 n":E3 at the turning of the morning), which he has in like manner to diminish from the higher scale before it will answer his purpose. So Hupfeld : '\Stiperstilc8 simt." Accord l'-^ to him, all this striking imagery, and this ^trong word m"', mean no more than that good njeu shall survive the wicked ; they shall visit their graves the morning after they have been buried. The morning, in Ps. xlix. 15, when " the righteous shall reign," is the great dies rctiibutionix so prominent in Scripture, and acknowledged too (like the conception of great times) in the earliest language aud thinking of the race.* Such an interpretation may seem forced to one who looks at it from the lowest stand-point, and feels the need of nothing higher. It was other- wise with the early, musing, meditative mind. The more dim aud indetinite their faith in another World, the more vast their conception of its times and its parallelisms (in these respects) with the present vicissitudes of our being. To such minds, even without revelation, the idea rose naturally out of the most obviously suggested contrasts. The brevities of our present state gave birth to the idea of the eterniiies. From this there grew a corresponding language which in modern times we have failed justly to interpret. The shortness of the human life was more thought of in the earliest days than it is now, although men then lived longer. Hence that wailing language respecting it, we find in Job and in the Psalms. Away back in the patriarchal time<, when, as some say, this world was all they knew, men confessed more readily and more feelingly than they do now, that they were pilgrims and sojourners on earth. Nothing, therefore, was more natural I'or such souls than the attempt to transfer these brevities and the language that represented them, to the higher scale. Their very desiiondency in respect to their having any share themselves in this higher chronology, would the more strongly suggest to the mind its vast durations. Hence the c^iabi" n^JUi "the years of the eternities," Psalm Ixsvii. 6, the ■l^br ■'IS'' mata, '"the years of the right hand of the most High," Psalm Ixxvii. 11. Hence the thought of the aaon, or higher world-time, of a greatei- day, of a more glorious morning. * The use of the word morning for the great day of light and retribution is very marked in the early Arabian poetp, before the time of Mohammed and the Koran. It has no appearance of having been invented by them, but oarries the evidence of long-established UBage, — a mode of speech which no one thought of explaining because of any obscurity or novelty in it. There is no reason why we may not suppose it as ancient as any phrase in the language, and to have gone ba/;k to the days of Job, as well as many other Arabic expressions, which the Neologists always find in abundance for that time when it suits other purposes they may have in view. Thus Lokraan, us quoted in the Kitab ul-at^any ; '* O my son, despise not small tilings ; for they shall be great in t/i^- morning " a*) also the old poet and orator Koss, as given by Sharastani 437 (Cureton's Ed.) ttXi *— >L«JI &aJI* iCjot. oLftt (\2kt> iJt sJJ\ "God is one j He began (life) ; He causes it to come back (from death) ; to Him is the reluming in the morning." See also Sprenger** *• Leben des Mohammed," vol. i. p. 97. For examples in the Koran, see Surat lix. 18 : *' (J believers, fear God, and let every soul see to it what it sends before it for ihe jntiriiin^ " (or the morrorr^ in pnslerum diem). It is used as an ancient and settled phrase for " the day of judg- ment," according to that frequent Koranic idea that a man's sins are sent on before him, and that they will be ail there to meet hui. in the uiuinhis of retribution, or the dies it a:. .See also the commentary of Al-zamakhshari on the passage ; *' It is the day of the resurrection, ' he says, " called the morning, to impress us with a sense of its nearness." Hariri uses tiie same ancient form of speech, not merely as a chance poetical phrase, but as having place among the lettled idioms of the language. The vagrant Abu Zeid is represented as saying of the man who will give him a robe io lover his nakedness, that in return for it he shall be well clad in the morning, — that is, both in this world and in the Uy of retribution lihat is to come. c < ^ ' " ' ^ , , ' *He shall b« covered to-day (thai is, in thia world) with ray grateful praise, and in th6 morning (or the morrow) blmH 111 be enrobed with the silk of paradise." Hariri Seance, xxv. p. 3<^0, ed. of l)e Siicy. The idiom, traopd in this way from the earliest Irabian iiouts. hbows the antiquity of the langtiage and of tL.» idea PAKT IV.— IDEAS OF NATURE AND THE SUPERNATURaU 14i Messiah's throne is to be niao ■'B^s, "liket science, but both the idea and the fact were none the less firmly held. ;' For ever, O Lord, thy Word is settled in the heavens " (Psalm cxis. 89), that is, in the remotest or highest space ; " from age to age is thy truth " (thy tr\ithfulne-8), i. e., throughout all time. That the language has reference to natural things may be seen by comparing it with Psalm xxxiii. 6, " By the Word of the Lord were the heavens made, and all their host by the breath of his mouth " (i^s rn-iV the utterance of his month, that is, the origin- ating Word, and its going forth or prolonged sounding in the nature originated, the Xdyof 77po-' ^opixis of Ooloss. i. 17, ev a ra TTavra (Tvvea-TijKf, " in whom all things consist,^'' or stand together Bo here. Psalms cxix. 89, -im is the word of God, giving law, as it gave origin, to nature ; nr":* * Johanni^ Henrici Pareau, theol. Doct. et Ling. Orient, in Acad. Harderv. C&mmenfalio de Immortalitatis ac Vita /uturts nnti/iis ab antiquissimo Jobi Scriptore. Davtntrist MDCCCVIJ. A most rare yet valxiable work. t This is the piel sense almost exclusively (the word not occurring in Kal). Hence it furnishes a name fcr the moon and the month, the renewal. It is almost wholly in this sense that it is used by the Rabbinical writers. Creation is nnewal, though, when the necessities of the reasoning require, it is used for absolute origination. 144 SPECIAL DJTRODUCTIOJI TO THE FIRST CHAPTEK OF GENESic. is the divine faithfulness in the preservation of that law, and the constant execution of that word. Tlie uuinerical ratios of this hoh olam, or cosmical ordinance, were nndetemiined oy the early mind ; it was not known whether its energizings were according tcj the squares or the cubes of the distances, but of such a harmony existing; in the heavens there was no doubt. '■ Th^.•i^ line had gone out into all the world ; " the author of the 19th Psalm was as sure of this 8S Kepler, who derived his scientific inspiration from it. A mighty law, a nniversal law, was ihe.u. That was known to David as well as to Newton. The same idea appears in what fol- lows: ''Thou also hast founded the earth," pjji; atatuhti ; thou hast given it an order, a genesis, an establishment. Hence, from this ssme loot, the Syriac ji ■- (ke-yo-no) natura, conditio na- turalix. Again, in the verse following (Psalm cxix. 91), " they stand (that is, things stand) accord- ing to thine ordinances ; for are they not all thy servants? "' This is not a mere figure to denote i mere mechanical forcing; there is a real law, and a real natural obedience. " lie constituteth the wind his minister, the flaming fire (the lightning) his servants," Ps. civ. -1. "Thou eendest them forth ; they go and return to thee, say tig. Behold ns, here we are." Job xxxviii. .35. Poetical as the language may be, there is something more than a fact represented, or a phenomenon. There is an abiding nature, an obedience to law, a command and a response, — not a capricious move- ment, but an invariable doing. " He appointeth the moon for seasons, the sun knoweth hia going down." Our modern science has discovered much in respect to the manner, but has revealed nothing new in respect to the essence of the idea. We have similar language. Job xxviii. 25 : " Me made a weight for the winds" {fecit ventis pondus), — ho determined the gravity of the most seemingly impimderable substances, — "lie established ("r, regulated) the waters in their measure," their [iroportions, their relations, their quality, as well as their quantity. " When he made a law for the rain, n::Tjb pn (quando poneliat plaviis leyem) uni nwin/ (^-|-n a constant course, an iiijmutable rule) for the lightning and its voice." It is the same idea in that most sublime declaration. Job XXV. 2, n^sin^sn dim n'rs, " He luaketh peace in his high places," concordiam in guhlimibus suis, he hath established a harmony in the heavens. Compare Ps. six. 6 ; Hos. ii. 22, 23. It was this style of thought and language that led to nature's being called a covenant^ whether such covenant or law was regarded as made with nature, or with man, and for man's sake. See Jeremiah xxxiii. 20. It is God's " covenant of the day and night ; " they are expressly called vnxi B"'BO nipn the statutes, "the laws of the heaven and earth," in their relations to each other, a.^ compared with the higher covenant of the Messiah. One of the most invariable things in the physical world is the rainbow, ever appearing when the sun shines forth after a storm; »nd it is this beautiful phenomenon that is made the symbol of nature's constancy, — not as a new thing, when pointed out to Noah, but chosen, from the very fact of its invariableuess, as the best representative of the great idea thus grounded on the eternal promise. There is a twofold idea in creation which the mind cannot separate, and which the Bible does not separate. It is the giving form by the immediate operation of the Word, and then the infixing that form as a permanent principle working on until the whole is finished, and afterward remaining as an unchanging law. The rudimentary expression for this we find in that repeated formula of Gen. i. id-tiii, rendered, "and it was so." That would simply denote the fact; but it is more than this. The particle p (or the adjective rather) never loses the primary idea of fixedness, establishment, order, that is everywhere prominent in the verb •jid, from which, as before remarked, comes the earliest Shemitic word for nature, unless we may regard it as rep- resentrd by the Hebrew mbin. " And it was so," — rather, " and it became firm, fixed. established." Another germ of the same thought we find in the nbmaa of Gen. i. 16, the ride or law of the heavenly bodies in the regulation of the seasons, and their general influence upon the earth. It appears still more clearly in Job xxxviii. 33: "Knowest thou the ordinances of heaven; canat thou set the dominion thereof in the earth." Here we have again the o-'Btl) mpn, the statutes or laws of the heavens (Vulgate, ordinem cali, LXX. T/iimas avpamv, the turnings or tropics of tlie heavens), —jiiiv is a still more significant word than ry::^^. It denotes a canon, a rule, a marked series or ordo. Taken in connection wih what is sail ali ve of the influence (or bands) of Plei t-ART IV.— IDEAS OF XATDRE AND THE SUPERNATURAL. 145 ades, it might seem to refer to the old belief in astrology; but this had in it nothing of the magical. Wliatever scientific errors it involved, it was precious as containing the idea of the unity of tiie Kosmos, or of a whole, in which each part had an influence upon tiie whole anc" upon every other part. This faith in nature which the old Shemitic mind possessed, was all the stronger, it may be said, in proportion to the want of exact knowledge. David, and Isaiah, and Moses, had a belief in the constancy of nature, founded on better grounds than that of the sceptical naturalist. It was, too, more truly a recognition of law than that generalization of mere inductive science which can only regard nature as simply that which is, or appears, and law as nothing more than a state of present facts, or relative sequences, that might have been any other state of facts, or any other order of sequences, and which would still have been nature, still have been law, from the mere fact of its being so. The natural law of the Bible, on the other hand, was a real causative power, a real ruling or dominion in itself, though inseparable from the will and wis- dom of a lawgiver. The true notion of the natural cannot be held without the complementary idea of the super- natural, since nature can have no beginning in itself (the thought involving a contradiction), and, therefore, demands a power older than itself, beyond and above itself. It is thus that the Scripture not only gives, but necessitates, the idea of the supernatural, although there is no parade of philosophical language in setting it forth. There are also to he found therein the specific diversities of the idea. The supernatural, as origin, is described as the Word going forth. It is thus all throutth creation acting /(art passu with the natures it originates. "When it is referred to among post-creative acts it is characterized as "making something new upon the earth " (nx'i:) ; >ee Numb. xvi. 30 ; Jerem. xxxi. 22 ; though this, as before remarked, denotes a new event, a new form of things, r.ather than new matter. As a change, interruption, or metamor- phosis in nature, in distinction from a permanent new power introduced into it, it becomes simply the idea of the miraculous. For this there is a peculiar expression. It is called "the finger of God," intimating that the merest touch of Deity can cause a deflection in nature, though nothing in nature is really broken or de.-troyed. See Exodus, viii. 16, the language of the baffled magicians, who thereby confessed that their art, whatever it might be, was not the finger of God, — that is, had nothing of the supernatural about it. See also Exod. xxxi. 18 ; Deut. ix. 10. Sometimes the figure contained in the expression ia applied to some great natural event of the more sudden and stupendous kind, as to the volcano, I\salms, civ. 32: "He touches the moun tains and they smoke,"— the lightness of the effort implying the mightiness of the power. The smgl- term, however, for the miraculous, or wonderful, is sis whose primary idea v, that of a tiling, or an act, separate and standing by itself, out of the'chain of causation, thougK the term is sometimes applied rhetorically to a stupendous natural event.* And this le.ads us to the main thing we wish here to remark, that though, in idea, the Scriptural distinction between the natural and the supernatural is clear, there is not, in practical speech, that sharp line drawn between them that distinguishes our modern thinking. In celebrating the praises of God xbE nas, " who doeth wonders" (Ex. xv. 11), the Bible writers are as apt to take one class of acts as another, though one or the other may predominate in certain books in conse- quence of the peculiar connections. In the Law, and in the Prophets, tlie supernatural is more dwelt upon ; it is the passage of the Red Sea, the fire and voice from Sinai, the smiting of the rock in the Wilderness, &c. ; in Job, it is the great natural as exhibited in the elements, the storm, the thunder, and the marvellous productions of the animal world. So also often in the Psalms— tee especially Ps. xxix. One class of events is regarded as much the work of God as the other. In both representations, moreover, is there a mingling of the two ideas. In the supernatural * There is another Hebrew term, of a very peculiar kind, used to denote the bringing about an event, special and remarkable, by a series of causes strictly natural or moral, or mainly such, yet continually deflected, or turned round, to the production of a certain result. There has been nothing startling, or sudden, but the finger of God has been upon tht •eries all the way. It is called nap (Sibbah), the etymology itself being its clearest definition. It is a bringing about oi iround (from 330 ) a causality, yet with a constant deviation produced by other causes, physical and moral. Foi examples, see the story of Rehoboam, 1 King, xli. 25, also 2 Chron. x. 15, and other passages. In Arobic tbe primary seoM »f 330 is lost, and the secondary ide'- of causation, thus derived, becomes predominant. 10 140 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS. displays, such as that of the flood, the crossing of the Red Sea, the Egyptian plagues, the pro riding food in the Wilderness, there is more or less of natural intervention linked in and di» tinctly mentioned as forming a part, at least, of the process. And :hen again the great natural is so described in Job wnd the Psalms, that the awe of the supernatural is upon us, and w« receive the impression of a divine presence as distinctly as though it had been all miracle. But it is in the creative account that this blending becomes most reiiiarlCais from (piia, or genesis {yeveais) from yiynotiat. Had the old Hebrew become a philosophical language this would have been the order of development. Lange intimates that toledoth, as applied to the generations of the earth and heavens, was taken retroactively from the human genealogies after mentioned. We cannot tliink so. It would seem to be a starting or model name for all generative successions. First the genesis of the heavens and earth, then of tlie human race, as involving ever in their reproductions the same mingling of the natural and the supernatural. We find a nature in the very beginnings of life. It is all prepared and waiting for the word, but it is nature when it moves. "Let the earth bring forth" — "let the waters bring forth." The first plants grow, whether slowly or suddenly. They are a production from tlie eanh. They are brought forth according to their species, with their order or law in tliem. As mbip corresponds to (fivcns and natura, so does the Hebrew -p^ to the Greek dSnt, tSia, and the Latin tpecus. This is etyuiologically clear in the derivative nj'an. It is tlie outward form, as representative of and produced by the inward form which is the real idea, or species. Thus it is law from the start, producing organization, and not law as a mere name for, and life as a mere result of, an outward mechanically formed organic structure. Th:it would be sheer materialism. The [irocess presented in the Scriptures, however difiicult to be understood conceptunlly, is the opposite of the idea of mechanical formation. As Cudworth forcibly though quaintly expresses it in his distinction between human and divine art, God does not stand on the nutsido like a human artist, and raoliminously, by means of shaping tools and processes, introduce his idea into the work. It is the word and the idea working from within. The outward material organiza- tion is its product instead of its cause. It matters n A that this is in another place spoken of as a making. That is merely a summary ot the manner of making as here set forth in the more detailed account. God's making a thing intends every step in its production. Thus the whole creation of the heavens and earth is set forth as a making (Gen. ii. 4), and a making in one day ; yet the whole of the first chapter is nccupied with the six great days, or successions, that intervene between the darkness and the oliaos on the one side, and man and [laradisc on the other. Again, there are cases which might seem the reverse of this, where God is represented as mak- ing, forming, ted by the inspii-ed vision. The SKEE was in that state of initial contemplation to which the prophet Jeremiah is carried back in the reversed picture, where he sees the earth returning again to the primeval descilation : " ' beheld the earth, and Id, it was without form and void, ir\zi inn ; and I looked to the heavens, and they had no light," Jerem. iv. 23. This is the beginning. It is a vision of darkness resting on a formless abyss. There is something, whether sound or vision, or both combined, that gives the iinpression of a Spirit hovering over the waters, or breathing upon their vast surface, ot commencing the pulsations of life in their deep interior. It is the beginning of nature. And now he hears a mighty voice saying: "Let there be light." Obedient to the Word the light comes forth (« ctkotovs, says the Apostle in his interpretation of this pictorial language, 2 Cor It. 6) out of the darkness. The first elemental division is seen taking place. It is a dividing of the light from the darkness. Again, a voice that calls it good, and is heard giving the names D'f, nbib, yom, la-y-la, Bay, Night, to this first creative contrast. A solemn pause succeeds. One creative period, one great time succession, is past, and again goes forth the Word. And now a sky, a heaven, presents itself, thougli all is fluid still. It is a phenomenon as strange as it is beautiful and sublime. There is an appearance of waters above and waters below, with an optical firmament, like the Revelation sea of glass, seeming to divide them from each other. We may regard it .as a phe nomenal, or optical, rejiresentation of the atmosphere with the clouds sailing in it, and the rain mysteriously su^^pended in the upper spaces, — a matter which even now science finds it diflicnlt to understand.* Or, with Lange and others, we may interpret it as denoting the separation between the lower waters i)roper and the upper »thereal fluid. In either case, that which is beheld is the actual appearance, or the optical word representing the fact, or state in nature^ lying back of it, conceived according to the science, real or supposed, of the seeb, and expressed in articulate or written words according to such conception. Thus we may take "waters above and waters below " as simply the expression of such conception, the grand fact revealed being the production, on the second day, or period, of that natural state of tilings which is actually repre- sented l.y the sky and atmosphere. Or we may take it without such explanation as denoting a nature or state i>f things long g'ine, and which has little or nothing corresponding to it in any present aspect of the world. The '' waters above and waters below " may have been an actual condition, an actual stage in the creative process thus revealed in vision, as no science could ever have revealed it — an " old heavens," in fact, that passed away at or before the introduction of the "new heavens" and new firmament of the fourth day. For it seems clear that in the skeh'b view, and accjrding to the very consistency of the account itself, this vision of " waters abuve' Would not bo in harmony with the firmamental phenomena of that later period. Sliculd any one, in the name of science, declare this to be impossible, or deny that there coidd ever have been any reality in nature, or in the history of our jdanet, represented by such a conception, let him take one of the largest telescor'es and turn it to the rings of Saturn. Why might not such a phenomenon have been exhibited by our "earth and heavens" in that early senii-chaotic state to which Saturn, according to our best science, now l)cars so close a resemblance? How nra these rings supported, whether liquid or aerial ? If licpiid, the state of things would correspond • "Undcretandest thou the balancings of the clouds?" Jobxxxvii. Ui,— the law of gravity in the donds, 31' "'trSEO, ithraliona nuiium, the weighings or suspeiiaions of the clouds,-how they uru supported in the air, and how their coutonti are condensed and poured upon the eatlh t Sec Unil>reit ; also ch. xxxvi. 27 : " When be makoth em:M the dropt of irater, iind for vapor they distil rain." There is something yet to be learned before this ancient challenge la fijl; iiiFWfTed. PART v.— now WAS THE CREATIVE HISTORY REVEALED? IjJ exactly to the Innguage of the text, and, if so, the possibility of our earth having once preaentei' a similar apiiearnnoe would not be unworthy the attention either of the Biblical student or tb* man of science. But to rt'turri to the creative scene; at this stage again there comes in the imago voeii. — '• And God called the firmament heaven " (n-iao, heights). There is aiiotljer naming, anoihei voice of benediction, another solemn pause; the second vision closes, and thus "there is ae evening and a morning, day second." And now a third command is heard, like the voices that attest the opening of the Revelation seals, and a new earth appears emerging from the waters. It should be remarked that there is no time here, — time, we mean, as estimated or measured duration ; for there is nothing whereby to measure it outside of the events themselves. Tnere is no fixed index of movement, whether constiint or changing, or of any constant or varying rate of change. It is time only as successicm, or rather the successions are themselves the times, — the great dividings, the solemn pauses, the new appearing*, making the evenings and the mornings of the numbered days. It is "from Olam to 01am " (Ps. sc. 2), from age to age. The unit of measurement is the change in nature produced by the Word, and the number and order of these changes and successions is the great matter of revel.ntion. "Not ?u>to long," as Delitzsch well says, "but Tiow many times God created," is the essential idea intended to be set forth. There is no absolute standard either of time or space. An hour, regarded as blank duration, has no more reality than an unrelated inch or foot. Since, then, an outside measured time is one of the things created, it cannot be the measure of creation itself. But again the vision changes, and lo, a new heavens and a new earth. The old rakia has passed away, and a new firmament appears, with its sun, moon, and stars. They are lights in the heavens (nmsis). So the seer calls them, — lights of greater and of lesser splendor. He does not speak of them as globes, or solid bodies, according to the ideas derived from our modern astronomy, of which he had no knowledge, no conception, and, if we may trust the simplicity and silenca of the account, no revelation. They were to him simply lights in the firmament, and mithing more; even as to us, with all our science, they are still but images in our near heavens, — optical ajipearances comparatively close by us, though made by a far-oft' causality. Such a statement may not seem easy or natural to some minds afieoted by certain scientific pre- judgments ; but that does not prevent its being literal fact. The sun we see is simply an appear- ance. These heavenly lights, as they are reflected and refracted in our near atmospherical sky, or rakia, are just as much images as the spectram that is artifioally cast in the astronomer's observ- atory. Their ruling or dominion, as mentioned Gen. i. 16, is not, primarily, a physical or dy- namical [lower (though this may be included in the language when science discovers it), but a time-regulating, and, in this way, a life-regulating dominion. As lights tn this earth, the only point "f view in which they are earliest regarded, the seonic date of their appearance is all that is given in this creative vision, whilst their antecedent materiality in time, as well as their remote causality in space, are left to the inference of human reason, and the discoveries of human science. The one of these ideas, namely, that the material origin of the sun and stars dates from the earliest creative period, antecedent, remotely antecedent, perhaps, to their appearance in our terrene firmament, is commonly received without diflicnity, and seems to be demanded by the literal consistency i>f the account itself. It has never been maintained that the matter of the sun was created, or even organized, on the fourth day. This being so held in respect to the remote time origin of this firmamental light, there is really no more difficulty in regarding in a similar manner that distant power, or entity, in space with which the pi lenoinemm is connected. Both are extra visionem; both lay equally on the outside in this account of the fourth d:iy liav. ing relation only to the phemimenal changes which took place in our earth or its near surround ■ !ng atmospherical heavens. The connection between this light in the celestial mirror, and a vast sody 95,000,000 miles distant, was left to the progress in, knowledge to be made by the human faculties which God meant should he exercised in such discoveries. We see in this a reason, it may be reverently said, why the time element, especially as order of sueces-ion, enters so much more into the creative account than any revelation in sp ice. The rehitive distances and magni- 152 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS. tinles of the worlds lie more within the range of human knowledge; the ages or periods of th« ko8mos, involving as they do the supernatural, are almost whoUy beyond it. " By faith we under stand that the worlds (the almvic or time worlds) were framed (put in order, Kcn-ijfjriVSai) by the Word of God," Heb. xi. 3. Scieace can never get out of the natural as a fixed course of thingo once established and now continuing, of which it may be said -js tiii, '' and it was so," or became firm. She can never attain to the supernatural, and therefore it is that slie has ever had mora t'j do with the space than with the time process, witli things as they are, than as they came to be. The ten times repeated way-yomer (and God said), the mighty utterances of " Him whose outgoings are of old, from the days of eternity " (Mic. v. 1), the six great evolutions in the earth's genesis, no science could ever determine, or hope to determine ; although, " from tha things that are yet seen," or from footprints that are left of those "outgoings," siie might inter, in general, that the earth bad a vast antiquity, immeasurable by any computations drawn from present astronomical arrangements. And so we might proceed throu;;h all the subsequent pictorial stages in the su|iposed visioo process, but reverence would require us to stop with what is sufficient to give an intimation of the probable method of revealing. It closes with the appearance of man, the divine iii-er the purposes of interpretation all that is necessary to he inaint.'iiiied is the subjective trutlifulne^^s and consistency of tlie picture. It was not a theory, not a fancy, or a guess, — much less a desiiined forgery. Buch sights were seen, such voices were heard, by some one in the early time, and he has most faithfully and grajdiicnlly narrnted them to us. The style bears the strongest testimony to this. It carries the internal evidence that it is a telling from the eye, whether the outward or the inward eye, ratlier than from the ear, C'alling it a dream, or a vision, does not detnict from ite lignilicance or its glory. But we are not (concerned with that here. The view tjikeii of the protable subjective jirocess is simply in aid of interpretation, wlii(di is nothing more nor lest than getting at the true conception ot the writer from the language employed, whether tha^ FART v.— HOW WAS THE CkEATIVE HISTORY REVEA-EU .' 15j language %ra8 the effect or the c;iuse of such conce|)tion. The absolute truthfulness of ttt account, or nf tliat wliich it represents, presents another question. This is connected with tlie absolute verity of the Holy Scripture in general, as grounded upon its whole external and internal evidence. We have already alluded to the analogy of prophecy. If the vision theory is in liarraonj irith the beat view of prophetical inspiration, as sanctioned by so many passages of Scripture, it is still more demanded in the present case ; since the future is not so sharply divided from th present, as the present and the future both from the ante-creative past. In both the propheti and the creative representation words may t\)rm a part of the vision, as res gestm, whilst the general narrating language is that which is prompted by the vision. In such case, though called the writer's own language, it is none the less the language of revelation, and none tlie less may the Scripture that records it be said to be verbally inspired. Ihe sights seen, the voices heard, the emotions aroused, are just those adapted to bring out the very words the seer actually uses, and, in both cases, the very best words that could have been used for such a purpose. Hence we may truly say it is the language of the divine inspirer as well as that of the human narrator. The description being given from the bare optical, rather than from any reflexive scientific stand- point more or less advanced, becomes, on this very account, the more vivid as well as the more universal. It is a language read and understood by aU. What lies behind it will be conceived according to the state of knowledge, true or false. We may confess the inadequacy of such language, not because better could have been employed, or other words could have done as well, but because the best words which the inspired mind can use, or the uninspired njind receive, necessarily fall short even of the vividness of the vision reality, and still farther short of the ineffable truth which that vision represents. Any use of scientific language, whether the Ptol- emaic, or the Newtonian, or that of a thousand years hence, would be still remote from this ineffable truth, whilst it would be a seeming endorsement of its absolute accuracy. Indeed, the language may be rightly said to be inspired, though no words at all are used, or even wlien the inspiration itself may be pure vision, or even pure emotion elevating tlie thoughts and concep- tiou'^. In either case, the words which are the result aie God's words, the last best product of the inspiring power, all the more vivid and emotional in tlie reader from the very fact of their having come through such a process of spiritual chemistry (as we may call it) in the real human life and human emotion of the inspired medium. In this way ;dl the words of the Holy Scripture are inspired words, — " pure words, as silver tried, purified seven times," Ps. sii. 7. Whatever be the human faculty employed as the medium, whether it be the understanding elevated and purified by a divine emotion, or a vivid imaiinn power supernaturally aroused in a state of trance or ecstasis, or simply a holy and truthful human memory, the words resulting, have passed through a refining process in which they carry with them the divine truth, not as a mere mechanical massage, but in all the vividness and fulness of the human conception. Thus they are divine words, although at the same time, most human. We may therefore study them with confidence. They are not arbitrary, and open to disparaging criticism, except as to their textual accuracy. Human as the language of the Bible is, it is stiU God's medium, and we can never exhaust its meaning. The process of learning from it, therefore, must be the reverse of that by which it is communicated. It is a going back, up the stream, and towards the fountain- head. Through the words of the inspired writer we get at his images, from these we ascend to his thoughts and their inspiring emotions, and in these, again, the soul draws nigh to that higher life and verity of which the inspired conception is the best human representative. Words suggesting images, or images suggesting words: the first would be called the objective method (whether such words were miraculously articulated to the ear, or whispered to the mind), and yet it is not easy to see why it would not be, to a certain extent, as subjec- tive as the other, — since in both cases, the imperfect human conception, whether of words or things, or of words or images, must make a necessary part of the revealing process. In this objective view there remains, in all its force, the great difficulty arising from those passages in which God is represented as speaking, calling, naming, &c. We are compelled to take it as an internal articulate speaking, in the Hebrew, or in some other language, or else to hold that there 154 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESiS. IB in the account a mixture of the figurative and the literal style. In the subjective, or visioc view, the diflSculty vanishes; and this is a great argument in its favor. In vision, one part is ai .'CmI, tliat is, as much seen and heard by the seer, as the other. A great power dividing, a great voice spealrd, and in the solemn benediction at each close, until the great finale, where it is all declared good, — "very good." Another resemblance is in the time aspect. In Genesis &r in Revelation tljere is the same impression of a strange chronology that cannot be measured bj any historical or scientific scale out of its own movement. It is like distance in a picture. It is there, but we cannot bring it either into miles or inches. It has succession ; height appears beyond heiglit, but there is no estimating the valleys, the immense valleys, it m.ay be, that lie between. In view of all this, it might be said, on the other hand, that had the author of Gen. i. nsed, like John, the first person directly, it would have made little or no diflference in the style of the narrative, or in the pictorial eftect produced by it. This analogy between the opening and closing portions of Scripture may be carried through out. As the scenic or vision view in the prophetic picture does not warrant us in regarding iv as .scene merely, or do away with the idea of a great reality lying behind, so neither does such a vision theory of the creative account detract, in the least, from a like reality in the great past, and of which such vision was the most fitting representative to our limited powers of conceptiou as well as to our ever imperfect science regarded as ever falling short of the ultimate facts of origin, whether called creative or purely pliysical. We may suppose it, therefore, chosen on thi« very account, as not merely the best, but the only way in which the ineffiible facts might bt' made shadowly conceptual to the human soul. Still, the fact, whether we rightly conceive ii or not. is in the representation, and he who takes the two as in all respects identical, or reduces them to the same measurement, has the essential faith, only he should not condemn as heretical )r unscriptnral the one who preserves tlie same ultimate facts but interprets the representatioD of them on the vaster and remoter scale. In most cases, however, it is not diiBcult to separate between what we have called the mods of representation and the ineffable truth (believed, though in a great degree unknown,) that lies back of it. We read, for example, in Genesis, that God " formed man in his own image." Now, none bnt the grossest gnosticizing heretics have regarded this as a T^Aastio /or7nation of clay into an outward molded likeness. So also when we are told that " God ireathed into man's nostrils the breath of life," the representation is most clear and perfect ; we have a distinct image of a divine mouth breathing into the as yet inauimate human nostril ; there is something very tender in it, denoting, as Lange poetically says, the Father of Spirits awaking man to existence with a kiss of love ; but, after all, the mind goes back of the representation in both these cases. The mere language is transcended even by the mystery of the human physical life as expressed in the one instance, much more so by that of the rational or spiritual life as set forth in the other. Now there is nothing to forbid — in fact, there is everything to require — a similar mode of inter- pretation when it is said "God formed man from the earth," or out of the dust of the earth. The image is similar to that employed in the other cases, and we may suppose that the seek hehehJ, even as the r^&Aev conceives, a plastic formation, a mold, shaped but inanimate, beginning to move under a pneumatic inspiration; but the thoughtful mind, again, goes back to something beyond it. It is helped by this picture, but it does not rest in it. It finds little or no difficulty in taking this coming "from the earth," or this being "formed from the earth," as denoting a divine process in nature, resembling the other processes similarly represented in this wonderful account {see Remarks, p. 135 on Ps. cxxsis 15) It is a mode of setting forth the contrast between aoul and body, between the physical and the rational, the animal and the pneumatical, — one from the divine life and the divine spirit, the other from nature, — "from the earth earthy " (tV y^i * See this exemplified in the Visions of Balaam, Nymb. xxiii., xxiv., and in the prophetical Scriptures generally. Ii may not be easy to explain, but it is a fact of deep significance, that, in all high or ecstatic states of soul, there is this tend «nc7 to rhythmical motion ami >'***>rance. 156 SPECIiL INTRODUCTION TO THE KIKST CHAPTER OF GENESIS. }(oiK<>s, 1 Cor. XV. 47), even as the plants and the animals came originally from the e;irth and the waters. Time is not given us here, whether long or short. All that we have is the fact that hy some process (necessarily involving some idea of causality, succession, and duration,) the human body was brought from tlie earth, — or that thus the human physical, coining from th« lower physical (from the lowest parts of the earth, Ps. cxxxix. 15), and through the connecting links, types, or molds, as carried upwards by the divine formations, was at last brought into the state in which it was prepared to receive that divine inspiration wliich alone constitutes the tpeciea, and makes it man. Thus the true creation of man, as man, was an inspiration. The primus homo was the first man thus inspired, and who became the progenitor of the species. The first Adam was made by the divine life raising the physical or animal into the rational The second Adam represents a higher inspiration, elevating the rational human to a closer union with the divine. Such is the analogy of the Apostle. Christ elevates the human, evec as the first human, "by the inspiration of the Almighty," is the uplifting of the merely animal or physical that lay below. The second mystery is the greatest, and our belief in it should take away any wonder or difficulty that may attend the first. Again, in that mysterious account. Gen. ii. 21, had it been said: "And I saw the man cas» into a deep sleep, and lo, the Lord God took from him a rib," &c., we would have recognized the vision style, and separated itumediatelv between the representation and the ineftable fact involving the ineffable process through which the female nature was originally divided from the one generic humanity. AH this is intimated in that mysterious language of the first chapter (ver. 27} of which this may be regarded as the scenic representation, or filling out of tlie picture: "So God created man in his own im.ige, in the image of God created he him, miile and female created he them.'''' The him and the them, the inx and the crs, are one generic being, oi,e creation. This is given to us in the first language. There is, however, necessarily a derivation in the process, not menti'ned in the first, but repre.'^ented to us in the second and more graphic picture. Here, too, if any one is inclined, or feels himself compelled to take the fact and the scenic representation of it as identical, he has the essential faith, and the essential dogma, woman derived from man ; but why should we find difficulty iji adopting, in this case, a mode of inter- pretation whi-h we not only find easy hnt even regard as demanded in the two first-mentioned cases of the image and the inbreathing? Again — let ns take Gen. ii. 19: "And out of the ground God formed every benst of the field, &c., and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them, &c. ; and Adam gave names to all cattle, and to every fowl, and to every beast of the field." This has nothing of the myth- ical ifi its style. As literal narration it has a difficulty, but this consists chiefly in its strangeness, which is wholly a matter of sense conception, whilst there is nothing in it, even as thus taken, to ott'end the reason or a rational faith. That God sliouhl thus teach the first man hy bringing ■suggestive oljjects before him, even as a father teaches his cliild the letters of the alpliabct, is in perfect harmony with the best view we can form of the providential and the supernatural, if these ideas are tn be admitted at all. When the account, however, is regarded as a vision, or a picture, all difficulties vanish, whether in regard to the style or the matter. As an objective narration, it would seem to represent a second creation of animals for this special purpo-e ; as something given in vision, it sets itself wholly free from the necessity of any such inference. It Ix'comes similar to the trance vision of the animals as seen by Peter, Acts, xi. 5, 6. L is the method of revealing to us that there is an ineftable mystery in language, that man wag led into it by the divine guidance, or that the superhuman is demanded to account for its origin AS the signijirnnt naming of tilings and ideas in distinction from those mere animal cries of the sense from which snme wotild derive it. Language is required for the invention of language, if regarded as merely human, and that involves a paradox. Some divine or supernatural power, therefore, must liave helped man in his first iiamings and olas-ifyings. Such is the conclusion of tLe profoundest philological science, and such is tlio teaching of the Scriptures. Hew far this is to be carried must be determined by intrinsic evidence. We are not to resort to It merely to escape difficulties. The snljer question is, whether the scenic representation, oi •he vision theory, is in harmotiy with the style of Scripture as employed in other cases wher« VABT v.— HOW WAS THE CREATIVE HISTORY REVEALED? 151 transcendent facts are set forth, and whether there is that in the very thought and aspect of the passage which favors the idea. We know tliat the great future transition from the present irorlil, alwv or 01am. to the alav or world to come, is thus set forth, and it may be deemed in accordance with the analofry of Scripture, that the origines or great beginnings of the present 01am, as it proceeds from those that are past (un-o tuv alosvaw^ Eph. iii. 9 ; Col. i. 26 ; 1 Cor. i L 7), ibould be given to ub in a similar apocalrntic lorm GENESIS, OH THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES FIRST PERIOD. The Genesis of the World and of the Primitive Time of the Human Race, as the Genesis of the Primitive Religion until the Development of Heathendom, and ol its Antithesis in the Germinating Patriarchalism, Ch. I. -XL FIRST PART. THE GETfESIS OF THE WORLD, OF THE ANTITHESIS OF HEAVEN AND EARTH, AND OF THE PRIMITIVE MEN. Ch. L and II. FIRST SECTION. The Heavm, the Earth, and Man. The Creation and the World in an Upward Series of Phyiieal and Generic Development. Universaliatic. Chapter I.-IL 8. A.— The Antithesis of Heaven and Earth, the Symbol of all Religion. 1 In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth. B. The Three First Creative Days. The Great Divisions (by means of Light, Heat, and Chemical Affinity), or the Three Living Contrasts : Light and Darlmess (or the Darli Spherical Material) ; the Athena. Waters (or the Vapor-Form) and the Earthly Waters (or the Fluid Precipitate) ; the Water Proper and the Land. The nearest Limit of these Divisions : the Vegetable World as a Symbolic of Commencing Life analogous to the Result of the Three Last Creative Days in the Appearing of Man, 2 And the earth was without form, and void ; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. 3 And the Spirit of God moved [hovered, brooded] ' upon the face of the waters. And God 4 said Let there be light, and there was light. And God saw the light [the beauty of the light] that it was good [niS, good and £a,ir ; as the Greek «aAbi', fair and good] ; and God divided 5 the li^ht from the darkness [made a division between the luminous and the dark element]. And God called the light Day and the darkness he called Night [sourceof day, source of night]. And i60 GENESIS, OR THE i"IBST BOOK OF HOSE!- the evening and the morning were the first day [i. e., by this division is measured one divine day 6 or day of God— •thown by the use of the name Jehovah Elohim. EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL. 1. See on the Introduction to Genesis, and under the head of Literature, the catalogue of cosmological works that belong here. Compare, especially, the r.iterature Catalogue given by Knobel and Delitzsch. '.. The passages of Scripture that have a special connection ; Job ; Ps. viii., six., and civ. ; Prov. viii. ; Is. xl. ; John i. 1; Col. i. 16; Heb. i. 2; xi. S ; Rev. xxi. 1. 3. This account of the world's creation evidently forms an ascending line, a series of generations whose liighest point and utmost limit is reached in mail. The six days' works arrange themselves in orderly contrast ; and in correspondence to this are the sections as they have been distmguished by us : a. The creation of heaven and earth in general, and which may also lie regarded as the first constituting of the symbolical opposition of the two ; b. the three first creative days, or the three great divisions which constitute the great elementary oppositions or polari- ties of the world, and which are the conditioning of all creature-life: 1. The element of light and the dark shadow-casting masses, or the concrete dark- ness, and which we must not contbund with tlie eve- ning and the morning; 2. the gaseous form of the tether, esptcially of the atmosphere, and tlie fluid form of the earth-sphere ; 3. the opposition between 11 the water and the firm land. In respect to this ii must be observed that the waters, of ver. 2, are a different thing from the waters of vers. 6 and 9, since it still encloses the light and the matter of the earth. Moreover, " the waters " of ver. 6 is not yet properly water ; since it encloses still the earth ma- terial. The first mention of elementary water iu the proper sense, is at ver. 9. c. The three last creative days, wherein the above parallel is to be observed ; d. the limit or aim of creation — man — the sabbath of God. 4. Vers. 1 and 2, the ground-laying for the crea- tion of the heaven and the earth. Considered cos- mologically and geologically — In the beginning. — The construction maintained by Bunsen and others (Raschi, Ewald, Aben Ezra) is as follows : In the beginning n'fi€7i (rod created heaven and earth, and w/if7i the earth was waste and desolate, and darlvuess was over the primeval flood, and the breath of God moved upon the waters, t/itn God said, Let there be light, and there was light. This construction is, in the first place, opposed throughout to the language of Genesis, as in its brief yet grand declarations it proceeds from one concluded sentenci: i.i another. Secondly, it contradicts the context, in which the creation of light is a significant, yet still ar isolated, moment. If we were to follow Uunsun, it would be the introduction of the Persian light religion rathe! than the religion of the Old Testament, And, final itia GKNESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. It. id the third place, it obliterates that distinguish- big ground-idea of the theocratic monotheism with which, in the very start, the word of revelation con- fronts all pagan dualism, — in other words, the truth, that in regard to the manner of creation, God is the sole causality o( heaven and earth in an absolute »ense. The view of Abeu Ezra that n^UJX"i3 is ever in the construct state, and that it means here, "in the beginning of the creation of the heavens and the earth," etc., is contradicted by the occurrence of the word in the absolute state, Deut. xxsiii. 21. — P^irs-13 (from msn — ITN-i). The substantive ivithout the article. It is true, this cannot be ren- dered iu the beginning, taken absolutely, so that the beginning should have a significance, or an existence for itself. It would be, moreover, a tautology to say in t/ie beginning of things when God created them, etc., that is, when there was the beginning of things ; or else we must take bereshith mystically : in prin- cipio, that is, in filio, as Basil, Ambrose, and others (see Leop. Sclimid, Explanation of the Holy Scrip- tui-es, p. 4), which is not allowable, although it is true that the New Testament doctrine advances at once to the determination that God created all things through the Son (John i. 3, 11; Heb. i. 2; comp. Ps. xxxiii. B). It is not easy to take the word ad- verijially: originally, or in the first place (Knobel); for the immediately following enumeration of the creative days shows that the author would have time begin with the creation of the world. According to Dehtzscli the author does not mean " to express the doctrinal proposition that the world had its beginning in time, and is not eternal, but only that the creation of the heavens and the earth was the beginning of all history." This interpretation seems arbitrary. Bereshith relates especially to time, or to the old, the first time (Is. xlvi. 10; Job xlii. 12). It may be further said that 3 can mean with or through. It is, therefore, the most obvious way to interpret it : in a begijinhtg, and that, too, the first, or the beginning of time, God created the heavens and the earth (with the time the space ; the latter denoted through the antitheses of heaven and earth). From that first beginning must be distinguished the six new begin- nings of the six days' works; for the creating goes on thiough tlic six days. In a beginning of time, therefore, that lies back of the six days' works, must that first foundation-plan of the world have been made, along with the creation of the heaven and the earth m their opposition. The first verse is there- lore not a superscription for the representation that follows, but the eomplet-^d ourauohigy despatclied in pne general declaration, .Ithough the cosmiciil gene- ration, which is describe ' ver. 3 and ver. 11, is again denoted along with it. That the sun, moon, and stars are perfected for >he earth on the fourth day, is an indication tliat God':, creating still goes on in the ueavens, oven as the cieating of the jieriod^ of devel- opment in the earth, alter its first condition as waste and desolate, when it went forth from the hand of (iod as a splieiical tbim without any distinct inward configuration. — X13, in Piel to cut, hew, form; but in Kal it is usually employed of divine productions ucw, or not previously existing in the " sjihere of nature or history (Ex. xyxiv. 10; Num. xvi. 3ii, and frequently in the I'rcjphetf), or of spirit (P.s. 11. 12, and the rre<|uent uTiftir in the N. T. ) ; but never denoting ..'inian production.s, anit »iever used ^vith t!ie accusa- tive of the material." JJelil/.scli. And thus the waception of creatiiij; >► .kin to that of the miracu- lous, in so far that the former would mean a creanD|| ill respect to initial form, the latter in respect to nov- elty of production. (On the kindred expressions in the Zendavesta, see DeUtzsch.) It is to be noted how K-;a difiers from Hit's and ^S"; (ch. ii. 2 and ver. 7). That iu this creating there is not meant, at all, any demiurgical lorming out of pre-existing material, appears from the fact that the kind of material, ai something then or just created, is strongly signified in the first condition ot the earth, ver. 2, and in the creation of Ught. This shows itself, in hke mu'iner, in the general unconditioned declaiation that God ij the creative author, or original, of heaven and earth. — Elohim, see the Divine Names in the Introduction. — n"i;ll"n . According to the Arabic it would denote the antithesis of the High (or the height) to the Lower — that is, the earth. The plural Ibrm is signiti cant, denoting the abundance and the variety of the upper spaces.* This appears still more in the ex- * [There must have been something more definite in tha early conception that gave rise to this form of the word. It looks like a dual, and this would suggest that the thought of the heavens, out of which it arose, may have been that of a hemi-sphere, and of the whole mundus .is havmg a spheri- cal foi-m. The phenomenal shape of the sky would give the idea of a counterpart. The roundness of the mundus, and, as a necessai-y inference, the roundness, or two-sidedness of the earth, must have been a conception much more ancient than we imagine. It must have occurred to a thoughtful mind every time there was witnessed the phenomena of the sun Siting (the sun going under) and the sun rising (its coming up from the world or sky below the earth). Comp. Ps. sis. 0 ; Eccles. i. 4 ; Job ssvi. 7. Such a notion, how- ever, would be more for the reliesive thought than for the sende ; but its early esistence is perfectly consistent with other langua.ge drawn from the more direct and near appeai-ance of the earth as an estended plane. A dual idea may also have been suggested by that of the waters above and waters below (Gen. i. 7), thus giving the notion of a double heavens divided by the rakia. The word, however, is more probablv a plural. This appears from some of its connections, and from a compari- son of its form in all the other Shemitic languages. The ^ is in the place of the Jl' as it appears in the root niS'iJ , to be high. Since there is nothing arbitrary in language, especially in early language, this plural form must represent the notion that would very early arise, of something above the 3?''pn , or that the rakia itself was merely an optical appearance in which were shoisTi the forms of things that were really at vast and vastly varj'ing distances beyond it. Such a thought was earlier in the Hebrew mind than in the Greek, though the latter, as usual, when they cjune to enter- lain it, made much more of the idea in the way of definite- ness, number, and locality,— treating it with less reverence, and giving it up more to the license of the imagination. 8o was It with the idea of a spirit-world. It was older m th« Shemitic than in the Javanie mind ; but the Greeks gave ic more of topography and scenery, whilst upon the Hebrew thought there seems to liave been ever thrown a holy re- serve, or rather, a providential restraint upon the imagina- tion, until the coming of Him who was the itesurrection and the Life. In both cases the latter were content with the general thought, namely, another life, especially for ihe people of God who *'is not the God of the dead but of the living" (Matt. sxii. 32; Exod. iii. 16), and other hearem beyond that which i>rimarily presents itself to the sense. We may, thcrefjrc, ascribe this early pliu-al form to that vivida vis unimi which first pierces through the seen into the unseen. From the single appearing rakin, or exp,tnse, above, lame the thought of a heaven over that, an'l of a "heaven of heavens" higher still, from which Got looks down to'Mehold the things that are ;n hcM.endhe uear heavens) and the earth." Ps. csiii. 5: TVho dwellelh 8C high (naijb "'n^S.IB ), who Btoopet'-i so iow { 'b-'ECr), even to look down into these lower enrth hfarei? ( t^1S<^.» C'^alira), as though immensely remote .ii* r**.l: from *bo superlative a height. Tlio very anthropt-piitb.'.^c: adds to the grandeur of the conception. Ue "stoot'Oth down to look," as though not only tl.o earth and ii\wn, but the heavens that surround them, were so far o.l, or so Ihi below, as to be hardly visible to the divine eye. I'rom such a germ the conception gre^ in tli* Hebrew CHAP. 1.— a. 3. 16)1 ftression, the heaven of heavenis fDeut. x. 14, and Ps. iviii. 84). 5. Vers. 2-5. Preparation of the geologieo- cosmological description of the days' works. First mind, until there came out of it a number of other words leautini; different supposed departments of the great spaces above. Still lat«r the Jewish Rabbins got from these their notion of the GilgalUm, or seven heavens (regarded as wheels, Ezek. i. 16, or spheres), and to which they give distinct names having, most of them, some philological iind conceptual ground in the old scrip:urcs. They are thus reckoned by them : "iiyr!, bl2T, □■'pniD, r'^p^, "p5'^% n^^fS", "2^^ Vilon, Bakia, Shehakim, Zebul, Maon, Makon, Ar6both. The first of these is the only one not found in the Bible. It is a Rabbinical word from the Latin velum. It is used for the very lowest heavens, or the sup- posed sphere below the nkia. It is the veil, or sky of clouds which mtercepts the light but permits the heat to pass through, and m this sense Jarchi alludes to it in his inter- pretation of Ps. xix. 7 : "there is nothing hid from the heat thereof." So also Rabbi Jehoshuah says, Berach 58, 1 : "the ""b^l is that space or sphere through which, when broken and rolled away, there appears the light of the open espanse." All the rest ot these names belong to the old Hebrew, and are found in the Old Testament Scriptures '.n such connec- tions as to ju>tify the Rabbins m reganling them as denoting different regions, to say the least, in the upper spaces or heavens. See Ps. Ivii. U ; xxxvi. 6; Job xxxviii. ;i7 ; xxsvii. 18; Ps. Ixxxix. 7; Hab. iii. U; Ps. xxxiii. 13- 14; Isaiah Iviii. 13; Ps. Ixviii. 6; Deut. xxvi. 15; 2 Chron. xxx. 27 ; Ps. xc. 1 ; Isaiah Ixiii. 15. The word HI 3*^51 . Ps. Ix^i. 5, is rendered heavens in our version : To Him who riddh upon Arahoth in his name Jah, Jehovah; ride h upon the highest or outer heaven, according to the Jewish scale. Almost all the modera commentators give it a ditferent sense here, and with apparently fair reasons. Our English translation, however, is countenanced by the old versions, besides being fully sustained by the traditional rendering of all the Jewish commentators and translators, ancient and modem. Accord- ing to them, it is the highest sphere corresponding to the Se&efjLixevTj of the Greeks, or the fixed sphere, where all is Immovable, whilst everything below is undergoing change. It is where God specially dwells, IS' '^ZW^inhabidngefer- nit)jy sedens in perpeluum. Is. Ivii. 15. Hence they render it, not riding^ though that would give a most sublime ini^ige jf we regarded this great sphere as rolling, but sitting, like Dne throned, and that corresponds well to the primary sense of "Dl in all the Shemitic tongues, which is not motion, a meaning which it never has, unless demanded by something else in the context, but super-posilion. Comp. with Is. xl. 22, •/"*!;< a^rrbS niB'n , "He that sitteth upon the orb of the earth," though so high that "the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers." The other words are also used to denote the divine throne or the divine dwelling. This Rab- binical astronomy may be said to have its germ in the Scriptures, though its expansion and arrangement are to be ascribed to the later imagination. It was the natural out- growth of that mode of thinking and conceiving that first gave rise to the plural C'^'OC . Comp. also the word I^T^yS , 2 Kings xxiii. 5, as used for the heavenly spheres or houses (from bT3 with its Arabic sense of dweUing)^ and rllTTD j Mazzaroth (which is the same word etymologically), Job ixviii. '62. See also the Aiabian tradition of the seven neavens as given in the Koran, Surat xvii. 46; more fully, Surat xli. 11; also xxiii. 17, with Alzamakshan's comment on the upper stories or gradations of the heavens. These Arabian tradition^ have every appearance of being ancient, and of having aid^.d the Rabbinical scheme, rather than of having been derived fi-om it. The Shemitic languages are certainly peculiar in these plural words for heaven. Tiie New Testament ovpavol is a pure Hebneism. The Sboniitic Word excels also in its radical significance. Ovpavo<; (6po? oupos) has simply the idea of limit. It is the vertical hori- zon, or the hoiizon above. The Latin caehim U simply con- cavif'i (to KolXov) ; so is the Saxon heaven (heave arch). In the Hebrew, the natural image is height, and this reduplicated and carried upward by the plural form. In this respect the Hebrew words for the great spaces are like the great time pliualitie^ to which we have referred in the Introduction to Uie first Chapter of Genesis. The heavens and heavens of heavens, the D*T2',U and Z^TSII,' "^TaC , are like the D3^3? and the C^Tsb? ^ the olam, and olam of olams, so frequent m the Old Testament, yet so obscured in the translations. There is another Shemitic plural equally suggestive, and Creative Day. — ^nh^ ^nn. The earth was. Th\i is spoken of its unarranged original or fundamt-ntal state, or of heaven and earth in general. Thohu Vabuhu, alUteratives and at the same time rhymes, or like sounding; similar alliterativea occurring thus in all the Pentateuch a3 signs of very old and popu lar forms of expression (Gen. iv. 12; Exud, xxiii. 1 5; Numb. v. 18; Deut. ii. 15). We find them alsc in Isaiah and elsewhere as characteristic feature* of a poetical, artistic, keen, and soaring spirit. Thej are at the same time pictorial and significant of tlia earth's condition. For, according to Hupfeld and Delitzsch, inri passes over from the primitive sense of roaring to that of desolateness and confuaioiL The last becomes the common sense, or that which characterizes the natural waste (Deut. xxxii. 10) as a positive desolation, as, for example, of a city (la. xxxiv. 11). It is through the conception of voidness, nothingness, that Thohu and Bohu are connected. DeUtzsch regards the latter word as related to cni , which means to be brutal. Both seem doubtful, but the more usual reference to nri- in the sense of void or emptiness is to be preferred. We have aimed at giving the rhyming or similarity of the sounds in oui translation (German: oden-wiist and wiisten-od). The desert is waste^ that is, a confused mass without onler; the waste is desert, that is, void, without dis- tinction of object. The first word denotes rather the lack of form, the second the lack of content in the earliest condition of the earth. It might, therefore, be translated form-less, matter-iess. '* Rudis indi- gestaque moles, in a word, a chaos,*' says DeUtzsch. It would be odd if in this the biblical view should so cleanly coincide with the mythological. Chaos de- notes the void space (as in a similar manner the old Northern Ginnun-gagap, gaping of yawnings, the gaping abyss, which also implies present existing material), and in the next place the rude unorganized mass of the world-material. There is, however, al- ready here the ivorld-form, heaven and earth, and along with this a universal heaven-and-earth-fonn is presupposed. It is not said that in the beginning the condition of the heavens was thohu and bohu, — at least of the heavens of the earth-world, as De- Utzsch maintains ; at all events, the earth goes neither out of chaos, nor out of "the sime chaus" as the heavens. It is clean against the text to say that the chaos, as something that is primarily the earth, em- braces, at the same time, the heaven that exi-t:; with and for the earth. For it is very clear that the lan- guage relates to the original condition of the earth, although the genesis of the earth may serve, by way of analogy, for the genesis of the universe. "jlUPI'j the first condition of the earth was cinn (from ^In ^ to roar, be in commotion), wave, storm-flood, ocean, abyss. The first state of the earth was itself the liiehom, and over this roaring flood lay the darkness spread abroad. It is wholly anticipatory when we say that " this undulating mas* of waters was not the earth itself in the condition of thohu and bohu, but that it enclosed it; for on the t./ird day the firm which is not found in other families of languages. It ip tl « word for life (C^n , lives), denoting a plurality in this J&a as well as in the words for heaven and eternity. Instead of being despatched as a mere i^f*s loquendi^ this, and other peculiarities of the earliest tongues are well worthy 0U3 deepest attention. The plui-ality of life, of the gi'cat spi02s. and the great times, seem all to have come from a way of viewing the works of God which has no parallel 'n the rip resentations of other human languages. — T. L.l 1C4 GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OK MOSES. iind (7";s<) goes forth from the waters," Delitzsch. Further on, Ps. civ. 6 is cited to show that, original- ly, water propei surrounded the firm earth-kernel, and Job xxxviii. 8, according to which the sea breaks forth out of the mother's womb (the earth) — poetical representations that are t'-ue enough, if one does not take them according to ihe letter ; in which case they are in direct contradiction to each other. The waters, of ver. 2, is quite another thing than the water proper of the third creative day; it is the fluid (or gaseous) form of the eartli itself in its first condi- tion. 2 Pet. iii. 5 is not opposed to this ; for as the water takes form, the earth breaks out of the water, just as the water comes foith from the earth in con- sequence of the creative division. The darkness is just the absence of the phenomenal, or the absence of light (for the vision view) in the condition of the earth itself, — in other words, night. — n^*1 , But the spirit of God hovered over (Aug., 7noved upon). The breath of man, the wind of the earth, and the spirit, especially the spirit of God, are sym- boUcal analogies. The breath is the life-unity and life-motion of the physical creature, the wind is the unity and life-motion of the earth, the spirit is the unity and life-motion of the life proper fro which it belongs ; the spirit of God is the unity and hfe-mo- tion of the creative divine activity. It is not a wind of God to which the language here primarily relates (Theodoret, Saadia, Herder, and others), but the spirit of God truly (wherefore the word Dm, De- jtzsch; comp. Ps. xxxiii. 6). From this place on- ward, and throughout the whole Scripture, the spirit of God is the single formative principle evermore presenting itself with personal attributes in all the divine creative constitutions, whether of the earth, of nature, of the theocracy, of the Tabernacle, of the church, of the new Ufe, or of the new man. The Grecian analogue is that of Eros (or Love) in its reciprocal action with the Chaos, and to this purpose have the later Targums explained it : the spirit of love. It was rBn"'2 (hovering) over the waters. The conception of brooding cannot be obtained out of Deut. xxxii. 11 (Delitzsch), for the eagle does not brood over the living young, but wakes them, draws them out (educates), makes them lively.* The mytho- logical world-egg of the Persians has uo place here. Should we adopt any view of this formative energy of the spirit of God (which may have worked upon • [Still the conception of brooding, cherishing (fovens), is /"Dudamental in the word Z\T\^ . Its primary sense is a vi- brating, throbbing motion, most emblematic of the bcgin- BinK of life — csjiecially as ti-aced in the epg-form — the first fteginning of heat and pulsation. Its primary significjince is onomatojiieal — rahap, to flutter (regular pult-atile mo- tion). Hence it becomes very early one of the verbs of lov- ing, being closely allied, both in sound and sense, to the Hebrew cm . In Syriac it is the common word for lovinp, warming, cherishing. In the Arabic the middle guttui'al baA Roftened down to alcph, and we havev^K, denoting intense and cherishing love. Ko word could have been bet- ter adapted to the idea, intended in this place, of an inwiird, Ufe-giving power, rather than a mere mechanical outward motion, sucli as is given by the translation "blew" or ••moved upon." Xowherecliie in all the usage of the He- brew or Syriac ia TiH"! ever employed in the sense of hhw- irifi. The PieJ form hero makes the inward sense of throb- hini; the more intensive. We see no harm to the Scriptures Croiu (he supposition that this idea of the cherishing spirit was the origm of the fable of EroH, or of the mytboiogical world-ogg, whether regarded as Persian or Greek. Sec AiivtopbanefS Aves, 694.-1'. L.] the unorganized mass through the medium of a gretH wind of God) it would consist in this, that by iti inflowing it diflferentiated this mass, that is, con- formably to its being, called out points of unity, and divisions which fashioned the mass to multiplicity in the contrasts that follow. It separated the hetero- genous, and bound together the homogenuus, and m prepared the way fur the dividing the hght fiom th« darkness. It cannot be said, however, that "all th« co-energizing powei-s in the foinaation of che world were the emanations or determinations of this spin! ot" God." For we must distinguish the creative wordi with Nl- from "^^ , or \\ni forming by the spirit of God.* The ol^ect, however, of this forming is not * [The word "*?7 ^ ii^ore formative than X"13 , lut not less creative. The latter is used more of the primary divi- sioHs, if not of the primary matter itself. The foimer de- notts generally the more artistic ur architectural work, th« handy work, 1">-1^ nt-'?.^, Ps. six. 2, or "'iiria 7)^P153SK , Ps. viii. 4, "the work of thy fingers." It is, according to one view we may take of creation (see Introd. to Gen. i. p. 128), the higher work, the greater work of the divine artistic wisdom as distinguished from the mere divine poioer. In its most outward primary applications, "13i'^ denotes the elaborate shaping formations, such as that of a statue, oi idol, Hab. ii. 18 ; Is. xliv. 9, 10. Hence it becomes the appropriate word to express inward formation— ybrm in the more interior sense — law, structure, constituting state— in a word, idea in distinction from idolon. As a word of physical creative constitution, it is variedly and impressively used to denote the appointed arrangements in the seasons, as Ps. Ixxiv. 17, om^J" nnx C)^H^ V^|?» "summer and win- ter thou hast /orwicrf them "'—Is. xlv. 7, Nll^^ nix "ISI^ ~^|n, "who formed the light and created darkness" (the ligiit the more ideal or artistic creation). " He made the sea, ITC*", and his hands /ormed, 11^" , the dry land,"— gave it its greater variety and beauty of form. So Amos iv. 13, ** who created the wind, or air (5<"^3^), who formed the mountains" C^SJV). It is used to denote the formation of a people by law and providential guidance: Is. xliii. 21, ■•b TllS*' !|T"C2?, "this people that I have tormed for myself." Is. xlv. 18, 5<"l3 is used of the heavens, and "2jt^ of the earth. This might seem opposed to the distinction we hnve made, but the context that follows shows why the more ideal or formative word is thus used of the earth— ^nrrxb i'n33iD— "who formed the earth and made it, who established it (gave it a nature, Syr. X3^D) that it might not be a tohu (a formless waste), who made it t" be inhab- ited." It is used of the human body, or rather nf the whole human physical constitution. Gen. ii. 7 ; " And the Lord God Ibime'd man," (ver. 8) "and he put the man whom he bad formed." It is, in like manner, most impressively applied to the most exquisite and divine processes in tht human structure. Ps. xciv. 9 : ::''3^ xbn "j"? nSEi"^ CX , " He that formed the eye, shall he not see ? " Ilcnnc, in a more interior sense still, it is used of the very constitulion of the soul : Zach. xii. 1, "who stretcheth out the heavens, and foundeth the earth, and formeth the spirit of man within him," i2'1p3, in interionbus ejus. Deeper btill, it is used of the hearty or the moi-al constitution : P&. xxxiii. Ii, C3b "in^ ->STn , "that forms their heart alike." It carries the pamp idea as a noun, and this gives lise to its u>e a^ denoting the forming or imaging faculty of the soul, as in the striking passage. Gen. vi. 5 : P'i^tUn'C ~i3t"?31 "^25 I "and everj" imaging of the thoughts of his heart." 12C^ is the form of the thought, as the thought is the form of the emotion, or of the deep heart that lies below all. One of the must noteworthy uses of the verb "iSt*^ is iti np]>lication to the human generative process ; it is also to bi ubscrved liow this is a-^cribed directly to God, as though, in every cjise uf lUe individual gestation m the womb, there was something of a creative power and prorosp ■ see Jer. i. 5, ^^23 "^SK D")C33, " before I formed thee in the womb.* Compare Krcles. xi. 5, where this formative process is pro 8cnted as cjne of the deep mysterious things known * nly u CHAP. I.— II. 3. 161 the primitive matter, but the flowing earth-sphere. Just as little can one say that the six da_v.<' works have their beginning in Ter. 3 ; for the result of the tirst day is not the light merely, but also the dark- ness (see Is. xlv. 7). Concerning the theosophic interpretation of thohu vabohu as a world in ruins whicli had come from God's judgment on the Fall of ihe Angels (see ver. 3). — Ver. 3. Let there be light. — Here begin the geologico-cosmical creative periods. This new beginning, therefore, must be distinguished from that first creation of the heavens and the earth which is to be regarded as having no creative beginning before it. Heuoeforth the treat- ment is that of a sacred geology, yet regarded in its bibhcal sense as geologico-cosmological. Hence, in ver. 3, the ci-eation of the Ught-heaven ; ver. 8, the creation of the air-heaven; ver. 14, the creation of the star-lieaveu ; ver. 26, the creation of the he:iven- ly core of the earth itself.* — And God said. — " Ten times is this word, ^^ST i repeated in the history of the seven days." The omnipotence of the creative word^ Ps. sxsiii. 9 : He spake and it was done, he commanded and it stood (Rom. iv. 17). The creative- word in its deeper significance : Ps. xxxiii. 6 ; Is. xl. 26; John i. 1-3; Heb. i. 2 ; xi. 3 ; t'ol. i. 16. Tli£ light, the first distinct creative formation, and, tlierefore, the formation-principle, or the pre-condi- tioning for all further formations. Of this forntative dividing power of light, physical science teaclies us. It is now tolerably well understood, that the light is not conditioned by perfected luminous bodies, but, on tlie contrary, that hght bodies are conditioned liy a preceduig luminous element. Thus there is set aside the objection taken by Celsus, by the Mani- cliajans, and by rationalism generally, namely, the supposed inversion of order in having first the light and afterwards the luminous body. And yet the light without any substratum is just as little con- ceivalile as the darkness. The question arises, how the author conceived the going forth of the light, whether out of the dark bosom of the earth-flood, or out of the dark bosom of the forming heaven ? As the view of the heavenly lights (light bodies) ver. 14, is geocentric, so may the same view prevail here of the heaven-light itself By this is meant that in the fact of the first illumination of the earth the author presents the fact of the birth of Ught generally in the world, without declaring thereby that the date of the genesis of the earth's light is also the date of the genesis of liglit universally. But we may well take the birth of light in the earth (or the earth becoming light) as the analogue whereon is presented tlie birth of liglit in the heaven, just as in the creation of man there is symbolized the creation of the spirit-world collectively. \Ve let alone here the question whether the light is an emanation (an outflowing) of a lumi- God, and especially Ps. cxxxis. 13-16, whether the language there denotes the individual or gcnci-ic formation, or both — "when I was curiously wrougliL,*' etc.; "and in thy book all my members were wi-itten, ^^22^ ^"'^7' *^^ '^^^ *^*^y were being formed " (see remarks i'n Introd. to Genesis, p. 135). If the Hebrew had developed itself into a philosophical Unguage, from this root would have come their n.ame for formal cause, causa /onnalis, that wliich gives idea to any- thing, or Mia/.v5 il what it is, in distinction from the causa finaiis, or ':ausa efflcifns. In fact, it is in this very way that such a term lias been formed in .\nibic, and m the Habbtnic.'il Hebrew, only they have employed for this pur- pose the kindred "11^ , which connects the idea oi formation with that of biiidinij or inward unity. — T. L.] • I .Man is thus called by Lange as the causa Jinalis of all tLe other earth formations. — T. L.l nous element, or an imdulation from a lumluoui body; only it may be remarked that sound goes oi all sides, and may, therefore, be supjiosed to undu late in sonorous waves, whilst the ray of light, on th« other hand, goes directly, for which reason the appU cation to it of such an undulation of sonorous ivavef would seem unsuitable. The idea of an letheria vibration may make a medium between emanation and undulation. Without doubt, however, the mean- ing here is not merely a light-a|)pearing which goes forth out of the heaven-ground,* and breaks through the dark vapor of the earth, or from heavenly clouds of lighi (such as the primary form of the creation may have appeared to be), but an immediate lighting up of the luminous element in the earth itself, some- thing like what the Polar night gives rise to in the northern aurora; enough that it is said of the contrast presented between the illuminating .and the shade-producing element. The light goes, how- ever, in the first place, out of the dark world-forms (not the mere world material) after that the spirit of God, as I'ormative principle, has energized in them. The spirit of God is the spiritual light that goes out from God ; therefore its working goes before the creation of the outer light ; and therefore, too, it is that this light is t.ie symbol, and its operation simi- lar to the operation, of the spirit — that i.s, the forma- tion and the revelation of beauty. — And there ■was light. — The famed sublimity of this expression as given by Longinus (in a somewhat doubtful text) and others, is predicated on the pure simjilicity and confidence with which it sets forth the omnipotence of the creative word. — And God saw the light that it was good, — The first beauty is the light itself For the Hebrew 3ia denotes the beautiful along with the good, even as the Greek icaKbi' de- notes the good along with the beautiful. The sense : t/ial it was good, does not seem easy ; and therefore TertuUian (and more lately Neumann) have accepted the quia of the Itala. On the other hand, DeUtzsch remarks : " The conclusion is that to God each sin- gle work of creation appears good." The conclusion lies, perhaps, in the pause of solemn contemplation, out of which, at the end, goes forth the perfect sab- bath. It is because the religious human soul recog- nizes the fair and the good in the event of the ap- pearing, that there is therein reflected to it the foun- tain of this spiritual ethical satisfaction, namely the contemplation of God Himself Still the contempla- tion of God does not regard the object as though captivated by it because it is fair, but it rejoices therein that it is fair ; or we may say that, in a cer- tain manner, it is the very eflicacy of this contempla- tion that it becomes fair. — And God divided between the Ught and the darkness. — Although it is farther said that God named the light day and the darkness night, still it must not be supposed that here there is meant only the interchange between day and night as the ordaining of the points of divi- sion between both, namely morning and evening. Although hght and darkness, day and night, are called aftei their appearing, yet are they still, all the more, ver^ day and night, in other words, the very causahties themselves. The Ught denotes all that is simply illuminating in its eflicacy, all the luminous elemeni; the darkness denotes all that is untrans * [Ilimvtelsgrundi'.. "We fail in translating this to gel any better word to represent the frequent tieiman Grunt (m composition) than our word ground. Foundation pr& scnts an incongruity of figure which is less in the more gen eral tciin ground. Plane wf ild be too indefinite. — T. L.l itm GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. parent, dark, shadow-casting; both together denote the poliiritv of the created world, as it exists between the light-formations and the night-formations — the constitution of the day and night. " One sees," says Delitzseh, " how false is the current and purely pri- vative conception of darkness ; as when, for exam- ple, a mediseval interpreter (Maxima Bibl. Lugd. vi. p. 868) says: sicut siienlimn nihil est, sed icbi vox non est mlcntiuyn dicitw, sic tenebra nihil sutU, sed ubi lux non est teitebr9 ICjOtcs properly not merely an outward assembling, but an intensive close combining (see Gesenius, T^'^p). ijpon the formation of tlie water proper, as it is now introduced, is conditioned tiie firm underlying of tlie eartli. The completing of this division, however, has for its cousei-iueuce tiiat flowiug togetlu'r of tlie water into its peculiar place, with wliich immediately the self-foi-ming earth-soil now comes into risibility. It is thereby implied that the elevations and depres- sions of the earth's surface — the hills and vales, the highlands and the ocean-depths — are here formed, just as it is so precisely set forth, Ps. civ. B-8 (with which compare Prov. viil. 24). And so, too, the crea- tion of the hills is here only indicated, or rather pre- sented, as a consequence of the creation of the sea (see Ps. xc. 2; Deut. xxxiii. 15; Habak. iii. 8). Thus much is clear ; as long as the water and the earth-mass are not divided, there can be no mention of any oiigination of the hills. With the sea-lite, however, must begin also the earth-life, that is, the working of the imier earth-fire that causes the up- heavings. It is a wrong apprehension of the waters of ver. 2 and ver. 6, when one takes the story of cre- tion as favoring a one-sided Neptuuism (Wagner). The volcanic action of the earth in the formation of the earth, is not expressed, indeed, but it is through- out freely unplied ; it would appear to be indicated, Ps. civ. S. There is truly no tlitficulty in supposing that the formation of the hills kept on through the succeeding creative days. In respect to this, De- litzsch expresses himself better than Hofmann: " Generally," says he, " the works of the single crea- tive days consist only in laying Ibundations; the birth-process that is introduced in each, extends its efiicacy beyond it, and, in tiiis sense we say with Hofmann (i. p. 278) : ' Not how lorig^ but how mani/ limes, God created is the thing intended to be set forth.' " Much more have we to distinguish between the distinct creative acts and the creative evolutions. Even after the creative division of the first day the evolving of light may stiU go on, and the same thought holds good of the efiicacy of the succeeding &cts of each of the other days. The act itself means the introduction of a new principle out of the word of God, which, as such, has the form of an epoch- creating event. — Ver. 10. And God named the dry earth land, that is, earth-soil in the narrower sense, and, therefore, it is that }'"IX has no article. — And the water named he sea. — Properly seas, "or rather ocean; for it is more intensive than a numerical plural, and is therefore (as ui Ps. xlvi. 4) construed in the singular." Delitzsch. On the other nand, Knobel would make prominent the singleness of the seas in the rendering Weltmeer^ or world-sea, main sea, or ocean. — And G-od saw. — Xow has the earth-formation come into visibility, though only in its first outlines, or, according to the idea of the naturaUst, as an insular appearing of the land-region as it untblds itself to view. — Let the earth bring forth (sprout, germinate). — It is agreeable to the nature of the earth as well as of the plant that both «re together as soon as possible. The earth has an mclinatioii to germinate, the plant to appear. In truth, its origination is a new creative act. In the proper place is this creation narrated ; for the plant denotes the transformation of the elementary mate- rials, earth, air, water, which are now present in organic life through the inward working of the hght. It forms the preconditioning, as the sign or prognos tic, of the awaiting animal creation. And though it has need of the light too in some measure, it doea not yet want the sunshine in its first subordinate kinds. The question now arises, whether we must distinguish three kinds of plants : Xtlj^ , tender green. --" , herbs and shrubs, vegetables and grain !o the smaller growths generally), and i"i3 y: , fruit tree, according to the view of Knobel, embracing aL trees inasmuch as tney all bear seed. Delitzsch, at well as Knobel, assumes this threefold division. Farther on, however, we see that the more general kinds precede (lights, water-swarmings), in order that they may become more or less specific. And here XIU^ may present the universal conception of all vegetable life in its first germination (although including along with it the more particular kmds of cryptogamic and the grasses), whilst in this way the contrast between the herbaceous plants and the trees becomes more prominent (Umbreit, Ewald). Thence, too, it appears that the sign of sted-formation, of propagation, and of particular specification, is ascril>- ed to all plants. Closer observations in respect to single particulars may be found in Knobel. We must protest against the exposition of Delitzsch : " Its origination follows in that way which is un- avoidable to a creative beginning, and which is to it essentially what is called a generatio equivoca ; that is, it does this in measure as the earth, through the word of the divine power, receives strength to generate the vegetable germ." The sentence con- tains a contradiction in so far as the question still relates to the divine word of power ; but this divine word of power creates not merely a strength, or force, in general ; * each new and distinct creative * [The argument from exegesis here would depend vei-y much upon the view taken of the words 3r")T ^"'^t^ - They are rendered by the LXX. ainlpov trirepfia. THe Vulgate, .faciensjsemeu, and our translation, yielding seed, are better, since the Iliphil I'orai seems to demand a causative or pro- ducing sense. The rendering of ttie LXX. would do lor the other form >nT "^TT , which occui-s ver. 29, representing the plant, after it was made, as casting its seed upon the earth. If we take It in the causative or seminative sense, there is still the question, whether it is merely desciiptive of the plant in general as distinguished from other created things, or whether it sets forth something in the very crea- tive or tirst generative process. If it were the former, it would seem to demand the article, J^ITlsn , the plant that bears or semmat^is seed. As it stands,* however, the whole force of the word (as emphatic) and of the context, would favor the latter idea : " Let the earth bring forth the plant as seminating,*' or in its semination, that is, as growing from a seminal power in the vei7 beginning. It may not be easy to understand, conceptually, how tliis can be withont a previous material seed (seed-vessel) or a previous plant from which the seed came, but still, as a fact, it may be clear, and clearly stated. The opposite notion is, that the plant was outwardly and mechanically formed with its stem, leaves, limbs, seed-vessel, etc., all perfect, and then, in somp way, connected with the ground, which, after all, has noth- ing to do with its first production. Or it might be thought that merely the seed (seed-vessel) was thus mech.aiucally made (that is, by a force acting on the outside of it), and then this seed placed in the ground if> grow. Either of these latter views is attended with great difficulties, increas- ing ever the more they are contemplated, though as a nier< conceptual view it might seem at first the easiest. It ma> be said, too, that they are not favored by the langnagt which assigns to the earth an iiupoit-ant part in the prooe«s, and seems to make the very semination an original act. We gain nothing by regarding it as the mechanical ereatioD of the seed-vessel, since that is not, in itsell, the =eminat ns power, any more than the entiie plant, but only the seat 01 its uearer'residence, or its more interior wrapper as it may be called. Every plant that now grows springs Irum ar immaterial power (and thnt not a blank force, but condition ed by an idea) brought in certain relatious to the earth This power is not the seed as seed-vessel, for that dies I dis* .. 'ves> in the process (see John xii. 24), and by such disso i70 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. »ord introduces a new and distinct principle into the already existing sphere of nature — a principle which hitherto had not been present in it. Along lution sets free the immaterial life to work again, as at first, in gathering from the flowing outward conditions iho mate- rial for its new manifestation, and arranging tuch tiowing material in the fixed order commanded and demanded by its unchanging ''^^'C , species, elSos, law, or idea. In the begin- ning the command of the Logos plaees it in immediate con- nection with such outward conditions. There is no need of any protophist whether in the form of plant or seed. The tree, regarded materially, or as ^an-ofxevov, is as much a flowing thing as a river, although it flows much more slow- ly. It is, therefore, alike irrational to think of God's mak- ing either of thim outwardly, or immediately, int^tead of the causation from which they respectively proceed. In the case of things that are intended to reproduce themselves, thie primitive seminal power is aften^'ards deposited m a seed- vessel from whence to come forth for all future manifesta- tions ; but it is the same power — the same that was first created — the tsame species (»»wm in TnuUis)it\. the myriad manifestations outwardly existing at the same time, and in all succeeding times as long as the power lasts, or is able to find the conditions under which it appears. It may be re- ^rded too, with all reverence, as the same process, except that at each intermediate beginning it st^irts with its libera- tion from the holding seed-vessel to work anew in building itself a new house, but in the same manner, after such lib- eration, as when it first issued from the divine fiat. For a moment, too, may this immaterial power be said to become disembodied, as in the instant of passing from the old per- ishing organization into the commencing new— each being successivi'ly its work, deriving from it structure, foim, and outward species. It is not made by the organization — for then chemistrv might find it. It is before the organization, thus making the latter a real organism produced, as at first, by a force and a law working from within, and building around itself, instead of an artificial semblance having its idea outwardly or mechanically introduced into the matter after the way of human art ^Ve may say, therefore, that it is the same original life, the going forth of the same unspent energy, the prolonged utterance of the same Word sounding on m nature, and obeyed now, e^ch time, with the same alacrity as when it first felt the pulsations of the voice that eaid: '("^JXt^ XCTP , "Let the earth germinate," let the earth bring forth. It is mother-earth that gives the plant its body, its outward manifestation, so far as that alone may be called the plant, but not its idea, its law, or even its im- material ptiwer. And it is this which makes it something quite ditk'rent from the generatio eqiiivoca of some natural- ists, and Jo which Deiiizsch unfortunately compares it. The veiy term implies a blank, blind, and doubtful force that mitiht produce one thing as well as another. But here there is a conditioning power bringing out the plant ^njiiDb according to its species. It is God's word appearing (speak- ing) through the earth ; it is *' the Lord hearing tiie heavens, and the heavens hearing the earth, and the earth hearing the corn, the wine, and the oil," Hosea ii. 22, 23. Hence the exceeding significance as well as beauty of one of tlie Hebrew names for plants. They called them PlIIX , lig/ils, manifeslalionsi see Is. xxvi. 19, P'^mx 313, the "dew of herbs," to which ie compared the resurrection-power (or *• resurrection-rain " as the Jewish Rabbins call it), which nail revive the bodies " sown "' in the earth. Whatever difficulty there may be in such views of the Dripinal growth, it is far less than that which attends the tiechanical notion, if we push it to all its consequences. It ►oulfl follow that the earth did not really bring forth the first pl:ints (as Serijiture expressly says it did), unless we take it in some mere magical sense, or think of some sudden starting out of the earth independent of any nexus of physi- cal causation. We must also, in that case, give up the idea of the species determining the construction instead of the construction the species. But the strongest argument for the commentator is that the exegesis will not bear it. In Bucb an outward mechanical view the words Xttllin. -"^"ms lone all their cauj^ative force, and thus become merely re- dundant cyphers in the account. The language of causation whore there i« in reality no causative process is simply magical and unmeaning, llad 5'^^T13 hero meant nothing more thr»n casting or sowing seed, as the LXX. interpret it, there would only have been need of the present Kal parti- oiple ^')^^ , aH in ver. 20, where the plant is spoken of after tfl creation, and as carrying on its procesnes of reproduction. fliid "yielding seed" been the sense intended, there are »thei words that would have better expressed it. This with the various species and seeds, along with th* determinate propagation of plants, each afiei iti kind, there clearly and distinctly comes in that con- ception of nature which is already announced in the gi'eat contrasts. The words : upon (he earthy ■}*")>fn"b5 (ver. 11), are interpreted by Knobel of the high growth of the trees [over the earth) in con- trast with the plants which cleave closer to the ground, and wliich are regarded by Dclitzsch as a present clothing of the earth. With respect to ver. 20, we may assume that Knobel is right. In the contemplation of the young world, this majestic rising above the earth in the case of the tall trees, as in that of the birds, has a peculiar excitement for the imagi- nation. With the plants there appears the tirst thing that is distinctly symbolic of life as well as of their individual beauty. 8. Vers. 14-19. Fourth Creathe Day. Begin- ning of the second triad. — The preconditions of the now expectant animal and human life, are the lighta of heaven, the stars, or heavenly bodies, partly as physical quickening powers, and partly as signs of the division of time for the human culture-world. It is theirs, in the first place, to make the distinction between day and night, between Ught and darkness, and to rule over the day and night — to make that great contrast upon which the human developments, as well as the animal nature-life, are essentially con- (litioned, such as sleep, waking, generation, diversi- ties in the animal world — animals of the day and animals of the night, etc. It agrees well with the text, that again, whilst it makes a more special men- tion of the ordinance of the heavenly bodies, it gives the chief prominence to their spiritual or humane appointment : let them be for signs and for festivals, and for days, and for years. The question arises here, whether these appointments are to be taken as four (Luther, Calvin, DeUtzsch, Knobel); or that three are meant: namely, for signs of times, for days, and for years (Rosenmiiller, Eichhorn, De Wette, Baumgarten) ; or only two : for signs, for times, including in the latter both days and years (Schumann, Maurer). For the first view, indeed, there speaks the simple series of the appointments, but there is, too, the consideration that the spiritual (or ecclesiastical) appointments of the heavenly bodies are not exhausted in tlie chronological. The sign rix has oftentimes in the Old Testament, a relig- ions significance. Thus the rainbow is established for the sign (nix) of the covenant between Jehovah and Noah, together with his sous (Gen. ix. 1 2). Later, Abraham receives in the starry heaven a sign of the divine promise. But when it is said (Jer. x. 2): Ye must not be afraid of the signs of heaven, there is not reprobated therein the meaning of the signs of heaven in their right significance, but only the heathenish misconception of them. The primi- tive religion was throughout symbolic ; it was a con tcmplation of the invisible deity through symbolic signs, and the most universal of them were sun, moon, and stars. It was thus thai th*^. primitive symbolic religion became heathenish ; e religioui symbolic degenerated into an irreligious mythical; the glory of God was suffered to pass away in the Hijihil form otcurs only in one othe- place in the Hebrew Scrip'ures, namely Lev. xii. 2, wh s it evidently bears exclusively the coneeptive or sominaving Benwe. Its choice hero, therefore, shows that the writer had HomethinK else in view than an outward construction, either of the pKiut M a whole, or of the seed-vessel whether regarded as tpparatJ from, or as contained in, the plant. — T. L.1 CHAP. I.— II. 3. 17\ form of transitory signs ; it became identified with them, whilst men utterly lost the consciousness of the difference. The true representatives of the primitive reUgiou on its light-side held fast this consciousness, as in the example of Melchizedek ; but they reve- renced jod as such under the name El Kliou (God Most High). It is an improper inference when Knobel here would refer this to the UQUsual phenom- ena of the heaven, such as the darkening or eclipse of the sun aud moon, the red aspect of the latter (in •D eclipse), the comets, the liery appearances, etc. Moreover, we cannot find indicated here, as Delitzsch does, an astrological importance of the heavenly bodies, on which he remarks : " This ancient univer- sally accepted influence is undeniable, a thing not to be called in question in itself considered, but only in its extent," The question refers to the signs of the theocratic belief, such as are celebrated Ps. vhi. aud Ps. xix., from which the culture-signs of agricultuie, navigation, and travel, must not be excluded. Thence, by right consequence, must be added the festival signs, S''"15113 . Moed, it is true, denotes, in general, an appointed time, but it comes in close connection with the word Jehovah before the festival seasons. The significant time-sections of the Israel- ites were, moreover, religious sabbaths, new moons (Ps. civ. 19), and yeaily festivals which were likewise regulated by the moon. Upon the two religious appointments of the heavenly bodies (signs of belief, ■signs of worship) follow the two ethical and humane : the determination of the days and therewith of the days-works — the determination of the years and therewith the regulation of life and its duration. Hereupon follows the more common determination of the heavenly hghts for the annual hfe in general. —To give light upon the earth. — With the light ~f the sun there is also determined its vital warmth, ihus the text speaks first of tlie appointment of the teavenly bodies for the earth-world (vers. 14, 1.5), »nd then of the creation of the luminaries in their variety and distinct appointments, in which the stars form a special class, ver. 16. After this there is mention of their location and their efficacy ; their place is the firmament ; their primary operation is to give light; next follows their government, that is, that peculiar determination of the day and night that is necessary for the preservation of life. The third thing is the thvision between light and darkness, the instituting of the vicissitude of day and night. For here must the dividing of light from darkness denote something quite different from that of ver. 4 ; it is not the division of the luminous and the shadowy, but of the day-Ught and the night-shadow them- selves. But now arises the question : How comes it that the first mention of the creation of the heavenly bodies is on the fourth day ? It follows from the fundamental cosmical laws that the earth, before the sun, was not prepared for bringing forth thi' plants. It is saying too httle to affirm that this place must only be understood phenomenally, or that the earUer created heavenly bodies make their first appearance on the fourtl day along with the clearing-up of the atmosphere. But, on the other hand, suiely, it is gajiiig too much, when we assume that the formation of the starry world, or even of our owu solar and planetary system, had its beginning in the fourth creative period. This representation is inorganic, abnormal. It is just as httle supported by any sound cosmogony as demanded by the scriptural text. As little as the text requires that in generil tiie first light of the universe should have its originatiot cotemporaneous with the light out of the thohu vahhohu of the earth, just as httle does the placi before us demand that we should date the abso.utelj first formation of the heavenly bodies from the fourth creative day. This, however, agrees well «ith ou? text, that both the appearing of the starry world, and the development and operation of the solar sys- tem, were first made ready for the earth on that same day in which the earth became ready for the sun. On the fourth creative day, therefore, there 18 completed the cosmical regulation of the world for the earth, and of the earth for the world. See more under the Theological and Kthical. 9. Vers. 20--.;3. Fifth Creaiive Day.— Corre- sponding then to the second day (of the first triad) we have here (on the second day of the second triad) the animation of the water and the air in the marine and winged creatures. The creation of the marine animals begins first. It is not only because they are the most imperfect creatures, but because the water is a more quickening aud a more primitive condition- ing of life than the earth. The like holds true of the air. It is clear, moreover, that the land-animals in their organization stand nearer to men than the birds; nevertheless they are not, in all respects, more per- fect than the biids ; and of these latter, as of the trees, it is emphatically said that they hover high over the earth. IndeetJ, as birds of the heaven, they are assigned to the heaven, as the fish to the water, as the land-animals to the earth, and so far correctly, since they not merely soar above the earth, and have their proper Ufe in the air, but also because they are in part water-fowl aud not merely land-birds. This graphic nature-limning is, moreover, to be noticed here in the formation of the fishes and the birds, as at an earlier stage in the formation of the plants. The first animals are now more carefully denoted as living souls, n^n fs: (soul of hfe). On this De- litzsch remarks : " The animal does not merely hare soul, it is soul; since the soul is its proper being, and the body is only its appearing." That might hold in respect to men, but it could hardly be said of the animal (see Ps. civ. 29, 30). It is true, the beast is animated ; it has an animal principle of sen- sation and of motion which is the groimd of its appearing, but as soul it is inseparably connected with all animal soul-life,* that is, the life of nature. Knobel translates : Let the waters swarm a swarm. This conception is still more lively and pictorial than that of our translation {es solleit wtmnieln die Wasser vom Gewimmel, let the water swarm with or from a swarm) ; nevertheless we hold the latter to be more correct, since the causality of the swarm cannot he in the water itself,f but in the creative word. — And * [Thierseelenlehen. Lange evidently forms this Ger- man word with reference to the peculiar Hebrew phrase n*n tUE3 , nephesh hayya, or soul of life, rendered in our English Version living 3oul. We use the word animal, in translating, from an aversion to the English word beast, which has feilien much below the German Thier. — T. L.) t [This reasoning seems doubtful. There is no more uced of such an argument to avoid naturalism here than iQ interpreting the similar language y^XH XUJ'IFI , Let the earth bring, ver, U. The causality here, as there, is dou- ble, but there is certainly a secondary causality in the earth which justifies us in giving its obvious active transitive meaning to the denominative verb Vl'ilj : Let the waten swarm a swarm. The verb is evidently made from the noun 1'"]Ui , reptilia, the lowest and most prolific kind c f animals. So the Jewish- Arable translator renden it by a siinilaj 172 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. let birds fly and fly (fly about). — The strong sense of tlie Hebrew conjugation Pilel (rsi?^) cannot be expressed by the simple words let Jiy. The element of the formation, the air, is not here given ; for it is clear that they are not referred to the water in their origin.* One might think here in some way of the upper waters ; but the birds are under the firma- ment. Their element is the very firmament of hea- ven, just where the two waters are divided, tin its underside, or that which is turned towards tlie earth (":s"br), must the birds fly. They belong just as much to the earth as to the water and the air ; there- fore are they assigned to no special district, ver. 21. The great water-animals (l"'3n , long-extended), a word which is elsewhere used of the serpent, the crocodile, the marine monsters, but not specially of fishes. "These, with the insects that live in the water, worms, etc., are all here to be understood under n^n Ce; (soul of Ufe)." Knobel. That the animal creation had its beginning mainly with the water-animals we learn from natural science ; but whether with the vertebrated animals? (Delitzsch.) All birds of wi?iff, translates Knobel. We would rather take ^3S as a more general designation; winged^ which would also include the insects. De- litzsch correctly rejects the old view, which is re- stored by Knobel, namely that the author meant to represent God as having always created each species of animals in one pair; for one pair cannot swartn^ and with a swarm the animal creation begins. With good ground, however, does Delitzsch maintain that for the animals there were determined central points of creation, p. 117. None the more, however, can we approve what he says of the generatio lequhoca of the water and air-animals out of water and earth ; denominative verb made from ^;laces cited by DeUtzseh. Ps. viii, ; Heb. ii. 7 ; Luke sx. ye, prove nothing. Although the angels are called spirits and sons of God, yet the Scriptures accurately distinguish between the angelic and the human nature, and there seems to be an impropriety in the minghng of the divine and the angelic image. More- over, from this human creation it is that we have the first disclosure of the existence of any spirit-world in general. 5. Pluralis majestaticus^ ov pluniUs inten- sivus (Grotius, Gesenius, Neumann, Knobel). It omst be noted that the plural is carried into the word • [Among the Jewish interpreters the view of Maimoni- des is peculiar and noteworthy, though it may at first .strike a'l &s strange and irreverent. It is God, he tljinks, speaking to the earth, or rather, to the nature already brought into being by the previous utterances of the word, and which, in the commands preceding, had been addressed in the impern~ iice third person : " Let the earth bring forth," etc. Xow, when man is to be made, there is a change to the.^rs^ person Imperative, that is, nature is addressed more as an a-ssociate th;xn as a servant : " Let us make man," the higher work in Muich both co-operate— God directly and sovereignly, nature mediately and obediently through the divine woid. Prom the out' comes his body, his physical, trom the other his Ji\-iuer life and image. "In regard to the lower animal ind vegetable life," says this great critic, philosopher, and theologian, "the language ('ITSX'Sn , the word; was J 3 , Uei ns make man,' that is to say, * I and the earth,'— let the latter bring forth his body from the earthly elements, even a.^ it did in the case of the lower things that preceded him. For this is the meaning uf that which is written (ch. ii. 7): 'Jehovah Elohim foimed man '■^^E^T, see note, p. 1G4) from the dust of the earth, but he gave him a spirit from the mouth of the Most High ; ' as it ie written, 'He breathed into man,' etc., and said, moreover, 'in 0 if r image, according to our likeness,' meaning that he should lie like to both, that is, in the composition of his body a likeness of earth (or nature) from which hi; was taken, and in his spirit like to the higher order of being in that it is incni-poreal and immortal. And so i i what follow^, he -;iys, in the image of God (alone or unassociated) created tie him, to set forth the wonderful distinction (X^D, the miracle) by which man is distinguished from the rest of the creatures; and this is also the interpretixtion that f have found given by Rabbi Joseph Kimchi." Maimon. Comm. it, locum. Of all these views the pluralis majesfalicus has the le;ist isapport. It is foreign to the usus loquendi of the earliest language ; it is degrading instead of honoring to Deity, and A.ben Ezra shows that the few seeming examples brought from the Hebrew Scriptures, such as Xum. xxii. 6; Dan. ii. 36, do not bear it out— the latter, moreover, being an Ara- maic mode of speech. If we depart at all from the patristic view of an allusion to a plurality of idea in the Deity, the next best is that of Maimonides. In fact, if we regard nature as the expression of the divine Word from which it derives its power and life, the opinion of the Jewish Doctor approaches the patristic, or the Christian, as near as it could oome from the Jewish stand-point.— T. L.l ^3T33:£3 (in our image), etc. This appears to go b« yond the pluralis majei^taticm^ and to point to tht germinal view of a distinction in the divine personali ty, directly in favor of which is the distinction of Elohim and Ruah Elohim, oi that xji God and h^ Wisdom, as this distinction is made, Prov. viii., with reference to the creation. Although D^:i and naT, as well as the particles 3 and 3 , are used proniiscu ously (Knobel, Delitzsch), yet still the double designa- tion does not serve merely to give a stronger emphasis to the thought (Knobel). In that case the strongei expression cb:: ought to come last, cba is th* shadow of the figure, the shadow-outlin , the copj and therefore also the idol. miST is the resem blance, the comparison, the example, the appearance And whilst 3 denotes the near presence of an object, as zn, or within^ close to or in it, into^ whether in a friendlv or a hostile sense, near fiy, etc., 3 expresses the relation of similarity or likeness, as a*, in some degree^ like as, instead of, etc. The former preposi- tion denotes the norm, the form, mass, number, and kind of a thing; the latter its relation, similarity, equality, proportion, in reference to some other thmg According to this, in our image means, after the principle, or the norm of our image ; but as our like- ness means, so that it be our Hkeucss. The imagt denotes the ideal, and therefore also the disposition the being, the definition ; the likeness denotes the actuality, the appearing. As the likeness of God, man is set (placed, appointed) ; but the image of God he is made to become {fit^factus est) through his most interior assimilation, his ideal formative impulse (or that tendenf'V that forms him to the idea).* Foi * [We have found it difficult to express the thought of Lange here, and especially to give the force intended in the Geiman werden. "The image," he says, "is the ideal, di« Anlage, das Wesen.^' So Maimonides here calls cbs tLe specific form, n^3^73n n^'i^ , the species determining form, or that which makes a thing inwardly what it is, in distinction from n^3"Clxn nman , the architectural form. The manner in which the two words are used would warrant the interpretation that zb'S, (image) is to man what T^T3 is to the vegetable and animal species, or rather, that in man, as created after this higher idea, the Z.h'li (image) is the "p^a (species). This is most important in respect to the question : in what consists the unity of the human race? Oneness of physical origin and physiia.1 life Q'^'Q) un- doubtedly belongs to the idea of species, but in a much higher sense is this unity conserved by the cbs , the highei species, the one spiritual humanity in ;ill men. It is on proofs of this, and not on fiicial angles ur length of hceli that the argument should be built. Of the animals it ij said, ^ns^^b , each one according lo his kind. This is never said of'man, but instead of it, it is ^Di;b23 , in our image. In the next verse it is said God created man TobsS , "in his image"— that is, God's image, though some of the Jewish Interpreters, as referred to by Abi-n Ezra, woold make the pronoun in iTSbSt relate to man (Art image, man's image), but still that which God had epeclU- eally given as his divinely distinguishing idea. So also in thf ^:'ob^, o«r imase, they interpret it, the imncre that we have given, as in Gen. vi. 3, ^n^l"! , 7n{/apirit, is the spirit or life that I have given. So in Pe. civ. 29, 30; " Thougatherest in. cnil , (Aa'r spirit" — airain : "Thou aendest forth, T^Jl^l, ihy spirit," the life that thou hast given. It is the same spirit in both verses. There is in 'J'^lD , also, the radical sense of image, as w« see in the derivative n^^lDn' Ps. xvii. 15, joined, too, with a Di'»nwun reftrring to God, 7ir3!l^ri, "thy imajf*." **/ 174 GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. the dogmatic treatment of this, see farther below. Enobel and Delitzsch, following the Syriac Version, we of opinion that r^n (beast) has fallen out before V"ixn (the earth); but wherefore should the domin- ion of man be limited merely to the animal-world '! Through his lordship can man domesticate the wild beast ; he may also rule over the plant-world, and o< er the earth absolutely. This, in its widest accep- tation, is set forth, ver. 28. In this divine viceroy- ehip must his possession of the image first reveal itseif ; it must be the likeness of his higher and more intense conformity. — Ver. 27. Very explicitly is this divine-imaged nature of man presented in a two- fold manner along with his creation. — As man and woman. — Properly, as male and female created he them. Rightly does Umbreit remark ; " The lan- guage here soars to a most concise song of tri- umph, and we meet, for the first time, with the paralleUsm of members." In three parallel mem- bers, and therefore in the highest poetical form, does the narrative celebrate the creation of man. Con- cerning the derivation of men from one pair, see be- Bball be satisfied when I awake, thy likeness." So in a fearful passage directly the reverse of this, Cp^ seems to be used for the bad image, or the stamp of the Evil One in wicked men, as in Ps. Ixxiii. 20 : "As a dream when cue Ewaketh, so, O Lord, in the awaking (not "thy awaking," for which there is no pronoun and no warrant whatever), in the great awaking C"l^?2), in the arousing (the dies retri- buiionis), thou wilt reject their image," HT^P D735^ , In what this image consists, and whether lost, or to what extent lost, by Ihc fall, are mainly questions of theology instead of interpretation, but that there is still in man what in a most importani and specific, or constituting, sense, is called " the image of God," most clearly appears from Gen. ix. 6, where it is made the ground in the divine denoxmce- ment of the atrocity of murder. The reasons are strong for interpreting "man from the earth," as we interpret, the fish and the reptile from the waters. If the formative word ^ !£ ^ is used in the one case, 60 is X"13 , which some regard as the more directly creative, employed in the other : " And God created the great whales, and tile moving thing which the waters swarmed," that is, all the marine animals fi-om the greatest to the least. The one language is no more inconsistent with the idea of a pro- cess than the other. There is nothing then to shock us as anti-^criptural in the thought that man, too, as to his phys- ical and material, is a product of nature. As such physical being be has his "?3 {physical species), and may be said to be ^n3''T2b , as well as the other animals. But he is also a metaphysical, a supernatural, a spiritual being, and here it nay be questioned whether he can be said to be Sn3^133 . To describe him in this respect there is used the higher word CbiC , the image, the image of God, in distinction from his male and female confoi-mations which belong wholly to the physical. \\"c arc expressly taught that this .atter (iocs not belong to angels, or any purely spiritual beings. They have no sex, and it may be doubted whether they can properly be said to have species, unless it may be :ilSrmcd of bad Bpirita who are greatly mingled with the phy.sical, and whose defoiincd iviogr God despises or rejects, I's. ixxiii. 20. That there is specific variety, or species, among Buch may be inferred from our 3avioui-'s language. Matt, xvii. 21 : " This kind (to yeco?) goeth not out but by prayer and fasting." The image of Goposed hint or protestation. — T. L.] * ["We get the best order of senses in the root X3i£ and its cognate HSIJ , by regarding, as the pi-imary, the idea of splendor, or glory, as it remains in the noun ^3!t . See its use, Is. iv. 2, where it seems synonymous with 1133 , Is. xiii. 19, and a number of other places. The secondary sense of host, orderly military array (comp. Caniicles vl, 10), comes very easily and naturally from it. Or we may say that along with the idea of hosts, as in the frequent P1X3S "^^J^^ ' Jehovah of hosts, it never loses the primary conception. " Thus the earth and the heavens were finish- ed and all their glory," or their glorious array. Compar* the Syriac "Li^., dtcus, ornamentum, where the servile iau has become radical. The LXX. and Vtilpate transla» tors seem to have had someihing of this idea : n-dy 6 Koufiot airratv — omnis ornalus eorum. There Is a grand significance in the Greek Koa-fio^ and Latin mundus as thus used for the world or the array (artistic unity) of the worlds. X22£ is the Hebrew for Koafj-o^, and thus there is a most sublime parallelism presented by its two expressions : mxSSf mn'' and D^ w5" ~5^ — Lord of the worlds in space, King of th# worlds in time : /Sao-iAeus t^v aiutvutv, Ps. cxlv. 13 ; Is. xx^i 4; 1 Tim. i. 17. The Hebrew far transcends the Greek.- T. L.l 176 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. It seems to us, however, that the rest of God does not denote a remaining inactive merely, or a doing nothing. The perfecting of the worls on the seventli is likewise sometliing positive; namely, that God celebrated His work (kept a holy day of solemn tri- umph over it) and blessed the sabbath. To cele- brate, to bless, to eoiisecrate, is the finishing sabbath- work — a living, active, priestly doing, and not merely a laying aside of action. "The Father worketh hitherto," says Christ in relation to His healings on the sabbath (Jolm v. 17). The doing of God in respect to the completed creation is of a festive kind (solemn, stately, holy), a directing of motion and of an unfolding of things now governed by law, in con- trast with that woik of God which was reflected in the pressure of a stormy development, and in the great revolutions and epochs of the earth's formation. "His n:sbi3 (His work) was the completion of a task which He had proposed." Delitzsch. God rests * now and triumphs in that last finish of His • I" The .Scriptures," says Delitasch in his comment on n2C^ , p. 12y, "do not hesitate to speak anthropopathi- cally of God's entrance into rest." As far as the word n31I3 is concerned, there is no anthropathism here except as all human language, and all human conception, in respect to r>eity, is necessarily such — that is, necessarily representing him in space and time. The prunary sense of the word P^C is simply to cease, cease doing — as the LXX. render it, Kareiravat — not av€Trav ■'■IS •)'» I'-IUJ can iis'iiti"' — rBiy> ciiri — ^3"i5 iHe — m-^'-\n li;B"in. 0. The six days' work itself ^The idea of the cosmos. It appears distinctly in all the solemn pauses of the creative work, as they are marked with the sevenfold repetition of the words : and (Jod saw that it was good. The celebration of the sabbath also belongs iiere, as it points back to tiie beautiful completion of the universe. — liut the idea of the a;on appears with the fact that man is made the end and aim of all days of creation, by which it is clearly pro- aouiiced that he is the real ]irinciple in which the iTorld and its origin is comiireliended. The history of the eaith is thus made the lifetime of humanity. (l8 profouidest princijile of development and meas- ure of tiu,e is the support of man. 6. The C'realirm. — On the dogmatic doctrine of Jie crcMiCon, Hce Hase, Hutter, jLIaiin: "Doctrine of Faith," and Lange's " Positive Dogmatics." Hen comes especially into consideration 1 . the relation of th« doctrine of the creation to the Logos, John i. 1-3. The first verse of Genesis clearly forms the ground presupposed in that passage, God spake ; through Hi" word He created the world, says Genesis ; His woro is a personal divine lifi', says John, and the Ne» Testament in general, especially f'ol. i. 15-19; ch. ii. 3-9. According to Genesis everything is created through the idea of man in the image of God with a view to this man; according to the Ne* Testament it is through the idea of Christ, who i» the principal of humanity, with a view to Christ. A.i Adam was the principle of the creation, so is Chrifi the principle of humanity. Therefore it reads : " God hath chosen us in liim before the foundation of tlie world" (Eph. i. 4; comp. John xvii. 5). The creation is, in its most essential point, the production of the eternal God-Man in the eternal to-day. In man nature has passed beyond itself, from the relative, symboUcal independence, to the perfected and real, to freedom ; it has in him the mediator of its redemp- tion, of its glorification. The beautiful cosmos, this unity of all varieties, which combines in it an endless complex of unities, to the production of external harmony and beauty, has, in Christ, the most beau- tiful of the children of men, its middle point, the centre of its ideal beauty. Finally, the first aeon, which is fixed by the life of Adam, has for its cort its root, and its aim, the second ffion fixed by Christ. 2. The relation to the Holy Ghost. The spirit is the living, self-impelling unity of spiritual life, the breath of the suul, as the wind forms the spirit of the earth, the vital, ever-active unity of its varieties. The Spirit of (lod hovering over the waters, is the divine, creative, living unity, which rules over the ferment- ing process of the Thohu Vabhohu ; hence, as the peripheral principle of Ibrmation (at one with the central principle of formation, the Logos), it etlectu- ates the separations and the combinations by which the formation of the earth is determined. In the New Testament, however, it appears in its personal strength, as the unity of all works of revelation of tlie lather and the Son, and as the absolute, spiritual principle of formation which etti'cts the glorification of the world through the separation of the ungodly and the godly, aud through the combination ol every- thing godly in the church and the kingdom of God. 3. The relation of the creation to the Diviue Be- ing. In the creation, God appears as the creator, who calls forth things as out of nothing. But from J the genesis out of the pure nothing, are distinguished ^ the creative things as proceeding from the life op breath of the creator's word, with which they come forth into existence (Ps. civ. ■i"); and finally man stanils eomjilete "itli the features of divine allinity, proceeding from the thought of His heart, Iroiii His counsel, as created in His image, and inlended to be His visible administrator on earth. In the New Testament, however, the paternal feature of the Divine Being has uiivailcd itself as a paiernity, from which all paternity in heaven aud on earth proceeils, bul which, in the most special sense, refers to Christ, tlie image of the Divine Being. By the relation of the work of creation to the coming Christ, the whole creation becomes an advance representation, a sym- bol of Christ ill a series of symuOiical degrees, of which each represents in advance the next followiug one. Through the relation of Christ to the Father, the whole creation receives the mark of the Imuiaii, especially of revelation, or of the wonderful (as de CHAP. 1.- [I. 3. \li noted by the lion), of resignation, or of sacrifice (as denoted by the ox), and of the reflection of light, that is, the idea (as denoted by the eagle).* But the spirit, as the unitary life of the revelation of the Father and of the Son, is reflected as creative wis- dom in all creative movements of the world, and, indeed, in the fundamental forms of separation and combination, of centrifugal and centripetal force, of repelling and attracting operations. — The account of the creation. Gen. ch. i., is not a dogma of the trinity of God; the completed creation, how- ever, as a work of God and revelation, is a mirror of the trinity, and a prophecy of the revelation of its future (see Lange's " Positive Dogmatics," p. 201; ff. 4. The relation of the creation to revelation. The most general sphere of the revelation of God, that which forms the basis of all future revelations, is the creation of heaven and earth as the objec- tive revelation of God, which corresponds with the subjective revelation of God in his image, man. 5. The relation of the doctrine of the creation to the heathen and post-heathen view of the world. It denies polytheism^ for the creator of all things appears as the only one, and if his name stands in the plural (Elohim), the element of truth in polytheism (in contrast to Judaism) is therewith recognized, namely, the variety of the revelation of the one God in the variety of his strength, works, and signs, and the variety of the impressions which he thereby pro- duces. It denies pantheism, for God distinguishes himself by his creation of the world ; he creates the world through his conscious word, consequently freely, and stands in personal completion before his work and over it, so that the world is neither to be regarded as an emanation of his divine being, nor especially as a metamorphosis of the divine being, (the second form of it,) or, viee versa, God as the emanation of the world. But it emphasizes also the true in pan- theism (in contrast to deism) : the animating omni- presence and revelation of God in the world, with his creating word, with his spirit hovering over the form- ation of the world, with his image in the dispositions and destination of man. It denies dualism, for God appears as the creator of all things directly. He is also the originator of the Thohu Vabhohu of fermenting ele- ments ; he finds in the creation no blame, and, at the end of the sixth day, everything is very good. The true in dualism is, however, also retained (against fatalism), namely, the contrast between the materials and the formative power, between the natural degrees * (For this thought of Lanp:(?, which some might regard «a pure fancy, there is an etymological ground in the He- brew langu.^ge. The words for tight, and for the motions of light, have a close affinity to those for fiying, compare ri^l* , votare, CIST, vibrare, n^^V rendered tenebrse, but which strictly means the earliest twilight or twinkling of the morning, and that beautiful word, Hn'aJ ^SZ-'ESJ , palpebrm aurorsf, .Toli iii 9; xli. 10— ijfiepas ^Xc^apoi/, Soph. Autig. 103, "the eye-lids,*' the opening wing "of the morning." Compare also X2£3 , volavit, Jer. xlviii. 9, and v:J3 , splen- duity micavit, shone, glistened, glimmered, VD , a flower, etc. It is something more than a mere poetical 'image when we speak of light as having wings, especially as the conception S3 applied to the faint gleaming. glimTa&mn^, fiutlering, we ocay say, just waving up out of the darkness. How natural the order of the images : to fly, flutter, palpitate, vibrate, qtliver, twinkle, glimmer, gleam, shine. Comp. Engl. : fly, flare, flash ; Latin : volo ivotito), Jlo, fiare, flamma. So •piritually, idea and rejUMion support the same analogy. It may bo the piercing eye of the eagle that represents tho idea, but the other view has the best philological grounds. and the natural principles, between nature and spirit But the doctrine of creation denies much more the aiitichristian polytheism, that is, atumism, even tr its most tnodern form of inttterialisin, as such mate rialism rejects not only the truth of the .spirit, of personal Ufs, of the Godhead, of the immortality of the soul, and of liberty, consequently all clhical priu ciples, but also the physical principia of crystal form- ation, of the formation of plants and animals. I| does this by making matter regai'ded as devoid of al visibility, and in so far thoroughly hypothetical and abstract, or rather the infinity of ieigiied abstract substances (with which the TJiohu Vabhohu, as a living fei-mentation of appearing elements, is not to be contbuiided), the sole God-resembling factor of all phenomena of life, such phenomena consisting of two classes, of which the pliysical and abstract spiritual is to be in accordance with the play of matter, the ethical, on the contrary, a bare appearance, having no conceivable or comprehensible reality. The hving God here stands in contrast with the nmltitude of these dark idols of a feigned deity, and he places opposite the subordinate elements of life the super- ordiuate vital principles, which give the elements their cosmical form, whilst over all he places the ruler man, with his godlike, spiritual nature. The only thing that endures as an element of truth in materialism is the infinite and subtle eon- ibrmity to law that is foimd in material things, a fiict which spiritualism nowadays far too much disre- gards. The doctrine of creation also deifies with increased emphasis the intensified pantheism, i. e., the most modern pantheism as opposed to personal- ity— the pantheism which makes everything pi-oceed from an impersonal thought, in order to let every- thing again disappear through continual metamor- phoses (morphologism) in impersonal thoughts ; for the scriptural doctrine makes all thoughts of crea- tion proceed from an unconditioned personality, pass through fixed forms, and culminate in a conditioned personality. The truth that lies in such self-deifica- tion is recognized in this, that all works of the abso- lute thinking are themselves thoughts. He has spoken thoughts which have become works of crea- tion. Finally, it denies the d)-namical dualism (or the dualism of power), i. e., that hierarchical abso- lutism which holds as evil not only the material world, but still more the entire realm of spirit and spiritual life regarded as something to be controlled with infinite care, and with the infinite art and power of an abstract authority ; for it testifies for the word of God as imni,anent in the world, and thereby holds fast the element of truth in that hierarchism, accord- ing to which the spirit of God hovers over the waters, and mail as the administrator of God is commanded, with reterence to all animal life in the world : Rule over them, and make them subject to you. At the very first verse and word of Genesis, u clearly steps over that impure sink of dualism beyond which the entire heathen and philosophical view of the world could never go. It does this, by contrast- ing God in his eternal self-perfection to the creation which arose with time. The doctrine of the creation is the first act of revelation and of faith in the historj of the kingdom of God. It would lead too far, should we attempt to show how the three heathen errors of religion are ever present with each other, although al one time polytheism, at one tune pantheism, and a: another time dualism, prevails. We make this observ ation, however, to indicate thereby that we do not ignore the pantheistic basis of Gnosticism, even wher 180 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. It plaT3 with polytheism, since we present it accord- ing to its prevailing characteristic as dualism. But not only are the coarse ground-forms of the ancient And modern darkening of the doctrine of the creation to be judged by the tirst chapter of Genesis, but also the more subtle, Cliristianly modified forms, as, on the one hand, they present themselves in Gnosticism, (with which we also reckon ilanichaeism and its later shoots, extending to our time : PriscUlianism, Paul- Icianism, Bogomiles, Albigenses, dualistic theosophs of Jacob BiJhm), and, on the other hand, in Ebion- itism, as it has found its continuation in the later ilonarchianism, and still more modern deism. The Gnostics ground their opposition to the Old Testament on a paganistic misinterpretation of the New, and thus they may be ranged according to their more or less hostile attitude to the Old Testament, and as representing various heathenish views of the world which, after the manner of old Palimpsests, placed one upon the other, appear through the overlying Chris- tianity. Among such Palimpsests, on which a form of Christianity has been overwritten, may be reckoned the Samaritan (Simon Magus), Syrian (Saturninus, etc.), Alexandrian (Basilides), old-Egyptian (Ophiten), Hellenic (Karpocrates), Ponto-Asiatic(Marcion), and Persian Gnostics (Manes). Finally, in Mohammed, the Arabian Gnosticism and Ebionitism ran together, as the again broken forms of Subordinatianism and ilonarchianism ran together in Arianism. Through the manifold modifications which Christian dualism experienced immediately, and especially in the course of time, one must not he led astray in respect to the unity of the genus. Just so, pure Ebionitism, whose naked image is Jewish Talmudism (as it is to be rec- ognized throughout by its obhque position (o the New Testament and the New Testament elements in the Old), has passed through various mutations whose ground-thought remains the same : namely, a fatal- istic, eternalized, ontological divorcement between God and the world, through the law of religion or nature, whether the form of the change be called deism, naturalism, or rationahsm. And, finally, the mixed form of gnostic Ebionitism, which was prepared tlirough the Alexandrian system of Philo, and whose naked image is the Jewish Kabbala, has remained unchanged, through all mutations, in its ground- thoughts, whether they appear as Montanism, Douat- ism, or pseudo-Dionysian, mediaeval and modern ultra- "upernaturalism, as inflexible baptismism, or yielding spiritualism. Together with the true difference be- tween God and the world, the doctrine of creation expresses also the true combination between both, and finds the living mediation of this contnist in the man created in the image of God ; whereas, dualism makes the difference a separation, while pantheism makes the combination a mixture, and the still ob- Bervalile, polytheistic remiidscence in Christendom vacillaies, in its love of fables, between creature deification and creature demonizing. 6. The relation of the temporal creation to the eternity of God. It is quite as wrong to transfer gnostically the origin of the real world to the eternity of God, to fix the existence of God according to theogony by epeaking of a becoming of God, or of an obscure basis in God (Biilim), or of an origin of the material contemporary with the self-afllrmation of God (Rothe), as it is to declare, with scholastic super- BatunUsm, that (iod indeed might have left the world uncreated. Against the first view, tliere is the declaration that the world had a beginning, which, a little farther on, is fixed as the beginning of time. Against the latter, there is the declaration that Ooc chose believing humanity from eternity in Christ, as it is also indicated in our text, by the decree of (lod at the creation of man, and by tlie image of God Jlie icorlfl rests therefore^ as an actual and tempora. world, on an eternal ideal ground."^ Its ideal prepa- ration is eternal, but its genesis is temporal, for it if conditioned by the gradual growing, and the beauti' fill rhythm of growth is time. 7. In the significant number ten, the number of actual historical completion, the account is repeated . God said, Let there be, and there was. The speak- ing of God now certainly indicates the thinking of God, and it thence follows that all works of creation are thoughts of God (ideahsm). But it indicates also a will, making himself externally known, an active operation of God, and thence it follows that all th« works of creation are deeds of God (realism). Both, however, thinking and operating, are one in the di- vine speaking, the primal source of all language, his personally making himself known, although we can- not bring up the thought of this speaking to the con- ception (personalism). Through creating, speaking, making, forming, the world is ever again and agair denoted as the free deed of God. 8. Theological definitions of the creation. The creatio is distingtushed as a single act and as a per- manent fact. A third period is, however, at the same time pointed out, namely, the continuance of the doing in the deed, so that the world would not only fall to pieces, but would pass away, if God with- drew himself from it. The thought that he cannot withdraw from il in his love, should not be confound- ed with the untenable thought that he might not be able to withdraw from it in his omnipotence. The absolute dependence of the world on God is at all times the same (see Ps. civ. 30; Col. i. 17; Heb. i. 3). On the relation of the creation to the trinity, compare Hase, Hctter, p. 149, and L.inge's "Pos- itive Dogmatics," p. 206 ff. — The expression, crea- tion from nothing, is borrowed from the apocryphical word, 2 Mace. vii. 28 : H o-k Sr/TUK ; comp. Heb. xi. 3. It denies that an eternal material, or indeed that anything, was present as a (material) substratum of the creation. One can, however, misinterpret the expression by making the act of creation one of ab- stract will, absolved from any divine breath of life (Giintherianism). On determining the creatio ex ni- liilo we distinguish the nihil negativum, by deming the eternity of matter as substratum of the creation, and the nihil privativum^ by assuming that God at first created matter as nihil privativum, then the forma in the hexahneron. This tlie tnodtts creationis : first, matter ; then, the form. Tliis idea of a matter as something before form, does not correspond, how- ever, to the idea of a quickening or life-giving ac- tivity in creation. With the beginning of crea- tion there Is immediately estabhshed the contrast of heaven and earth, i. e., different spheres, which as such are not mere matter ; and with the Thohu Va- bhohu of the first earth-form there is immediately established the constructive activity of the spirit of * nVo havo placed this sentence in italics as containing a truth of vast importance, transcending all science on thi one hand, and all theology that places itself in onta^onijl]] to science on the other. If it contains truth in respect to the world, then, a/or/ion, is it tnxe in respect to man, wh« is the final cause, or "the spiritual core of the world,'' as Lanpo ehsewhore styles him. There is an eternal (ground for the world; much more is there an eternal pround foi humanity ( Adaro-ity) ; beyond all, is there an eternal ground for the new humanity (Christ-ianity). "Chosen in Hixr before the foundation of the world." — 1". I-l CHAP. 1.— II. 3. 18. i;od. The demiurgic conception presupposes an eter- nal world-matter, wnether regarded according to the Persian idea as evil, or according to the Greek as blind, heterogeneous, and antagonistic, or according to the Indian idea as magically mutable, which eternal world-matter must, in all cases, make the demiurgic formation a thing of mere ai'bitrary sport. The true idea of the work of creation lies between this and the theurgo-magical, according to which God had made the universe, in abstract positiveness, a purs mate- rial contrast of His divine being. This is a concep- tion in which the creating word, the spirit of God hovering over the waters, the image of God, or even the omnipresence of God in the world, do not receive their just due. As the aim of the creation finally [Jinis creationis)^ there have been distinguished the highest or last aim, God's glorification, and the inter- mediate aim, the welfare of his creatures and the happiness of man. But it must be observed that God glorifies himself in the happiness of men, and that the latter should find their happiness in contem- plating the glory of God. 9. Ttte Relation of the Mosaic Account of the Creation to the Mythological Legends of the Creation, — The cosmogonies of the heathen are confounded with their theogonies, as their gods with primeval man. See Licken: "The Traditions of the Human Race, or the Primitive Revelation of God among the Heathen," Miinster, 1856. "These cosmogonies are all very similar to each other. At first chaos is placed at the head as a disordered mass (chaos alone V). This chaos develops or forms itself into thp world-egg. This egg, which plays a certain part in the cosmogonies, is only a conception called forth by the apparent form of the earth,* so that the sky presents itself as the shell and the earth as the yolk of this great egg. With this shaping of chaos into a fforld-egg, or earth-sphere, arises then, according to the representation of these cosmogonies, the first being, the ' first-born,' or the first man. This first man originating with (out of) the world-egg, the father and founder of all life, is now, according to the popular conception, a giant-like being. As the * [This conception seems to be sanctioned by Lange, but th re is no proof of it. Instead of being suggested by the riuire of the mundus (which is not like an egg, or the earth ife- its yolk, unless we make very ancient the knowledge, 0^ notion, of the earth's sphericity), this so common feature J * the old cosmogonies came most probably from the idea >^ a brooding, cheristdng, life-producing power, rej resented tt» GMlesis by the rBnn'3 fl^l , the throbbing, pulsating, OPtoving spirit — from r)n^ , primary sense in Piel, palpitare, ipoondary sense, yet very ancient in the Syriac, to love % irmft/, or with the strongest affection. Hence in the 3re«k cosmogony the first thing bom of this ecg was epw?, ' .e primitive love, which shows that the egg had nothing to U* wiih the figure of the earth, either real or supposed. See ^e Birds of Aribtophanes, 697, where the poet calls it umji/e- ^ovj the egg produced without natural impregnation : 'Ef o5 )TepiT€AAo^€^ai? ttipati e^Aoo'Tei' 'Eptuy 6 irofleii-o?, From which spning Love the all desired,— ^nly the Greeks, as usual, inverted the primitive idea, and awde the generating cause itself the effect. Eros then pro- ■IMccd the human race, etc. In other respects the heathen Bo^mogonies are very fairly given here by Lucken ; but what ft wntrast. do these monstrosities present to the pure, har- v-nious, monotheistic grandeur of the Bible account ! If *h5 ilos-aic co-mogony was derived from the heathen, as is 'intended, how very strange it is, and counter to what takes place in all similar derivations, that the Hebrew mind (a Terj' gross mmd, they say) should have taken it in this im- pure and monstrously confused state, and refined it back to that chaste and sublime consistency which the Bible naira- Uve, whatever may be thought of its absolute trutb, may so lastly claim.— T. L.] present man, according to primitive conception, is i microcosm, so is that first being, in heathen concep- tion, the macrocosm itself, originating all life in nature by developing from himself the various partt of the world-organism, heaven and earth, sim and moon, mountains and rivers. Now by dividing or killing this macrocosmic being, or by mingling its generating parts with earthly things (esi)ecially fer- tilizing water, as in the story of I hronos), the lowej Ufe of nature begins, and things can multi|ily in sex- ual division and separation. This is the whole nucleus of all co.smogonies. And we would here observe, how Irequent it is in heathen conceptiona that all primitive generating being is imagined imder the form of a great world-animal (as an injmense ox or goat, for example), and as such worshipped. Thus the first being of the Persians is the ox Abu- dad, and the Egyptians worshipped it as a goat under the name of Mendes." Here, however, the following is to be observed : 1. Behind, beside, or over the chaos, or the disordered matter, usually stands a mysterious form of the highest divinity : Brahma among the Indians, Fimbultyr among the Teutons, Ormuzd among the Persians. 2. With the Hesiodic Gaia, which proceeds from chaos (i. e., from boundless empty space), there is also Eros ; so in the Chinese legend the first macrocosinic man or giant (Panku) is formed with the earth. In like manner Brahma with the Indians, and Ymer with the Teutons, become, by the division of their limbs, the foundation of the world. 3. Matter is always fixed with the divinity, or the divinity with matter. But matter is coherent with God in the predominant- ly pantheistic systems of emanation. According to the Indo-Brahmic, Platonic, and Alexandrian system of emanation, matter emanates witli the world from divirdty ; according to the Egyptian and mytliologi- co-Grecian system, divinity emanates from the world, from chaos, or the ocean. According to the pre- dominantly duahstic systems, the world arises from a mixture in the conflict between the emanaticjiis of the predominantly spiritual, light, good God, and the emanations of the predominantly material, dark, wicked God — sometimes in a decidedly hostile posi- tion of the two powers, as in the Persian niytliology, sometimes in a more peaceful parallelism, as in the Slavonian. For the various cosmologies, compare the quoted work of Lucken, p. 33 ; Delitzscm, pp. 81, 83, and ti09 ; Hah.n : Compendium, p. 374, with reference to Wdttke : " The Cosmogonies of the Heathen Nations before the Time of Jesus and the Apostles," Hague, 1850. The Chaldean myth of the creation, as given by Berosus, is found in Eusebils: " Chronicles," i. p. 22 ; Syncellcs, i. p. 25 ; the Phenician myth as given by Sanchouiaton in Euse- bils; Praparatio Evangelica, i. p. 10; the Egyptian myth in Diodorus Siculcs, i. 7 and 10; a Grecian myth in Hesiod's Theogoni/, ver. 116 s(iq. ; the In- dian myths in P. von Bohlen : " Ancient India," i, p. 158; Lassen: "Indian Antiquities," iii. p. 387 (at the begiiuiing of the code of Manu) ; the Zend myth in Avesta, the Etrurian myth in Suidas under Tyrrhenia (see the " Commentary " of Keil and Delitzsch, p. 8) ; the Scandinavian myth in the Edda, etc. According to the older conceptions of the dayi of creation as combined with biblical chronology, one could speak of a date of the creation. Starke Lt satisfied with the correctness of the date: 23d of October, 4004 before Christ. Schroder makes thi date the 1st or 17th of September, 4201, but adds 182 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. " The Son of Man knew not the day nor the hour when heaven and earth should pass away, but the child of man would know the year and the day when heaven and earth arose." The autumn seems to have been chosen on account of the ripe fruits, without reflecting that on the entire earth it must ever be autumn Bomewhere. id. The World as Mature, a. The A ndent View of tht World, that of the Bible and of Modern Times. — Tlie world-view of the ancients was based on appearance, according to whicli the earth formed a centre reposing under the moving, rolUng starry world ; this geocentric view received a scientific expression in the well-known Ptolemaic system. This system was abandoned in the time of the Refor- mation for the helio-centric system of Copernicus. But because the Bible, with "Kspect to astronomical matters, speaks the language oi common life, which is yet authorized in accordance with appearances (the Bun rises, sets, etc.), it was supposed that the Coper- Dican system contradicted the teaching of Holy Writ, and not only the papal council imagined that in its treatment of Galileo, but even Melancthon was of the same opinion, and to the present day such pro- tests, even on the Protestant side, have not entirely died away (see the attacks on Dr. Franz in Sanger- hausen in Diesterweg's "Astronomy," p. 104; also p. 20, especially p. 326). These prove how often a contracted Bible belief can injure more than profit the faith. The Copernican theory was especially supposed to be in contradiction with the passage iu Jos. X. 12, 13. While men were torturing them- selves with this difficulty springing from a blind adherence to the hteral rendering, a much greater one was gradually stepping forth out of the back- ground. The cousequences of the Copernican system were developed, according to the discoveries of Her- schel, in this wise : the sun among its planets is only a single star of heaven, and the earth is one of its smallest planets. Since now the fixed stars of hea- ven are nothing but suns, and these suns are all, according to the analogy of ours, surrounded by planetary groups, there appear to be countless num- bers of planets, of which very many are larger than our earth. How shall we now retain the thought, that the earth is the sole scene of the revelation of God, as Holy Writ declares : the scene of the incar- nation of God, and the centre of a reconciliation, dissolution, and glorification of the world, embracing heaven and earth. The Hegelian philosophy sought at first to meet this dilBccdty in its own interest. In order to make the earth the sole arena of the evolutions of mind, whicli was to reacli the full glory of its self-con- Bciousiiess in the Hegelian system, the whole starry world was declared to be destitute (jf spirits and in he main spiritless — mere films of light, etc. (see Langk's " Pd.sitive Dogmatics," p. 2711). The ettbrt was made to render this barren view agreeable to theology with the pretence that it was in accordance with the Bible, and favored the faith ("Land of Glory," p. 12 ff.). Against this insinuation the author wrote the articles which are collected in the work: "The Land of Glory" (Meurs), Bielefeld, 1838. "ith reference to the work of 1'fafk: "Man »nd the Stars." The results of modern a.^ironomy (according to Struve, Miidler, Schubert, etc.), viz., that the other planets of our solar system have not, in the first place, the same plastic consistency nor the same planetary relations as our earth, and sec- jndlf, that the stellar world is divided into a solar planetary region like our solar system, and a solai astral region (the world of double stars, of etema! sunshine), were applied to the bibUcal Christian view of the world as recognizing (in its conception of various places of discipline and punishment) a plact beneath the world on the one hand, and a placa above it on the other ; consequently the contrast oi a region of growing and a region of perfected life, of the church militant and the church triumphant, of the earthly and the heavenly, of the earthly-human and the angelic hfe. Above all, it was observed that with the doctrine of the ascension of Christ the exist- ence of a land of glory, in contradistinction to the earthly sphere of day and night, birth and death, or the sphere of the creative, was settled. This work was followed by the work of Kurtz: "Bible and Astronomy," 1st ed. 1842. In the meanwhile there sprung up a third representation of cosmology, which was again to fix the geocentric stand-point in a spiritual respect. This was mainly induced by A. von Schaden, but diligently prosecuted by Dr. Ebrard, recently in his work ; " The Results of Natural Sci- ence," Kbnigsberg, 1861. With respect to our plan- etary system, the said work endeavors to prove that the earth is its teleological centre, and to that end, fartlier, that the other planets could be either not at all or only partly inhabitable ; that they are only ac cretions to the planetary nature, having their places there simply on account of the earth ; and that con- sidered under any other point of view they could only appear as caricatures of the planetary nature. DeUtzsch (p. 614) is in general inchned to this view. He permits, however, a natural pliilosopher by profession (Prof Franz Pfufl'), to speak for him, who nevertheless acknowledges (after a severe criti- cism of the plant-family) that there may be imagined elsewhere such beings as are organized in correspon- dence to the prevaUing relations on other heavenly bodies. But one cannot see how the conceptions in question can be called " creatures of fantasyy We consider the view of the pure unreality of the extra-earthly planetary world as neither cosmologi- cully grounded, nor of wholesome tendency in aid of a biblical view of the world. As respects the first point, one must clearly distinguish between an in- habitability of the planets ot our solar system for beings of our earthly organization, and a similar in- habitability for spiritual beings in general. If the earthly organization of man is to fix the measure for the liabitableness of supra-terrene bodies, then must we also apply the analogy to the most beautiful and briUiaiit stellar-world. And what must become of the departed human souls, separated from their bodies ? How shall there be found a native region for angelic spirits '/ But it would redound little to the glorification of the living God of Holy Writ to consider the whole planetary group of our snii, the earth alone excepted, as spiritless wastes. Wliat- ever in this respect is true of the llegehan system in general, in its relation to the stellar-world, is true of the said view m special reference to our iilauetary system. [Note on tmk Astronomical Oiuection tc Rkvelation. — The (piestion of the planets' iuhabita- bility, especially in its religious and biblical bearings, has been very ably and scientifically discussed iu a work entitled "The Plurality ol' Worlds" by Prof Whewkll of Oxford. Tlie author maintains a vi(!» similar to that of Dr. Ebrard, that the earth is the advanced planet of the system, and that the molt scieiitilie evidence goes to slion that the otheit CHAP. I— II. 3. !8i (especially the largest, or those of least density) are In a rudimentary or iochoate state. The same may be true of all the visible bodies of the stellar spaces. The only reasouiug against it is simply the question, why not, poiirquoi non, as Montaigne employs it, without any inductive evidence. This author employs also the modern view in geology with great [lerti- nence and Ibive : lumiense limex without life or witli only th(! lowest forms of Ufe ! If tills is not ineon- Bistent with the divine wisdom and goodness, then immense spaces without life, or with only the lowest forms of Ufe, for a certain time, is no more incon- sistent. So far, however, as this presents a difficulty to revelation and Christianity, it is not due to modern fcience alone, or even mainly. The inhabitaljiUty of the planets, and the " plurality of worlds," are as much a priori thoughts, that is, rising of themselves to the musing meditative mind, as they are the results of any scientific or inductive reasoning. In both cases, imagination is the chief power of the mind employed, tuough modem science has furnished it with its stronger stimulants. As such a priori or independent thought, the notion of a plurality, or even an infinity, of worlds, was very ancient. It was, however, larger than the modern notion, being rather a plurality of Konnol, or mundi (that is, total visible universes) than of worlds used, as the name is now used, of planetary or stellar bodies. It wa."? the old question of the soul demanding a sufficient reason for the non-^xisieiice^ the absence of which reason seemed to be itself a proof of the actual exist- ence. Why not? If one world, why not two^ three — more — numberless? See Plotaech : De J'lacilis Philosophonim, vol. v. p. 289, Leip. ed., where among other statements and arguments he <^uotes the saying of Metrodorus: 6.ronov eii/at eV ^eyd\(i> irefittjj eva araxvf yffTj^ijvaty Ka't eva Kofr^iOt/ eV T(f iireifia'. " it is absurd (incredibly strange) that there should be but one head of wheat in a great plain, and no less so, that there should be but one cosmos in infimte space." The other idea of the planets' inhabitability appears also in the Greek poetry. See especially the fragment given by Pro- cius: fiWijf yaiav aireipaTov ^vre aeXTjvTiv a^dvarat K\ijCov(Tiv, einx^Oifioi Se t€ fJLTjirrjy TJ woAA' ovpe ex*'i toAV iffrea noWa jueAadpa, Another Ian J of vast extent. Immortals call Seleue, men, the moon, A land of mountains, cities, palaces. The Bible is charged with narrowness in its space conceptions, but how narrow is that science, or that philosophy, which while vaunting itself, perhaps, on its superior range of view, has no idea of any higher being than man, and sometimes would seem to reject any other conception of deity than that of a devel- oped humanity, slowly becoming a god, an etre su- preme, to the nature still below. How glorious the Scripture doctrine appears in the contrast, as start- ing with an all-perfect peisonal being: Jehovah Tzebaoth, Jehovah of Hosts, with cherubim and ueraphim, apx"', Kupi6rriTes. Uving principles, ruling energies, angels, archangels, thrones, donunions, principalities, and powers. If not in space concep- tions, yet how sublimely in the higher idea of ascend- ing ranks of being do the Scriptures surpass the low %nd narrow views of Herbert, Comte, and Uarwiu. *fter a past eternity of progress, nature and the cosmos have just struggled up to man t This is thi highest limit yet reached after a movement so im. measurably long, yea, endless in one direetion; and that, too, not man as the Scripture represents hini, a primus homo, an exalted being, so constituted bv the inspiration that gave him birth, and signed him with the image of the eternal God, but man jus* rising above the ape, just emerging from that last growth of nature that preceded him in this intermina- ble series of chance selections at last falling into some seeming order, and of random developments that never came from any preceding idea. Man as he now appears on earth, and whom Scripture pro- nounces a fallen being, the highest product of an endless time! Such is "the positive philosophy," so boastful of its discoveries in width and space, but so exceedingly low and narrow in respect to the other and grander dimension ! It discards theology and metaphysics as belonging to a still lower stage of this late-born child of nature, but alas for man if all the glory of his being, all his higher thinking, has already thus passed away ! We may thank the Liv- ing God for giving to us an ideal world, as in itself a proof of something above nature, and of a higher actual even now in nature than our sense and our science ever have drawn, or may ever expect to draw, from it. The objection to revelation to which Lange here alludes as drawn from the modern astronomy is itself simply anthropopathic. They who make it imagine Deity to be just such a one as themselves. If He has two worlds to take care of, it is incredible that His providence should he as particular, and His interest as near, as though He had but one to govern. Such a mode of thinking makes worth, too, and rank, wholly ijuantitative and numerical, banishing, in fact, all intrinsic quality, and intrinsic value, from the world of things and ideas. The bigger the uniTerse in space, the less the worth in each part, as a part, and this without any distinction between the purely physical or material to which such a quantitative rule of inverse proportion might apply, and the mo|al and spiritual, which can never be measured by it. The force of this objection comes from the fact of the imagination overpowering the reason. The lower though more vivid faculty impedes or silences for a time the higher. Reason teaches intuitively, or as derived from the very idea of God, that Uia care and providence towards any one rational and moral agent cannot be diminished by the number of other rational and moral agents, or be any less than it would be if such agent had been alone with Deity in the universe. The Ught and heat of the smi are the same whether the recipients are few or many. The case, therefore, may be thus stated : If a certain manifestation of the divine care for, and interest in, our world and race (namely, such as is revealed in the Bible) would not be incredible on the supposnion of their being but one such world or lace, then such credibility is not at all diminished by the discovery that there are others, few or many, to any extent conceivable. We must hold firmly to this as a pur« rational judgment against the swaying imaginatioD invading the reason, and even assuming to take its l)lace. If the interest revealed by Christianity could be pronounced credible before the discoveries of astronomy (and this is assumed as the ground of the argument), then such measure is equally credible now, or we are convicted of judging God anthropo- pathically, however we may dignil'y the feelluj 184 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. with the name of an enlarged and liberal philos- ophy. Besides, there is no end to the argument until it banishes all providence, all government, all divine interest conceivable in the cosmos — everything, in ehort, which distinguishes the divine idea from that of a wholly impersonal nature. On a certain scale of the universe the Old Testament becomes incredible. On a wider sweep Christianity, the old Christianity ef the Church, can no longer be beUeved. The in- carnation and the atonement must be thrown out; God could not have cared to that extent for this petty world. Turn the telescope, so as to enlarge the field, or, through its inverted lenses, behold the objects still farther off, and " liberal Christianity " disappears. Even that has too much of divine inter- est for the new view. Draw out the slide still farther, and the very latest and faintest '" phase of faith " departs. Everything resembling a providence or care of any kind for the individual becomes incre- dible in this time and space ratio. Prayer is gone, and hope, and all remains of any fear or love of God. Farther on, and races are thrown out of the scale as well as individuals ; even a general providence of any kind becomes an obsolete idea. Not only the earth but solar and stellar systems become infinitesi- mals, or quantities that may be neglected in the cal- culus that sums the series. There is no end to this. We have no light to limit it by the present size or power of our telescopes. The present visible worlds of astronomy may be no more — they probably are no more — to the whole, than a single leaf to the forests of the Orinoco. The false idea must be carried on until every conception of every relation of a per.sonal deity to tinite beings, of any rank, utterly disappears, and a view no better than blank atheism — yea, worse than atheism, for that does not mock us with any pretense of theism — takes the place of aU moral fear as well as of all religion. And this raises the farther question : If such be the diminishing eS'ect on the rehgion, what must it be on the science and the philosophy? If human Bins and human salvation become such small things when seen through this inverted glass, what becomes of all human knowledge, human genius, and human boasting of it ? We do not find that the men who make these objections, as drawn from the magnitude of the universe, are more humble than others ; but Burely they ought to be so, after having thus shown their own moral and physical nothingness, and, along with it, the utter insignificance of their Bcience. lix one aspect, his mere physical aspect, man is Indeed insignificant. The Scripture does not hesitate to call him a worm. It pronounces all nations "vanity" — "the small dust of the balance," uuap- preciable physically in the great cosmical scales — " less than uotiiing and enqjtiuess." Such is its view of man in one direction, whilst in the other his value is to be estiiuated by the incarnation of Christ, and the very fact th&t the Infinite One condescends to make a revelation of Himself to such a being. — The cosmology of the Bible is geocosndc in its practical point of view. After it has presented to us the creation of the heavens and the earth, it lets us sonclude I'rom the devslopu-cnt of the earth the development of the heavens, namely in respect to the creatiwi of light and of nian I'Voni the spirit- world of eai til we are to cout'u.le a spiriUworld of h«»vrTi flut H fuperabuudauily '.n licates a develop- ment of the earthly solar system parallel with th« development of the earth (ch. i. H). That heaven is an inhabited region, appears from many passages, e. g., Gen. xxviii. 1'2; and also that this region Li divided into a rich multitude of various departments. And the question is not only of heaven, but also of the heaven of heavens (1 Kings viii. 27). Chris* teaches us too : In My father's house are many man- sions (John xiv. 2). But finally the Holy Writ ;3- forms us clearly, that notwithstanding the changea- bility, and necessity for rejuvenation, of the entire universe (Ps. cii. 27 ; Is. h, 6), there is yet a contrast between the regions of growth on this side, and of perfection on the other (Ezek. i. 21 ; 1 Pet. i. 4; 2 Pet. iii. 13, etc.). In this respect the newest and purest astronomical view of the world corresponds entirely to this biblical distinction between the regions of growth here, and of perfection beyond. But the Bible also promises for the form of the world, even on this side, a new structure and perfec- tion. Once all was night ; but in the present order of things day and night alternate ; in the future the new world shall be raised beyond the contrast of day and night (Rev. xxi.). Formerly all was sea ; the present order consists in the contrast of land and sea ; in the new world the sea shall be no more. b. 77ie Idea of Nature in the Bible. The Bible and the Iiivestigation of Nature. — We have shown in passing that the Scriptures fully recognize the idea of nature, i. e., of the conditioned going forth of the fixed life of nature from a fundamental piinciple peculiarly belonging to it. Every creative word be- comes the ideal dynamical basis of a real principle. At first appear the principles of the separation. The separation of heaven and earth has the more general signification of universe on tlte one side, and of a special world-sphere on the other as represented by the earth, of which we now speak. At the second separation (light and darkness) the co-operation of the spirit of God is brought out, i. e., of the creative formative activity of God ; at the third separation (water and land) the co-operation of light is presup- posed. The natinal law set up by Harvey (see Lange's "Positive Dogmatics," p. 259): omne vivmn ex ovo, has been again brilliantly restored in moJern times by the exact investigation of nature in opposi- tion to the theory of generatio wquivoca, which nat- ural philosophy had taught (see Sobernheim: "Ele- ments of General Physiology," Berlin, 1844). In Delitzseh also the conception of the generatio cequi- voca plays a part in the account of the creation (p. Ill), because he has not sufficiently considered that the creative word.s, in the ideal they carry, form the fouiiilation of the actual princi|iles of nature. From the last-quoted principle it appears as fol- lows: 1. Every grade of nature is fixed by a correspond- ing principle of nature, the natural principle of the plant, etc. 2. By its unfolding, this principle brings to light the standard of its develo]inient as the natural law of its grade. The natural principle is the first, the natund law is the second. ;). Hy the new princijilc of the higher gradi ot nature, the natural law of the preceding grade L mollified in aecorilancc with the new and higher fife. The plant modifies the natural law of gravity, th« animal modifies the hical attaclmient of the plant- in man the anunal instinct is ertaced. 4. With each new life-principle God create? a new thing. The creation of tlie new is however th« CHAP. I.— n. 3. 18S most general idea of the miracle, as the announce- ment of what is new is the most general idea of prophecy. Consequently, each new natural prmeiple is to the preceding surpassed grade of nature as a miracle. " The animal is a miracle for the vegetable world " (Hegel). From this relation of the new nat- ural principles, as they form the new degrees of nature, it follows that all nature is a symboUcal sup- port and prophecy of the ethical miracle of the king- dom of God. For as the first man, Adam, miracu- lously changes the natural law of the animal world, that is, changes instinct into human freedom, thus does Christ, as the new man from he.aven, as the completed life-principle and miracle, change the Adamic laws of life into fundamental laws of the kingdom of God. It is in accordance with his nature to perform miracles within the Adamic sphere (1 Cor. XV.). 6. But what is true of the laws of natm'e, is also true of the matter of nature. Principle is the first thing in nature, law is the second, matter, as we know it, is the third. For through the intervention of a new and higher natural principle in the world by means of the creative word supporting it, the life of the preceding grade is reduced to the grade of matter. Thus by the appearance of the vegetable principle, the elementary world becomes matter for new formations ; so, too, the animal reduces the vegetable world to the grade of material, and in like manner does man change the grade of the animal world. But the man from heaven makes from the elements of the Adamic world the matter for a new world. The materialists of our day have ridiculed the idea of a hfe-power which should be different from the supposed fundamental matter of the world. Instead of the life-power, there should have been opposed to them something more real : the Ufe-prin- ciple. The life-principle is fundamentally distin- guished in the contrast of plastic formative power and material substratum. They are both mutually estabUshed each with the other, but above them stands the principle. I'he materialist, therefore, as he explains everything from a force of matter, which no man has ever yet seen (see La.nge's " Miscel- laneous Writings," 1st vol. p. 54), does not only deny the existeuce of the human soul and its ethical nature and highest causality, the Godhead, but he is also the antagonist of the genuine zoologist who be- lieves in the reaUty of the animal principle, as he is of the genuine botanist who does not consider the vegetable formations a shadowy play of matter on the wall, and of the crystallographer who connects imponderable forces and polarity — yea, of the genuine ihemist too, who has perceived that the relations of elective affinity in substances extend beyond the atomistic conceptions. May it not possibly be explain- ed, that as the material side of the natural principle is formed by the creating word, so is the reference of the origin of matter to a pure thought of God something else than the reference to the difficult enigma of a crea- tive matter ; and experience proves that the coarser matter everywhere, as outside or precipitate, pro- ceeds from finer formations. It is a radical contra- diction that matter should generate spirit, and, never- ttieless, be everywiiere subjected to spirit, even to the disappearance of its original nature. 6. The ascending line of natural principles is an iscencUug Une of acts of creation, with which the principles always the more strengthen, deepen, gen- Iralize, and individualize themselves, and with which, at the same time, new forms of the nat- ural law and new combinations of substances ap pear. 7. The finished lower sphere of nature does no produce the newly appearing principle of the highei sphere, but it is, however, its maternal birth-place. And because the lower sphere prepares for th« higher, in order to serve as its basis, it is full of indi- cations of it, and becomes throughout a symbol which represents in advance the coming new world* form. 8. With respect to the development of the nature- principles into the reaUzation of the conditioned self- generation of nature, we must distinguish the follow- ing kinds of development: a. The development of the world-creation in general ; b. the development of our solar system ; c. the spherical development of the earth ; d. the gradual development of the indi- vidual Ufe on earth ; e. the natural development of the individuals themselves ; /. the development of nature in the narrower and the bioader sense, or 1. apart from human Ufe, and 2. in connection with it. a. The Development of the Creation of the Worla in general. — Through the analogy of the development of the earth, the Scripture permits us to infer also a development of heaven. The heavens are created (Gen. L 1 ; 1 Chron. xvii. 26 ; Neh. ix. 6 ; Ps. xxxiii. 6; cxxxvi. 5; Prov. iii. 19); the heavens grow old and pass away (Ps. cii. 27; Is. h. 6); the heavens are renewed (2 Pet. iii. 13 ; Rev. xxi. 5). Astronomy also teaches a continuous growth, and in the same way recognizes indications of passing away in the stellar world. But there is a difference between the various celestial regions. The old Jewish and Ma- hommedan tradition, and the Christian Apocryphas know seven heavens (the Koran, the Kabbala, the Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs). But the He- brews admitted in general three heavens as in accord- ance with the Scripture (Paul also 2 Cor. xii. 2-4 ; the third heaven the paradise); 1. The heaven of the air (the clouds, birds, changes of the atmosphere) ; 2. the heaven of the stellar world, the firmament; 3. the heaven in which God dwells with His angels, paradise. Of the latter heaven it must be observed that it is a sjTnboUco-rehgious idea, and by no means excludes the stellar world (see Lange's work : " The Land of Glory "). The Scripture recognizes also the distinction between an earlier heavenly stellar world and the system to which this earth belongs, as we find it indicated in the fourth day's work. When the earth was founded the morning-stars sang to- gether, and all the sons of God shouted for joy (Job xxxviii. 7). Consequently before the foundations of the earth those morning-stars were there. Also the " Heaven of heavens," as well as the ascension of Christ, point to a heavenly region which Ues beyond the cosmical sphere of the world, to a region "of eternal sunshine." See the above quotations. b. 77(6 Developtnent of our Solar Si/stetn. — Al- though on the fourth day of the creation the whole stellar world is introduced into the cucle of vision of the earth, nevertheless the cosmical completion of the system belonging to the earth is especially indi- cated. Special allusion is made to this system whet the New Testament biblical eschatology treats of th end of the heavens and the earth, and their renewal (Joel iii. i ; Matt. xxiv. 29 ; 2 Pet. iii. 10). [Note o.s the Scriptural Heavens asu Earth. — We think Dr. Lange carries too far what may be called the cosmological view of the Mosaic account. It either gives the writer too much seienct, or, ii order to get a ground of interpretation ildependenl 186 GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. of bis conceptions, makes him to be a mere automa- tic medium — thus taking awaj the human, or that subjective truthfuhiess nUch is so precious in any view we may take of this narrative. Hence the ten- dency to regard the Bible heavens as the astronomi- .;al lieaveus of modern science, instead of the heavens of the earth, nearly connected with the earth, and in which the sun, moon, and stars appear as lig/ils, whatever may be the near or remote causes of those appearances. See remarks in note on the Hebrew plural c'^aa, pp. 162, 163. The symboUc contrast of the heavens and the earth, with which Dr. Lauge starts in the mterpretation, has all the value he attaches to it; but it is not at all lost in what he might regard as the narrower view. The optical heavens, with the appearances in it, was all the writer knew, or was inspired to know, or describe. It was to him the cosmos. As this enlarges, by science, or otherwise, the conception of the heavens enlarges with it, but only as a conception. The idea remains as in the beginning. In keeping up this contrast, however, we are not to regard the scientific bodies discovered in the remoter spaces, as the heavens in distinction from our own home, as though the heavens were simply all that is oft', and away from, the earth. The planet Mars is no more a heaven, or heavens, to us than we are a heavens to it. As knowledge hfts up the everlasting gates, the conception of the )nun- aiis enlarges to take in other earth-like bodies in space; but the old idea travels forth unchanged. The great symbolic contrast yet remains. The hea- vens, too, enlarge their scale, and the pecuhar divine residence, once thought to be in the near sky just above us, is carried tarther oflf, beyond the sky of clouds, beyond the sphere of the moon, the sun, the planets, the solai- system. Science adds the stellar bodies ; the heavens, the great symbolic, or rather symbolized, heavens, are still beyond, high over all, embracmg all. " Who hast set Thy glory above the heavens," c^"9rn bj" (compare b? as used Gen. i. 20; six. 23, ""Xfi'bi" CCUJ); "Who stoopeth down to behold the things that are in the heavens (the lower heavens) and the earth," Ps. cxiii. 6. Solomon's language, " The heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain Thee," may, or may not, be surpassed in its local co-ncepiion^ but no science, it may be repeated, will ever transcend it in idea. 'Whatever the number of spheres, real or imaginary, the D^~t" ""IC , the heaven of heavens, is still the great heaven above them all. — T. L.] c. The Spherical Jjmeloprnent of the Earth, or the Six Uai/s' Work. — As was above indicated, the six days" work have been represented in the sequence of a twofold ternary, in which is mirrored the signiti- canee of tlie number three. We construct these ternaries m the Ibllowing manner: 1. higlit and the lights; 2. water and air, and the animals of water »nd air; A. the solid land and over it the vegetable world ; the land-animahi and over them man. As to the strict consistency of these days' works, tlie most celebrated naturalists, as Cuvier, have expressly »cknowledged it. Now we find these days' works eonstrued in the most manifold way ; in part purely »ccording to tlje Scriptures, in part purely according lo natural science, and partly in distinct comi)arison, whereby the harmony between the Bible and natural science is contested or maintained. — Scriptural repre- 9entatiiina of the six days' work. Here the 104th Psalm exceeds all. First d ly, vers. I, 2 ; second day, rers. H, 4 ; third day, vera. (i-IS ; fourth day, vers. 19, 20. The fitth day and the first half of the sixlL are freely inlaid into the picture from the fourtee-ith verse. The sixth day also from ver. 14 ; but in vcr 23 man appears more distinctly in his rule. Hert follows an accurate picture of the whole creation from ver. 24. The creation of the new world, which is the aim of the Apocalypse, passes also through i sevenfold stage. Here an accord in the order of the six days' work is not to be misunderstood. 1. Thj seven congregations as the seven candlesticks of the earth, Christ in a figure of light in their midst, with seven stars in His hands — an allusion to the creation of light of the first day (ch. i.-iii.). 2. The seven seals. The council in heaven and the seven seals or decrees of sorrow on earth — an allusion to the crea- tion of the firmament between the waters above (ch. iv. 6, the "sea of glass"; comp. vii. 17) and the waters beneath (the blood of the lamb,* ch. vii. 14), ch. iv.-vii. The seven trimipets. Decrees of judg- ment on the earth preaching repentance (ch. viii. 7) and on the sea (ver. 8) — allusion to the separation of land and sea (see also ch. x. 2), ch. viii.-x. 2. The seven thunders (voices of awaking whose speech had been sealed). The angel who had awakened the seven thunders, raises has hand to heaven and swears that hereafter time shall be no more.f Epi- sodes from the stage of the seven thunders: tha swallowed scroll, the measuring of the temjile of God, the two olive trees, the woman in heaven clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, and a crown of twelve stars on her head — an allusion to the lights created to mark the seasons (eh. x. 3 to ch. xii. 2). 5. The seven heads of the dragon. The (flying) dragon in heaven, the woman with eagles' wings, and the beast out of the sea with seven heads, the earthly anti-Christ representative of the seven heads of the dragon — allusion to the birds of the heavens and the beasts of the sea (eh. xii. 3-xiii. Iti). 6. The seven last plagues or vials of wrath. Intro- duction: the animal out of the earth, the number 666 (with reference to the significance of the number 6; perhaps also the sixth day); the lamb on Mount Siou, .the image of God with the 144,00(1 virgins who bear on their foreheads the name of the lamb and the name of the father, i. e., are images of God ; the announcement of the judgment, of the seven last plagues; the judgment on the earth; the whore, her counterpart the bride and her bridegroom, heroes and deliverers, judges of spirits and associates in the apostasy — allusion to the animals of the earth and to man created in the image of God, with the com- mand : Rule over them and make them subject to you, ch. liii. 11-xix. 21).:} * [Dr. Lange'e fanry Here seems altogether too exuberant The lla^alleli!^m with tiie Mosaic account in the 104th I'salci is too striking to be nustalion. It was doulitlcss, too, in the mind of the writer ol the Apocalypse, as it is alto evident in the lieginning of the (iospel of .lolin, but many of the reseml)binces here traeetl bv Dr. Lange altogollicr fail to satisfy— T. L.) * [Dr. Lange's renai nng nerc is that of Luther, and ia the same with our English translation. But there can be hardly a doubt of its l)eing erroneous. It should be, " that there "shall be no more delay " —that is, in what is to follow, .Set lilo.imfleld.— T. I.., J (It may t^eem strange that Dr. Lange, while hiymp io much stress on these remoter, if not altogether far.riful, parallelisms with the creative account which be liuds in the Apocalyjisf, should have overlooked the much more distinct reference in the beginning of the (iospel of John. Whether the priniipium there is the same with tliat in Genisis, may adnnt of diseussinn, but there can be no doubt of tlic nnral- lelism, and the mention of light and life inmiediately fol- lowmg makes it unmistakable. It is a higher light, indeed, for ' the darkness overtakes it not," is it should bv -oU' CHAP. 1.— 11. S. 181 7. The great Sabbath of God (ch. xx. and xxi.). It is, of course, understood that so original a crea- tion as the A]>ocalyi)se cuuld not be an allegorical copy of the six days' work. In the Epistle of Bar- nabas (among the writings of the FatrfR apostolici) we find eh. xv. the incorrect Uteral interpretation ol the passages Ps. xc. 4 and "2 Pet. iii. 8 (according to wiiieh a thousand years of earth should make one day of God, consequently six thousand years of his- tory the great spiritual week of God which is to pre- cede the divine millennium sabbath). This became later a standing presumption of the chiliastic com- putations. One of the first patristic representations of the hexaiimeron with polemical references to the hciithen ^^ew of the world, we find in the apology of Theophilus of Antioch: Ad Autolycum, lib. ii. cap. 1 2 sqq. Many others have followed these (see Intro- duction). Among the modern biblio-theologieal representations of the six days' work, that of Hkrdkr ("Oldest Record of the Human Race") occupies a prominent place. It rejects all combinations of the ticriptural text with natural science. It traces back the account to the teachuig of God; but it arose by means of human observation of the rising sun, as in this the picture of creation is ever unrolled to the eyes of the observer. The representation itself he calls a hieroglyphe for the instruction of man in the great pictures of creation, as presented to his con- templation in the order of life, first work, then rest (the sabbath-law), and in the numbering of days (with reference to the week) as given to him in lan- guage, etc. He finds in the account the symbols of the fiisi religion, natural science, morality, politics, clironology, writing, and language. In his poetic diction there is much that is beautiful ; but fhe pic- ture he gives us of the terror of the Orientals in respect to darkness and labor is very partial and exaggerated. The same may be said of many other ttimgs in his book. The ignoring of the reaUty of tue six days' work is rationalistic. The construction is as follows : I. Light. II. Firmament. III. Terra firma. IV. Lights. Water ) \ of heaven. YI. Creatures of earth. YII. Sabbath. In the spirit of Herder, but independent in its view, and determination of the individual parts, is the representation in F. A. Krommacher's "Paragraphs on Sacred History " (p. 22 ff). The six days, as such, and in themselves understood, are to him divine days. Zahn also falls back on Herder in animated representation (" History of the Kingdom of God," p. 1 ff.). Gkube's deUneation of the six days' work is very comprehensive and full of meaning ("Features from Sacred History," p. 11 ff. — Scientific npreseiU- ation of the six daya^ work. On the historical devel- •pment of the doctrine of the cosmos, see Alex, vo.n- Humboldt, iii. p. 3 ff. Steffens : " Polemical Sheets for the Advancement of Speculative Physics." Second number, on Geology, Berlin, 1835 (here arc quoted, p. 6, the respective geological works of Cuvier, Boue, Brogniart, EUe de Beaumont, De la Beche, and Von Leonhard). Mekleker: "Cos- lered. There is no night fi)llowing that new and eternal iay, and so there are no mornings and evenings to succeed. it is a new cieution, and a new chronology, but this idea mly makes more clear the reference to the old ilo&aic crea- tion and the Mosaie days. — T. L.] V. mography," Leipzig, 1848, p. 3. There is also the hi& torical part of Lyell's " Principles of Geology," ani Voot's " Compendium of Geology " (Braunschweig, 1854, 2 vols.); Reuscu: "Bible and Nature," p. 71. — Here belong Qde.vstedt: "Then and Now." A popular treatise : Hakting: "The Antemundane Crea tions compared with the Present." From the Dutcli, Leipzig, Engelmann, 1859. See, moreover, the prelim- inary literature. We must distingnisli those treatises which regard the Hexatmeron of Hoses, and tboso which do not. And further, we must distinguish the systems which assume the formation of the earth bj radical revolutions in a steady secjuence of new crea- tions (Cuvier), and those which assume a gradual transformation with partial revolutions. Harting be- longs to tlie latter. We must, however, certainly maintain tliat a seed or germ of creation (for the transformation) must have passed through the ca- tastrophes out of the earlier stage into the later, analogous to the process at the flood, but transform- ed in a creative way during the metamorphosis of the earth. But the doctrine of the great catastrophes is not therewith excluded. In respect to those who deny the existence of any harmony between the Bible and natural science, it may be said, that a few the- ologians in Germany, with shallow scientific acquire- ments, have undertaken the work ; such as Ballen- SHEDT (in the notorious book ; " The Primitive World "), Bretschneider, and Strauss. In England recently Goodwin (in the Essays and Reviews). ScHLEiERMACHER has also in this respect expressed anxieties which prove that he was not well posted on the point ("Studies and Criticisms," 1829, p. 489). Most recently has this assumed opposition become a special dogma of the Hegelian school of Tiihingen, which has its njain altar in Eastern Swit- zerland. On the side of natural science the harmony has been mainly contested by French authors ; in Germany, by Vogt and Burmeister. On the side of the naturalists, who at the same time were scientific- ally learned and Bible-believing men, stand Coperni- cus, Kepler, Newton, Pascal, Haller, and Euler; at a later period the Frenchmen Cuviei-, Brogniart, De- luc, Biot, Ampere; in Germany, Steflins, H. von .Schubert, A. Wagner, and others. (See Reusch, p. 63 ff.) To these add also the Bible-believing cos- mologists — the Frenchmen Marcel de Serres, de Blain- ville, the Belgian Waterkeyn, and especially many Englishmen and North Americans (Reusch, p. 67 ; see especially also Delitzsch, p. 609). A significant position is taken by the already quoted work of Buckla.sd: "Geology and Mineralogy," etc., as given by Wfrner, in the German edition of the well-knowu " Bridgewater Treatises," vol. v., with which com- pare the valuable criticism of it by W. Hoffmann, in "Tholuck's Literary Advertiser," 18.38, Number 44. " The conditions on which the great geologist treats with his timid brothers in the theological world are (according to W. Hoffmann) the following: 1. Ge- ology has evidently proved that the surface of our planet has not been from eternity in its present con- dition, but has passed through a series of creative operations, which followed each other in long, fixed periods of time. 2. There is an exposition of naturaj phenomena which stands so little in contrast with the Mosaic history that it even throws Ught on dark parts of it, and thereby confirms it. 3. The authen- ticity of the Scriptural text must remain unscathed, but the exposition demands concessions from the literal expositor ; the reader must make this, and indemnify himself therefor by the accession wlucll I8S GENES1I3, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. geology supplies to natural theology. 4. The Bible does not aim to give solutions of geological and other questions of natural science. Else, (jod would have found it necessary to endow man with omniscience, because he was obliged, at the same time, to impart to him all degrees and kinds of human knowleiige, if the revelation were not to remain an insufficient one." In several points Hotfmann has corrected the author irith a free and large survey, namely, in the endeavor of Buckland to transfer all the periods of the geolog- ically determined earth-formation into the uudetinable beginning before the first day of the creation, although to those geological periods the long biblical day-peri- ods are still to be added. Hoflmann, on the contrary, alleges that then the eyes of the trilobites, for exam- ple, must have existed before the creation of light. The same is true of the first vegetable and animal world throughout. The same untenable view, how- ever, that will transfer the geological periods, with their relation to each other, into the time of the Thohu Vabhohn^ meets us also now in various forms. It is represented by Andreas Wagner and Kurtz (see, on the contrary, Delitzsch, p. 112). The more de- fined combination of geological results and the bib- lical account appears in a form sometimes mainly scientific, and again mainly theological ; but the two series c;mnot be strictly separated from each other-. Keusch places here Marcel de Serres, Waterkcyn, An- dreas Wagner, Wiseman, Nicolas: "Philosophical Studies of Christendom," Sorignet [La Cosniogonie de la Bible devant les adences perfectionees^ Paris, 1854), Pianciani, Kurtz: "Bible and Astronomy," Keerl and Westermeyer, whose work, in his view, is without scientific value. So also Mutzl, Michelis, Ebrard, and a series of Essays in the Periodicals: "Nature and Revelation" (Minster, If 55 flu), and "The Cutholic" (Mentz, 1858 sqq.). We also enu- merate here, La Cosmogonie de la Rtvelalion^ par Godefoi/, Paris, 1841, tiie previously quoted works of 0. Reinsch, Fr. von Rougement, and Bohner (with respect to the cosmogonal theory of K:int and La Place). The newest commentary on Genesis, by Keil, shows no progress. Keil insists on regarding the account of creation as an historical record in the strictest sense ; he opposes the division of the six days' work according to ternaries, he sets the act of creation in excluding contrast with the idea of the natuial process, boldly questions the evidence of the various jjeriods of the creation, and contends that the days of the creation are simple earth-days. With this continued darkening of the present view of the state of the case, it is a small merit that the theosophic view of the Thohu Vabhohu seems sets aside (p. 16). The six days' works are above all things to be comprehended as six consecutive acts of creation, in whicli, every time, a new creation is placed as a new appearance of the cosmos. For the world is to be regarded throughout as being, in respect to its founda- lion, the act of (iod, or creah'on (in the stricter sense); according to its development, nature, whilst, accord- ing to its appearance, cosmos, and, according to the plastic life-principle lying at its ba,se (the future of man and the iot also stand the expression " He saw that it was good ; " it was because, say they, on that day the apostate angels fell, because on it God created hell, or because the waters brought the flood over the world. It is generally assumed that the sentence of approbation of the firmament on the second day is comprised with tliat pronounced on the formation of the land on the third day, and on the firmament on the fourth. This is jiursued farther in the preceding exegetical illustration. — It is known that the Grecian idea of beauty and of the cosmos is elevated far above that of the Chinese, satisfied as it is only with the delicately formed, the variegated, and the cheerful, and whilst it detests the shadows In the picture. Certain representations respecting the darkness and night In the treatment of the six days' work remind us of the Chinese or Persian views ; for Instance, In Herder, Delltzsch, RouGEMONT (p. 11), and in Christianus ("Gospel of the Kingdom," p. 5). In one respect, again, is there presented a similar difference between the Grecian and the scriptural Idea of the cosmical. The former throws the obscure into the background, because it cannot resolve it into higher unities. For the Hebrew, that which Is the ugly In a smaller unity is oidy the picturesque shadow m a general higher unity (see Ps. civ. 20; cxlvui. 7, 8). The obscurity of the cosmos, originating with sin, is iiuite as well to be regarded subjectively, according to which the world meets the sinner in an uneasy threatening form (Eccleslastes i. 8), as objectively, according to which the creature, as suffering, must. In reality, with fallen man, sigh for redemption (Rom. viil. 19). 12. Tlie World as jEon. — That the world also In its truest and most inward principle of life and devel- opment Is comprised In nmn, appears already fiom the strong emphasis with which man is Introduced in the first chapter of Genesis as end or aim of the creation, but still more from his princlplal position at the head of things, which is given to him In the second chapter. The Idea of the aon Is a develop- meut and a developing period of life placed with the power of life in the principle of life. The world as 8Bon has also the principle of its life-power, its dura- tion, form, and development m man. And thus Is It explained that with the distinction of universal liis- tory into the history of the first and second man, or Adam and the Messiah, there Is also distinguished a twofold aion. But it Is in aecoidaiice with the idea of the Eeon, that the new aeon o' Christ can have prlnciplaUy begun with His appearance and redemp- tor) act, whilst the old aeon still externally continues. The Ilfe-de-elopment of the aeon starts fiom the be- ginning and appears, at first, gradually, but not per- fectly, until the close. Just so It Is explained that the world iu the course of its development depends on the bearlug of man, and that the history of man is the history of the earthly cosmos. The sinless man »nd Paradise, Adam and the field burdened with the tuise, the r ±i of the first race and the lood, JCoah's generation and the rainbow, the people of promisi and the promised laiul, the renewal of humanity, through Cbilsi, and the renewal of the earth, the judgment, and the end of the woild, these are only the principal epochs of a chain of events which ar« expressed in the most manifold separate pictures and traits (see Laxge's " Life of Jesus : '' the Baptism of Jesus, the natural events at His death and ascen- sion). 13. That the Scriptures neither know nor will know of pre-Adamltes (see Hahn : " Compendium of Fiiith,'' ii. p. 24), nor of various primitive aboriginal races, ai>pears not only from Genesis I. and 11., but also from the consistent presumption and assertion of the entire Holy Writ ; for example, Matt. xix. 4 ; Acts xvli. 2ij ; 1 Cor. xv. 47. Here we can bring out only the following points: 1. The original unity of the human race coincides with the doctrine of the unity of the fall of man in Adam, and the unity of the redemption in Christ. It also accords with the biblical and Christian Idea of the unitary destination of the earth. 2. The autochthonic doctiine of the ancients stands in Intimate connection with their polytheism ; the special race of any certain laud cor- responds with the special gods of said land, as tho speech of Paul in Athens clearly shows (Acts xvii 26, 26). 3. The greatest naturalists have mostly de- clared themselves against the originality of different human races, see Lange's "Dogmatics," p. 330; the greater part of the earlier defenders of said view Ijelonged to the department of natural philosophy. With the distinction of the various ground-types, winch are formed from the one human species, the most serious difficulties are banished, though not solely by reference to climatic relations; and so in regard to the alleged fruitfulness of sexual combma- tlons among the various races, the proof of such fruitfulness Is justly pronounced one of the strongest proofs of unity. 5. The autochthonic theory has never been able to harmonize Itself In relation to the ground-forms to be presented ; and It can also, C. not deny the fact that the origin of the various types of men points back to a common home iu Asia, 14. As to the doctrine of the original image, compare the dogmatic works. The following dis tiuctlons need special attention; 1. cbs and TWS^ image and hkeness. The Greek expositors referred the first to the dispositions of man, and the latter to his normal development; thus also the scholastic* referred the former to the sum-total of the natural powers of man (reason, Uberty), and the latter to his pious and moral nature. This distinction appears again iu another form in the older Protestant dogma- tics, when it distinguishes between an image that man has not lost by sm (Gen. Ix. 6 ; James ill. 9), and such a oue as he. In fact, has lost, although this Protestant distinction does not refer itself back to those words image and likeness. Image has already been made to refer to the simlhtude to God In man (the so-called iJ-iKpi^io-i),! likeness to man as microcosm In so far as he unites the whole world In himself and presents It In a reduced scale, because the world Is a likeness of God on a grand scale (A. Feldhoff: " Uur ImmortaUty," Kempten, 1836). We malntali, rather that the image designates the principle In accordance with, and with a view to which, man hai been created — consequently, the dynamic-plastic idea of the God-Man (which view is supported by the fac; that man, according to Gen. ill., wished arbitrarUy to reahze this Ideaj. We maintain, therefore, thai the image denotes the primitive Image, as In Chrisf 102 GBXESIS, OK THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. ■lone is it plainly so called,* and comes in Him to its realized appearance. Tiierefore is it said in the image, tiiat is, the determinable similitude of man in proportion to tlie image of Ciirist. The likeness, on the contrary, is the real appearance of the copied similitude, as it was peculiar to the first man in the condition of innocence from the beginning. The older Protestant dogmatics distinguished, as said (without reference to the words image and likeness), the substantial human affinity, to trod, especially in B]iiritual powers, reason, etc., and the image in the narrower sense, the jaditia vriffinalis, the status initijritaHs with its separate attributes (especially impassibility, immortality). They laid the emphasis on tiie fact that the image in this stricter sense was lost. Thereby has this opinion, for its part, represented the glory of the first man in various ways as too much developed, whilst the Socinians, contrary to the nature of the spirit, wotdd consider it as a mere abstract power (see Lange's " Positive Dog- matics," p. 304). 2. To say nothing now of the Encratites and Severians, who denied to the female sex a share in the similitude, there may be farther noted the strange contrast between such as would 6nd the image merely in the bodily appearance of man (The Audians, and lately Hofmann), or merely in his spiritual nature (Alexandrians, Augustine, Zwin- gli), since here the simple observation suffices, that the body of man is above all an image of his pecu- Udr spiritual nature. In accordance with this the similitude can naturally be understood only of man in his totality. Its root is the spiritual nature or the divine affinity, its appearance is the bodily form in which man eifects his dominion over nature, and although this does not fulfil the idea of his simili- tude, it certainly appears as the first and most com- mon realization of it. Man is the administrator of God on earth. The similitude, i. e., the disposition and designation of man to the image, has remained to him ; the image in its integrity (6i)|a) he haa lost. Still, an obscure outline of it, especially of the like- ness, has remained to him, as is proved by the re- mains of the manifoldly evil administration of men on e.irth. The distorted image of the divine assumes various forms in sinful man, even to the image of evil spirits. One must make the distinction between the prhnUive imatie, Christ, and the copy, human nature, but not so as if the primitive image were the exclusive Godhead, or the copy pure creature. See also the article "Image" in Hkrzog's Real-Lexii^on- 15. Man (c^^«) indicates here collectively human- ity according to its origin in the first human pair, or in the one man in general, who was certainly the universal primitive man and the individual Adam in one person. Adam, referring to Adamah ; the red one, from the red earth taken. Or is it, in fact, as Starke maintains, the beautifid, tlie brilliant? It is true, cnx in Arabic may also mean to be beautiful, to shine, and Gesenius remarks : soUrd Arabes duplex genus hominum distinguere, allerum ruhrum, quod no* album appellamus, alteriim nigrum. If the earth liad the nanjc of Adam, Adainah, as might be inferred from the first ap])earance of the word in ch. ii. 7, the conception of .\dam had a good sense, as brilliant, beautiful, analogous to the commendatory appellations of man in other nations. But it is clear * (Oomparo H"b. i.3, where Christ is called "the express Image," whieh is a poor translation of the Greek xap<""JP riff un-0(7Top;ication • a. the operations in the world are IS bound to the order of time, 6. time is given fbi labor. To-day, to-day ! — The relation of worldlj time to the eternity of God (Ts. xc. 1). — The begin- ning of the Scriptures goes back to the beginning of the world, as the end of the Scriptures extends to the end of the world. — The outline of creation : Hea- ven and earth: 1. Heaven and earth in union; 2. earth for heaven ; 3. heaven for earth. — The primary form of the earth and the creation of Ught a pict'ue of the redemption : 1. The redemption of mankind in general, 2. of the individual man. — Waste and void tlie first form of the world. — Laying the foundations of the world (Eph. i. 4, aud other passages). — Tho spirit of God the sculptor of all forms of life. — The word of God: Let there be: 1. How the growth of the world points back to the eternal existence of the word; 2. how the eternal word is the foundation for the growth of the world. — The word — let there be — in its echo through time as the word of the creation, of the redemption and glorification. — The first clear- ly defined creation : the light. — -The significance of light ; its physical and religious significance. — God's survey of light. — Light a source of life : 1. Its good as existing iu its ground; 2. its fiena^y as disclosed in its appearing. — The creation of light at the same time the creation of physical darkness (see Is. xlv.). — How carefully we must guard against the commin- gling of natural and spiritual darkness. — The natural darkness as it were a picture of the spiritual. — But also a picture of the " shadow of His wings." — Even- ing aud morning, or the great daily pheuomenou of the alternation of time. — The creatiim of light a day's work of God: 1. The first day's work; 2. a whole day's work; 3. a continuous day's work; 4. a day's work rich iu its cousequences. — The fiist day. Vers. 6-8 : The second day's work, or the firmament of heaven. — The firmament in its changing phenome- na a visible image of the invisible heaven. — Vers. 9 and 10 : Laud and sea. The beauty of the land, the subUmity of the sea. The symbolical significance of the land : the fi''m institutions of God; of the sea: the wave-like hfe of nations. — The second day of God. Vers. 9-13: The earth and the vegetable worlil. The green earth a child of hope. — The plant the prelude and symbol of all life (of animal, human, and spiritual). — The providence oi" God iu the crea- tion of the vegetable world before the creation of animals and man. — This providence a picture of the same providence with which he thought and com- manded our salvation from eternity. — The store- houses of the earth supplied before the appearance of man, according to the Scriptures and natural sci- ence (coal, minerals, salts, etc.). — The third day. Vers. 14-19 : The creation of the heavenly lights foi the earth. — The sun. The moon. Sun aud moon (Ps. viii. 19). The stellar world. — -\ glance of faith into the stellar world. — The oHice of the stars fo' the earth: 1. God's sign for faith; 2. sacred signs for the festive periods of the solemnization of the faith ; 3. spiritual watchers and guides for the spirit- ual life of man; 4. homes of life lor creature-lite. — The fourth day. Vers. 20-23 : The life of the fishe.s in the sea and the Idrds under the heaven a sign of the po.-sibility of an endlessly diversified existence of spiritual beings. — The blessing of God on the animal world (in every cUniate and sea). — The fifth day. Vers. 24 and 25 : The animals of the earth as the forerunners of man : 1. The first signs and pictures of human life ; 2. its most intimate assistants ; 3. ita first conditions. — Vers. 26-31 : The creation of man: 1. A decree of God; 2. an anuouncemenl of th4 194 GEXESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. bnage of God ; 3. the last work of God. — The office of in;>n : 1. God's image in his power and perfection ; 2. God's likeness in bis appearance. — The perfect fullihnent of tliis destiny. — The one divine similitude in the contrast of man and woman. — The hiessing of God on man- 1. His future; 2. his calling; 3. his possessions and his sustenance. — The institution of marriage (see ch. ii.). — The calling of man, through- out, a call to domiiuon : I. In representing God ; 2. in ruling over the beasts : 3. in the free self-control. — The purity of the first creation. — The verdict of God: Very good. — Vers. 24-31. The si.xth day. — The completion of the world, the sabbath of God. — The significance of the rest of God on the seventh day. — The sabbath of God, the sabbath of man: 1. Man a sabbath of God ; 2. God the sabbath of man. — The contrast between struggling creation and joy- ful labor, also in the life of man. — The blessing of God on the sabbath. — The sabbath in its significance : 1. Its source in the heart of God, like the life of man (the bliss of God) ; 2. its signs : the solemn pauses ^God saw that it was good), like the evening-rest, preludes of the Sunday ; 3. its fruitfulness : the festi- vals of the Old Covenant, the Sunday of the New Covenant, the eternal sabbath-rest, and celebration of tlie Sunday in eternity. — The festal demeanor according to the pattern of God: 1. Reposing; 2. blessing ; 3. hallowing. — The first completion Of the world a presage of its final completion. Starke, ver. 1 : The question what God did be- fore the creation. He chose us (Eph. i. 4), He pre- pared for us the kingdom (Matt. xxv. 34), He gave us giace in Christ (2 TItu. i. 9), He madi- the decree of the creation. — Some understand by the beginning the Son (jf God (Col. i. 16 ; Rev. i. S), at which also the Chaldaic translation aims by rendei-ing it: in wusJom (couip. Wisdom of Solomon ix, 4 ; Ps. civ. 24 ; Prov. viii. 22) ; but because the Son of God is nowhere * absolutely called the beginning (see, how- ever, Col. i., apxi), and Moses, besides, intends to describe the origin of the world, the first explanation 18 reasonably preferred to the second (namely, from the beginning of the creation). — Moses, witii these words : in the beyinniny, overthrows all the reasons of the heathen philosophers and atheists with which they maintain the eternity of the world, or that it perchance has arisen from numberless atoms (see Kom. i. I'J and 20). — That the world is not eternal may be seen from the following passages : Fs. xc. 2 ; Prov. viii. 22, 24, 25; Is. xlv. 11, 12; corap. ver. 13; Matt, xiii. 35; xxiv. 21 ; xxv. 34; Mark x. 0; '2. Tim. i. 9 ; 2 Pet. iii. 4 ; John xvii. 24 ; Eph. i. 4 ; 1 Pet. i. 20. — The spirit of God (Ps. xxxiii. B). — \^cr. 3 : Of the speaking of God. Although God did not speak as we do, nevertheless the speaking of (Jod was a real genuine speech, in a higher but also more appropriate .sense than speaking is said of man. For as God really and properly, aUhougli not in a natural uiannei generates like man, .^d also is it with divine .speech. — Ver. 6 : God created liglit on a Sunday, and on that day the children of Isiaul passed tl rough the Red Sea, etc. — God is a lather of lights " .UnlosaitlioProv. viii. 22, is^ri rr'axi ""SSp nin" whiul - can only bo rendered " Jehovah possessed me, or tHKiit raP-^ the ito^finninf; of hw way." This prubalily w.u-. lh« (ground oi'tho translation m the Jerasalem Tarh'uni, aud IhC'fe would seem to Ite something in it, it" wo would in any way lyjQuect tho oreatiua of the world with the ot<.TUal be^iuiiing, as Ltinge does in respect to the ereatlou of the cllllr':h — chos<7U in Him, creatod in Him. The oxprtiti»ioa.s 1M1D pa-allel.— T. L.l (James i. 17), of the external light, of the internal, natural light of reason, of the spiritual light of graca and the eternal fight in yonder world of glory. — Ver. 11 : The herbs not only a house of supply, but also a store for heaUng. — To this third day belong also the subterranean treasures, .a p-ecious stones, metals, and other minerals. — Ver. 29 : We cannot say that they had not the liberty of eating flesh. Wiiethef they really used this or preferred to eat fruits an herbs, we can reasonably refer to its proper place.—* (Ver. 31 : Since God could have created everything in a moment, no reasonable cause can be given why He preferred six days, unless we reflect that it had perhaps a reference to the six great changes in the church, to which will finally succeed the sabbath of the saints. Thus the first day is a prefiguration of the time from Adam to Noah, etc.) — A Christian can use the creatures, but he must not misuse them (1 Cor. vii. 31) that they groan not against him (Rom. viii. 19). — Ch. IL 3: Discussion whether the first men were bound to respect the sabbath. On the contra^ ry: 1. Every service of God connected with certain times and places had a view to man after the fall ; 2. man in a state of innocence has served God at all times and in all places ; the sabbath was first insti- tuted in the wilderness : God gave the sabbath only to the Jews. Reasons for it : Appeal to the contents of our passage, etc. — The sabbath-day a favor of God. Schroder to ver. 3 : Then spake God, says Chry- sostom, "let there be light," and there was fight, but now He has not spoken it, but Himself has be- come our light. — From Valerius Uerberger: But it 16 much more that the Lord Jesus will finally trans- port us, after this temporal light, into the eternal light of heaven, where we shaU see God in His light face to face, aud praise Hicn in the everlasting hea- venly light and glory. — From Luther: He utters not yranivialical words, but real and material thinys. Thus sun, moon, heaven, earth, Peter, Paul, I and thou are scarcely to be reckoned words of God, yea, hardly a syllable and letter (y) in comparison to the entire creation. — From Michaelis : Moses endeavor? in the whole history of the creation to present God not merely as ahnighty, but at the same time as per- fect, wise, and good. Who considers all His works and has created the best world. — Vers. 6-8 : The conclusion of the first day's work was an actual prophecy of the work of the second day of creation. It was on the basis of the light shining into aud sep- arating the moist chaos of the world, that God made the division. — From Calviu: We well know that tor- rents of rain arise in a n.itural manner, but the flood sufficiently proves how soon we can be overwhelmed by the violence of the clouds, if the cataracts of hea- ven are not stayed by the hantl of (iod. — Gud named. The subsequent naming on tlie part of man is only the prophetic lolfilmeut of the naming of God here and elsewhere. — Vers. 9-13 : The first (rather the second) division (vers. 6-8) is followed by a second, both closely and intimately cUnging to and antithet- ically conditioning each other, lor which reason some would even reckon vers. 9 and lu to the prty ceding day. — Valesti.v UEiiBEituEK : Is it not miracle':' We take a handlnl of .seeii aud strew them on one earth and soil, where they have the same food, sap, and care, nevertheless they do not commingle, but each produces its kind : the one wliite, the other yidlow, the fruit sweet and sour, brown and black, red and green, fragraut and olfensive, high and low. Thtis we, though, like the seeds, buriet? CHAP. I.— II. 3. 19S a one consecrated ground (Sirach xl. 1), will ncvei- theless at the day of judgment not be confounded with each other, but each will go forth in his flesh, yet incorruptible (1 Cor. xv. 38). — Vers. 14-19. From Luthkr: He maintains the same order as in the three preceding days, in tliat He JirM adorns tlie heavens with Ughts and stars, and afleniiards the earth. Even the heathen philosopher Plato says, that eyes are especially given to men tliat, by the observation of the heavenly bodies and their move- ments, they may be to them as guides to the Isnow- ledge of God. It is by the heavenly bodies that men judge of the weather; by their help they hnd their way on the water and on the land. So, too, a star led the wise men to the manger, etc. — Michaklis: They (the stars) are the great and almost infallible clock of the world, ever moving at the same rate. — ■ From Ldther : Hereby is developed and shown to us the immortality of the soul, from the fact that, with the exception of man, no creature can understand the movement of the heavens, nor measure the heavenly bodies. The hog, the cow, and the dog cannot mea- sure the water that they drink, but man measures the heavens and all their hosts. Therefore there shows itself here a spark of eternal life. — From Cal- vin : '' Moses paid more attention to us than to the stars, precisely as became a theologian." — The true morning-star is Christ (Rev. xxii. 16), tlie sun of righteousness (Mai. iv. 2). — The aiiiuials of the water are in marked contrast with the animals of" the air. Water and air. The latter is as it were the embodied liquid light, the former embodied darkness ; in its depths there is neither summer nor winter, it is the heavy melancholy element, whilst the air, light and clieerful, gives hfe and breMth eveiywhere. The in- habitants of the former are opposed to those of the latter, the fish to the birds, as water and air, dark- ness and light. The fish is cold, .stiff, mute ; the bird warm, tree, and full of melody. Yet not with- out reason were both created on one and the same day. They have many things in commor., and are in structure and movement closely and intimately allied ; the variegated scaly mail of the fish pomts to the colored feathery coat of the bird, and what the wings are to the latter, the fins are to the former. Water and air once lived together, and do so now ; as the air descends into sea and earth, and vivifying- ly penetrates the water, the latter, for its part, rises into the air, and mingles with the atmosphere to its remotest border. — That God blesses the animals, ex- presses the thought, that God creatively endows ani- mals with the power of propagating their kind, and also points to the work of preserving the world. " Here we see what a blessing really means, namely, a powerful increase. When we bless we do nothing more than to wish good ; but in God's blessing there is a sound of increase, and it is immediately efficacious ; BO again. His curse is a withering, and its effect in like manner immediately consuming." Luther. — Only the largest water-animals are introduced, be- cause from them the greatness, omnipotence, and glory of the creator most clearly shine foi th. The land-animals a product of the earth — with heads bent downwards. — Various views as to the time of Ihe creation of the angels (p. 2o). — The Redeemer rests also through the seventh day in the grave. — In divinely solemn stillness lay the young world, a mirror of the Godhead, before tlie eyes of the still jnfalleu first human pair, as with Him they kept loly day, representing in their divine simiUtude the labVvatb of God in the creation, and the sabbath of the creation in God, harmoidously joined in ona — Of a sabbath-law, there is nothing said in the text IsraeFs later sabbaths (as the whole law was tc awaken a sense of sin) were reminding copies o! this sabbath of God after the creation, and uid'ulfillec prophecies not only of the completion of the theocra ey of the Old in the Christocracy of the New Cove nant, but also of the final consummation of tiie pre* ent order of things, especially on the last great sabbath, etc. — The ancient allegorizing of the days of creation according to the periods of the kingdom of God (p. 23).— "Six days," says Calvin, "the Lord occupied in the structure of the world, not aa if He needed these periods, before whom a moment is a thousand years, but because He will bind us to the observing of each one of His works. He had the same object in His repose on the seventh day." (Augustine had already expressed himself in the same way. There lies at the base of this an abstract comprehension of the divine omnipotence, and a great ignoring of the idea of nature. Luther's con- jecture : The fall occurred on the first day of crea- tion, about noon.) Lisco : Death is nothing in the creation. Every- thing lives, but in very manifold modification. — JIau is created in the image of God, i. e., so that all divine glory shines forth in him in a reduced scale. He has a nature allied to God, and therein lies the pos- sibihty and capabihty of becoming ever more like God. — The whole human race is one great family. All are blood-relations. — The dominion of man ovei n.iture obtains, in progressive development and ex tension, by the arts and sciences, by investigation ol nature's laws, aud by using its powers (of course under the conditioning of life m the spirit througL coniniunity with God). Gerlach : The whole subsequent history is writ- ten only for men fi. e., according to the human stand-point) ; therefore sun, moon, and stars, the host of heaven (ch. ii. 1), appear merely as lights in the firmament of hea\ en, and nothing is told us of the inhabitants of heaven, altliougli even in this book the angels frequently appear, and the fall of some is already in ch. iii. presupposed, etc. — All things have had a beginning. — The world was to develop itself in the contrast of heaven and earth, which repeats itself on a small scale — on earth, in spirit and nature, and in man, in spirit and flesh. — It is self-evident, theie- fore, that God's speaking is not the production of an audible sound, but the realization of His tlioughts through an act of His will. — The "jtaming'^ is equi- valent to determining something in accordance with its nature or its appearance. There is thereby indi- cated the power of God as ruling and thinking all things. (The naming here is not meant as a creative calling, but as an expression of the divine adaptation.) — The ujiper flimament from which descend light and warmth and fertiUzing moisture, casting blessings on the eartli. attracting with its wonderful moving and fixed lights the observation of the rudest man, and drawing forth the anticipation of, and longing for, a higher home than this earthly one, is the visible I pledge, yes, perhaps the distant gleam, of a heavenly I world of ligljt. It bears with it, therefore, a nami which is the same with the kuigdom. where iu un- I dimmed light " our Father in heaven " reveals Him- j si'lf — As originally everything was sea, thus in th« j glorified earth there will be no more sea. — It is ab- : surd to suppose, because fruit-trees oidy are her* I spoken of, that the others, as thorns and thistles, did I not appear until after the fall of man. (Only the fac« (U6 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. that they at a later period burdened the field, is al luded to by Augustine as a punishment.) A very fitting distinction of a similitude of man, which can- Dot be lost, and of such a one as has been lost. — The reader must carefully guard against the Jewish fables irhich have also tbund their way among Christians, namely, that man was at first created as man and woman in one person, and afterwards both sexes were separated from it. — God rested, etc. Perfect rest and the greatest activity are one in Him (see John v. 1*7). — Whether a fixed observance of the seventh day was ordered with the revelation of the history of creation, or whether this was first given to the people of the law with the other laws, presents an obscure question, but the latter view is the more probable ; in Genesis, at least, there is found no trace of the observance of the sabbath, and still less among heathen nations; the division of weeks, as found among some, might have been made according to the quarters of the moon. (The knowledge of the week, and the religious consecration of this know- edge, forms, indeed, the patriarchal religious basis of the sabbath-law, which no more came into the world abruptly than any other reUgious institution.) Calmer Bible Exposition: The number seven, important through the whole Old Testament, reminds one of the year of jubilee and the rest of the sabbath which is allotted to the people of God above, whither Jesus has gone before to prepare a place for His own. — BuNSEN ; The days of creation go from light to Ught, from one (outstreaming) of light to another. Man as the real creature of light is the last progres- sive step. — Fruits of trees " above the earth " in con- trast with bulbous plants, which are included in the herbs (?). — Sir/ns. Sun, moon, and stars ; especially Bun and moon are to be signs for three important points : for festive periods (new moons and sabbaths), for days of the month, ami for the new year (begin- ning of the solar and lunar year). — The week has its natural basis in the approximate duration of the four phases or appearances of the moon's disk, whose unity forms the fitst measure of time, or the month, according to the general view of all Shemites. Astronomically the number seven has in the ancient world, and especially among the Shemites, its repre- fientation in the seven plitnets, or wandering stars, accortling to the view of the senses (?): the moon, Mercury, Venus, the sun. Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. Thence comes also the series of our week-days. — Arndt (Christ m the Old Covenant) : As long as there i.-* a world there is an advent. — The birth of the world is the great moment of which it is declar- ed : God said : Let there be Ught, and there was jght. [Note on the Cre.itiox-Sabbatii. — The question of the sabbath in all its aspects stands wholly clear from any difficulty as to the length of the creative days. We ha\e already jhowii that there is not only a bare consistency but a beautiful scriptural harmony in the less being made a memorial of the greater. Bee Introd. to Gen. i. pp. 135, 130. God's great rest, or ceasing from His work of creation, commences with the first human consciousness following the inspiration that makes the primuK homo. Then the heavens and the •■arth are finished. Nature and the world are couiplcte ip this crowning work, :ind the divine sabVjath beguis. This is blessed and liallnwcd. Time, ds a part of nature, is now iirocci'diiig in its regular suii-divided ord(;r, and from this time a sev- enth returning part is also blesitcd and hallowed for ■US, nc a season in which he is to rest from his works, and contemplate that now unceasing sabbatl of God, which, from the very nature of the case, can have no such shorter recurring intervals. Hence the force of "ur Saviour's words that the sabbath, the weekly solar sabbath, was made for miin. They who contend that the divine sabbath is simply the first twenty-four hours after creation is finished, make it unmeaning, as predicated of God and His works. In tL'S sense God no more rested on that solar day than on every one that follows until a new creative aeon, or a new creative day, arises in the eternal coimsels. Such a view destroys the boautiful analogy pirvading the Scripture, by which the less is made the type of the greater, the earthly of the heavenly, the tempora of the eternal. It makes the earthly human sabbath a memorial of something just like itself, of one long- past solar day, of one single transient event, instead of being the constantly recurring witness of an xonian state, an eternal rest, ever present to God, and re- served for man in the unchanging timeless heavens. But the question with which we are most con- cerned is in regard to the sabbath as established foi man. Does this seventh day, or this seventh portioL of time, which God blessed and hallowed, have thus an eternal and universal ground as a memorial of the creative work with its sevenfold division, or does it derive its sanction from a particular law made long after for a particular and pecuUar peo]>le? The question must be determined by exegesis, and for this we have clear and decisive, if not extensive, grounds. It demands the close consideration of two short passages, and of a word or two in each. " And God blessed the seventh day," Gen. ii. 3. Which SL'venth day ? one might ask, the greater or the less the divine or the human, the a?onian or the astro nomical ? Both, is the easy answer ; both, as com meucing at the same time, so far as the one connects with astronomical time ; both, as the greater includ- ing the less ; both, as being (the one as represented, the other as typically representing) the same in essence and idea. The attempt to make them one in scale, or in measure, as well as in idea, does in fact destroy that universality of aspect whicli comes from the recurring, moving type as representing the statid- inc/ antitype. Take away this, and all that we can make out of the words, as they stand in Gen. ii. 3, is that God blessed that one seventh day (be it long or short), or, on the narrower hypothesis, that one day of twenty-four hours whieli first followed His ceasing to create, and left it standing, sacred and alone, away back in the flow of time. But blessing the day means blessing it for some purpose : it is the expres- sion of God's love to it as a holy and beneficent thing among the things of time, as carrying ever with it something of God, some idea of the Blesser, and of the love and reverence due to Him as the fountain of all blessedness and of all blessed tilings. So the blessing upon man looks down through all the generations of man. No narrower idea of the bless- ing of the sabbath can be held without taking froir the word all me:ming. " And hallowed it, inX U5^~"'" and made it hnlii. This also is a very plain Hebrew word, especially in its Piel form, as any one may set by examining it with a coneordiince. We have given to the word nnholy (the etymological opposite) too much the vague sense of wickedness in general, tc allow of its fairly representing the op()Osite in idea The hulji throughout the Old Testament is ojijiosec? to the romtiion, however lawful in iL-^elf it may be. To hallow is to make uncommon. To hallow a tim« is to make it a time when thinzs which are comnioi CHAP. 1.— II. 19', tt other times, and peculiar to otlier times, should lot be done, but the time so hallowed should bo de- moted to other and uncommon uses. Of course, things essential and necessary at all times are not included, or excluded, iu such distinction. Neither will it hold of days or times that mere human author- ity thus devotes to any separate uses. Such devotion may be as partial, or as indefinite, as the authority chooses to make it. But when God hallows a time it is for Himself. Not simply whatever man does, but whatever he 3 , ac- cording to the Hebrew idiom, makes a universal nega- tive of the strongest kind, being equivalent to gar nichts, as Lange says — nothing at all. Thus the ex- pression: every shrub was 7iot, etc., which with ua would be a particular or partial negative equivalent to not evert/, is the widest universal in the Hebrew : In the day of God's making the earth and the hea- vens, when (as 1 may well be rendered) there was not the least sign of shrub or plant growing in the earth. See LuD. de DiEtJ : CrUiea Sacra, in loc. This is, in the main, the view of Delitzsch, though he still seems to have some perplexities about the time. We get clear, however, of the difficulties of Lange and others. There is no need of bringing this vegetation down to the sixth day, and referring it tc the growth of cultivated plants from the adamah. The language will not bear it. In like manner there is disposed of the explanation of some of the Jewish Rabbis, that the plants barely came to the surface on the third day, but for the want of rain did not eotne forth and reach their perfection until the sixth, ilaimonides says justly, that this is against the posi- tive declaiation that the " earth did bring thejn forth " (ch. i. 12). In refuting it, however, he lays the em- phasis on mtr , the field, in distinction fro'n the earth generally, and so regards it as spoken of culti- vated plants. But this seems forced, arii thert, stands in the way of it the word H^v: , which is espi ciaUy used of uncultivated growths, as of the desert. Job XXX. 4, 7, or of the wild bushes in thi ^.■^derntv^a of Beer-Sheba, Gen. xxi. 15. See the attempts to reconcile the two accounts in Wordsworth, Murphy, and Jacobus. The troiole springs from the assuming of a chron'>logy, and en- deavoring to find it, when the chief (eature of this second narrative, or of the summary tl^at precedes it, is its wholly unchronological characttr. There e no time in it. The near and the remote are brought together; In the day when God made the h avens and the earth, from the firmament down to th' shrub — or, when there was not a sign of a plant in the earth — made them by His divin'j word, befo e there was any rain (compare Prov. viii. 24, n'^S'Ja "fXa z^V "^"tZDi , when there were no fountains full of water), though afterwards "He made a laiv lor the rain," and the mists went up and descend.d to fer- tilize the earth, etc. This absence of rain wa« soiiieir/iere in this summed-up day of creation ; it« place, however, is nut fixed in th^ series, and it ii alluded to not for its own sake, but in connection with the plants as originating from a higher causality — T. L.l 4. Ver. 7. The Lord God termed man.— Knobel: "As the princiiial le-tio^ of the earth ih< CHAP. II. 4-26. 203 author has him created before all his fellow-crea- turos." This is incorrect, inasmuch as the represen- tation evidently has in view no genealogical or chro- nological onier. It only presents him as the chief divine thought, at the head of the Paradise-creation. *' In respect to the mode of origin of the divine-form- ed man the first chapter says nothing; it only indi- cates that man is of a higher, and, at the same time, of an earthly nature, without being a product of the earth. But now, on the threshold of a history rising &nd revealing its purposes, there is need to know something more particular in respect to his mode of origin, so that, along with the fact of his existence, we may understand his established relation to God, 10 the surrounding vegetable and animal world, and to the earth in general." Dehtzsch. The spirit of tlie Old Testament, with all correctness, represents the nature of man, in respect to his bodily substance, as earthly; and just so does physiology determine. In the matter of his body man consists of earthly elements ; in a wider sense he is out of the earth (ch. xviii. 27 ; Ps. ciii. 14), and at his death he goes back to his mother-earth (ch. iii. 19, 23; Job x. 9; xxxiv. 15; Ps. cxlvi. 4; Ecclesiastes iii. 20; xii. 7). *' According to the classical myth Prometheus formed the first man of earthy and watery material (ApoUo- dorus, Ovid, Juvenal), and in the same manner Vul- can made the first woman (Pandora) out of earth (Uesiod). In other places the ancients represent man as generated out of the earth (Plato in the Kri- tiaSy and others, Virgil) as well as the beasts." Kuobel. The name Adam does not denote precisely one taken from the earth (}^^X, yT^yecTis), but one formed from the adamah, the soil of cultivation in its paradisaical state; just as the Latin homo from humus, and the Greek xoikos from x"*^^] *^lo not refer back to the earth-matter generally, but to the earth- soil as adapted to cultivation. This derivation from adamah is adopted by most (Kimchi, Roseumiiller, and others). On the contrary, others, after Josephus, derive the word from the verb 3ix , to be red, with reference to the ruddy color of man, or the reddish soil of Palestine. Knobel, again, explains it, with Ludolf, from the ^Ethiopian DIX , to be pleasant, agreeable, according to which it would denote some- thing of comely form.* One Jewish Doctor, and * ("WTiy should we go to the remote ^thiopic here, and take a secondary sense of a secondary, when the primary derivation seems to lie right before us in the Hebrew; CTX from niS'S , man from the earth, whether homo be from humtis or not. The reasoning of Gesenius will not bear close examination. "There must have been a name for man," he says, "much earlier imuUo anliquior) than the tradition of tlie Mosaic cosmogony.'* As far, however, as we can. learn anything of the first history of the race, from wh'itevcr source derived (biblical, heathen, or mytho- logical), cosmogonies, or notions about cosmogonies, belonged to the earliest human thinking, and might as well have fur- nished the ground of the most popular nam^s as anything else. The question, however, is not about " a name " for man (any namei, but this name Adam which seems the «stablished one in the Hebrew books. What more natural origin than the tniditional could there have been, even with- out deriving it from a cosmogony ? Names ever have a •eason for them, though that reason, in many cases, may be kist or uadiscoverable. They are given from tliat fact or gnality which most impresses us in the thing named. Man is ever retiLming to the earth, and this might easily suggest the name, and the idea, too, that in. some way he also came out of the earth: "Who am but dust and aahes," ^E" ■*B!<1 , Gen. xviii. 27 ; Job xxx. 19; Ps. ciii. 14. Homo ind humus certainly suggest each other, and the etymology 13 not wholly impaired by the n in the genitive. Those names are most impressive and likely to be most ancient .hat are taken from the sorrowful aspect of humanity. Such after him Eichhorn and Richers, would make th word Ci (Ezek. xix. 10 = niaT) the etymologic^, ground, and would, therefore, give it pre-eminently the meaning of image or likeness. The two firsi explinations are in so far one as the primitive con- templation saw the reflection of the reddish earth in the glow of the ruddy cheek or iu the color of the blood. In this it must be maintained that the earth- ly lowliness of man, as thereby expressed, become! modified by the superior excellence of the primitive paradisaical earth. First after the fall does it thus properly become the lowliness of this lower earth. As, therefore, in respect to one half, the lower de* cent of the outward human nature is expressed h} the name Adam, so also, on the otlier side, there ia the hidden nobleness of the adamah, and the destiny of man to draw the adamah along with it in ita development to a higher life. In respect to the Greek word for man, Siv^panros (= 6 &vw lidpaii', the is the case with that other Hebrew appellation for man, 123"35< , weak, sick, affitcted. Compare it with Homer's ppoTol (mnrtahs), which he seems so fond of using, and in similar connections of thought. IIJ^X , although having the more exalting sense when in contrast with CIS (see Ps. xlix. 3 ; Is. ii. 9 ; v. 15;, is clearly allied to ^*3X (the n lost or compensated by the long vowel). The plural D^IUSS, the n in the Arabic , »Lm*Ji > ^^"^ i^ *he Arabic name for woman -Jol ^^^ H'iJX , show this beyond a doubt. The first name for man, or the more common one, would not be from strength, or from a ruddy color. These do not dislin- guish him, at least, to the emotions. They are not such as would affect the soul, like his sorrowful return to the earth. Afterwards, when he forgot himself in his pride, and began to boast, he might call himself 1"5 ("[''S^), vir, avfip—hero, strong one — but these names are not the primitive ones. Least of all would he think of calling hiiuself anmulhig according to Knobol's notion, that is, pleasant, agreeable, handsome one. Certainly not, if his primitive condiiion were that which the " higher criticism," in spite of history as well as of revelation, is determined it shall be. The squalid dweller in the cave, suiToundcd by wolves, and bones, and stone-axes, and hardly distinguishable from his beastly companions, would be the last one to be called, or who would think of calling himself, the agrecat)le one, accoi-d- ing to this derivation for which the rationalists go to the ^thiopic. The same thought of depression, lowliness, and depend- ence, may be traced, if we mistake not, in the Greek av9po also for the Indo-Germanic Mensch, in the Sanscrit manu (from miui, to think, related to maniu, spirit), see the notes in Delitzsch, p. 619. The translations of ~E", dust, also clay, soil (Lev. xiv. 42, 45 ; English Version, mortar), are exegeti- cal; Vulf,'ate: Jje Unto ierrie ; Luther: Out of the tartti-dod ; Symmachus and Theodolion: x"''' o'"^ rfis aSoMS 'jod formed him out of the dust of the earth. The verb TS^ must certainly have its em- phatic distinction here from sna and nos . It de- notes the curious structure of man according to his idea, as an act of the divine conscious wisdom (Ps. cxxxLX. 13; Prov. viii. 31). — And breathed into his nostrils. — " The inbreathing takes place through the nostrils ; for this is the organ of the breath, but the breath itselt" is the expression and sign of the inward existing life. From the breath of God comes the life of man (Job xxxiii. 4; Is. xlii. 5), and the breath in the nostrils of man is the divine breathing (Job xxvii. 3). In a similar maimer does the Chal- jaic myth make the creature to be formed of earthy matter and the divine blood ; the blood is taken for the seat of life ^see ch. ix. 4)." Knobel. The ex- pression evidently presents the formative agency of God in an anthropomorphic form. There is the mouth of God and the nostrils of the man as he comes into existence; it is as though He had waked him into life with a kiss (compare 1 Kings xvii. 21). It evidently means the impartation of the divine Ufe, on which depends the divine kinsmanship of man (Acts xvii. 28, 29). niacj (from c\:;3), bn-ath, spirit, breath of the spirit, breath of man, life of the spirit is more specific than nn , more universal than ITBJ but may be interchanged with botli, as sometliing that stands between them ; yet only in relation to man. Here it evidently denotes something which is common both to God and man, something which goes forth from God and enters into man — God's *^ breath of ^(/'e," tliat is, the spirit of God in its active self-motion, as in man it calls out the spiritual prin- ciple, the spirit of his hfe, but none the less as the spirit in its actual personaUty. The HBCJ , or breath of God, has the predicate D^'Tl (life or lives) from the adjective n^n (ch. i.), in order to distinguish primarily the living subject, and, in the next place, the Ufe itself. Tlie life, in its most intensive sense, is the unity of the life in all Uving persons, and in any living thing ; — it is the personahty. ttJSJ (from tlie: , to breathe), the life's breath, the soul of life, anima, xl/vxn, the principle of the animal vitaUty, and, in this respect, the life itself; in a wider sense it is animus, the personal spiritual soul, the psychical allijclion, the man idmseif. In our text it denotes the man in liia totality as living soul. In conse(|uence of the formation of the human figure out of dust from the earth-soil, and the animation of this figure ttr ; it could have procured for Adam the power of living on forever. That this efficacy is not to be regarded as something purely physical appears from the contrast of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, whose efficacy, again, on its own side, is not to he regarded as purely spiritual (see ch. iii. 22). The spiritual side of the tree of life is also supposed Rev. ii. 7 ; xxii. 2. It is, therefore, just a false contrast when Knobel tells us that " the narrator supposes in Para- dise two trees, of which the fruits of the one strengthen the physical power of life and sustain the life itself, Thilst that of the other arouses and advances the spiritual power, and thereby induces a higher know- ledge." (1) Truly, the garden appears a "region of wonder, on account of this tree not only, but as the place of God's personal presence, the place of the vocal utterance of a spiritual voice by the serpent, and on account of the cherubim. The wonderful consists, in the first place, in this, that here is the region of innocence, of the integtity both of the human spirit and of the surrounding nature, and that, consequently, here the spiritual and the natural are embraced in pe'-fect union ; whilst therefore it is, that outward tilings become of typical and sym- bolical significance in their potential measure, it belongs now to the perfection of the gardeti, not merely that it is watered with its own Paradise rivers, but also, that by means of the four streams that go out from it.s one united stream it stands in close con- nection with the whole earth, and sends forth to it its own peculiar blessings. From the reading of the text : a stream went out, instead of, a stream r/oes out, Delitzsch finds proof that the author speaks of Paradise as of a thing purely past. Much rather, however, does he speak of Paradise after the fall, as of a place at least still existing, but closely shut up by means of the cherubim. That is, the representa- tion is not now purely geographical ; it is also, at the same time, throughout symboUc. According to our representation, the stream originates, not in Paradise itself, but outside of it, in the land of Eden ; and so here, too, as in the case of Adam, must we liistinguish between the origin in nature, and the destiny that was to have its development in culture. [n Paradise itself, therefore, does this one stream, jn its going out of the garden, divide itself into four (C'OSI) flood-heads (not " rain-streams," nor "brooks"), which as four rivers part themselves in all the world, the stream-heads become bead-streams. —The name of the first is Pishon: The free, flowing (Fiirst); the full-flowing (Gesenius). By thi name Pishon has been understood 1. the Phasis, 2, the Phasi-s-Araxes of Xenophon, 3. the Bisynga oi Fiadatti (Buttmaim), 4. the Indus (Schultliess), S the Ganges (Josephus, Etisebius, Bertheau), 6. tht Hyphasis (Haneberg), 7. the Nile (the Midrash), 8. the Goscliah (C. Ritter). See the Doctrinal and Ethical. — That is it which encompasses th« whole land of Havilah. — according to Fiirst, it ia the same with circuit, repion. (This is what Uavilab probably signifies ; according to Delitzsch it meani sandy land.) The word ::d (primarily, to xtirround] may be interpreted of a circuitous flowing round, though it also occurs in the sense of surrounding on one side. The verb may also denote a winding pas- sage through (Is. xxiii. 16, ""'? "30 , "Go round about through the city "), and here it may be better conceived of as a winding through than as an encom passing. We choose an expression that at the same time calls to mind a region of streams.— Where there is gold. — That is, especially or abundantly — the tnother-country of gold, not only in respect to quantity, but also in respect to quality. — The gold of that land is good. — Besides its fine gold, Havi- lah is also famous for its spices, such as Bdolach (Num. xi. 7), similar to manna, or according to JosC' phus Bdellion, and, similarly named (see Knobel), "an odoriferous and very costly gum, which is in- digenous in India and Arabia, in Babylonia and Media, and especially in Bactriana. It must have been well known to the Hebrews." To this is added, in the third place, the precious stone oriil) , schoham. According to most interpreters it is an onyx stone, sardonyx, or sardius, which belong together to the species chalcedon. The Targumists and others would understand by schoham the sea-green beryl. The onyx, on the contrary, has the color of the human finger-nails, and that is denoted by the name. With this agrees cntii as " signifying something thin, delicate, pale" (Knobel). In respect to the geography, see further on. — The name of the second river is Gihon — "According to Josephus, Ant. i. 1. 3, Kimchi, and others, also as might be inferred from the Septuagint translation of Jer. ii. 18, Ben Lira 24, 27, there was understood by it the Nile, which flows through all the south-lands (B^:) that fell within the circuit of the narrator's view " (Fiirst). Under the Gihon, moreover, according to the Shem itic use of the word, there have been understood the Oxus, the Pyramus, and the Ganges. B'S , the dark-colored (?), is a proper name for the oldest son of Ham, the ancestor of the JJthiopians. Thence it is given to the south-land, especially Meroe, and, thereupon, to Jithiopia and the south-region general- ly. And yet imder the like name may be understood a dark-colored people that dwelt in southern India, in Upper Egypt, and in South Arabia (Ktesias and Arrian). In like manner are there different geogra- phical districts under this name (see Fi-rst : Lex* con). — The name of the third river is HiddekeL — The Tigris, the rushing, so named from its violent flowing. Dan. x. 4, it is called the great river — so also the Euphrates. The Zend form is tiyra, tigr, tigira, swift, raging.* — Toward the east of As- syria (Lange: Before ov in front of Assyria). The • [There would seem, at first view, but a faint re&na> bl.ince between hiddektl and Tigris. There can be but lit- tle iljulit, however, of their etymologioiil conoection rh» M6 GENESIS, OB THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. word r~"ip before Assyria can also mean to the east, but as a preposition it has the more common sense before^ frontward. The latter sense, taken freely, is here to be preferred ; since the Tigris, in fact, I'urms the western boundary of Assyria. Ac- cording 10 some, Assyria is to be taken here in a wider sense. — The fourth river is Euphrates. — The outbreaking, the viohnt. It is the greatest river of Western Asia, and, therefore, called the great river^ or the river., without anything more. The origii. of the Greek form Et/(ppai-T)s is explained either from rr^BX = r"'E , or from the Persian Ifral, Uj'rat. For the different derivations, see Fiirst. 7. Vers. 15-17. Took the man and put him in the garden. — The author takes up again what is said in the 8th verse about the transfer of Adam to Paradise, but adds to it, at the same time, the pur- pose for which it was done, namely, to dre»x it and to keep it. According to Delitzsch man was created outside of Paradise ; since he must first see the extra- paradisaical earth, in order that he might have a worthy estimation of the glory of Paradise, and of his own vocation as extending thence over the whole »orld. Such an assignment of a purpose is altogether .00 didactic. The garden is the place of tlie human vocation, and of the human eiijovment in its undivid- ed unity. This enjoyment has two sides, to eat and ttt refrain. In like manner the vocation has two sides, to dress and to keep. The first thing is to dress it ; for nature, which grows wild or rank with- out the care of man, becomes ennobled under the human hand (Delitzsch). Says the same wiitcr, this work was as widely different from agriculture ]iio- per, as Paradise itself diflered from the later culti- vated laud, but it was still work ; " and work was so far from being unparadisaical, tliat, according to ch. ii. 1-3, eveu the creation is regarded as a work of (lod.'' We must distiniruish, however, work in its narrower sense, as it stands under the bunlen of vanity (made subject to vanity, Rom. viii. 20) from tlie paradisaical work, or activity. Even of the later Israel is it said : There is no toil in Zion.* Accord- ing to Dehtzsch, the whole earth, from Paradise out, was to become a Paradise : " The garden is the most holy (or the holy of holies), Eden is the holy place, whilst the whole earth around is its porch and court." The comparison is not wliolly apphcable; since where there are no spiritual orders, there could be no proper mention of court and sanctuary. — And to keep it. — The garden, as such, is unincloscd and imwalled ; still must Adam watch aud protect it. Tliis is, in (act. a very significant addition, and seems to give a strong indication of danger as threatening man and Paradise from the sitle of an already exist- ing power of evil (Delitzsch and others i, although, even in tliat case, tlie guarding of the garden belong- ed to man's vocation ; since against tlie misuse of Ids freedom, he had only to take care of his own free will, and, with it, the possession and the integrity of •"1 in bpnn tiiay be the article hardened, or it may be part of the 8yllal)le TH (sharp, Bwift) in composition. The re- ma'pder 5pT and Tigris have copnate letters — DKL, T(iK. rbe intermediate or tranijition form is seen in the Aramaic 1^1.^), Arabic SJL^A ; Diglath, DOL. The Zend TGll IK the H.-ime word.— T. L.J • [The rcfereno; hero would i*eem to be to Num. xxiii. 21, which the German Version (pves : '* Keirie MUlie in Jacob, und kt.int Arbe.il in Israel; no toil iu Jacob, no labor in Ismel," instead of our more correct Version : "no iniquity In Jacob, no perTunfjiiesa in IfiraeL"— T. L.I Paradise. Knobel refers the care with which Adan was charged, to the task appointed him of guarding Paradise against the mischief of the wdd beasts. — Of every tree of the garden. — Says Knobel : " The author clearly assumes that in the early period men Uved alone fiom the fruit of trees, and at a latei period first advanced to the use of herbs and grair (ch. iii. 17), whilst the Elohist, in the very beginning assigns both to men (cli. i. 2h). According to th classical writers, such as Plato (Polit. 272), Strabo and others, men iu the beginning ate herbs, berries, bark, and fruit o( trees, especially acorns ; the raising of grain came in later." That the paradisaical man did not eat herbs is nowhere said ; but the Iruit of the trees is prominently presented because of its symbolic relation to the two mysterious trees in the midst of the garden. The free enjo\Tnent of all trees is strongly expressed by the intensive idiom, bssnbss. So much the more precise, therefore, is the limitation of the freedom. — But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil According to Hoffmann and Richers, "ii Sia means good ana bad simply. Delitzsch denies this, aud rightly. "The good," says he, "is obedience with its good, the bad is disobe dence with its evil consequences. Here it must be remarked, that the conception of physical evil can be, at the most, only as a conse- quence of moral evil, and that, therefore, the ethical contrast is the main thing, though not to the exclu- sion of the physical side. The tree, in any case, was a tree thtit might produce tliis knowledge ; that is, it was the tree of probation, throngli which Adam might come to a conscious distinction of good and evil, and, thereby, to a moial transition from the stale of innocent simplicity into a state of conscious, religious virtue. Did he not sin, then lie learned, iu a normal way, to know the distinction between good and evil — the good as the actuality of believing obe- dience towards God, which was, at the same time, the maintaining of his own life in it.-; self-command and fi eedom — the evil, as the possibility of an unbe- lieving and disobedient behavior towards God, which must have for its consequent, slavisli desire and death. The opinion of Hilaiius cannot be sus- tained {Spicilegium Solesmense, i. Iti2): .Arbor fuluri de se tneitdacii nomen accepit. For, ' not to know good and evil,' is the sign of the infantile childish- ness (Dent. i. 3y) or of senile obtuseuess (2 Sam. xix. 36); the con.^cious free choice of the one or tlic other indicates the most mature period of Ufe (or that ot the so-named anni diJicrelio»k, Is. vii. 15; Ueb. V. 14). So to know good and evil, and to dis- tinguish between them, is called the charisma or gift of a king (1 Kings iii. 9), the wisdom of the angel (2 Sam. xiv. 17), and, in its higher exercise, of God Himself (Gen. iii. 5, 22). By the tree of knowledge of good and evil man is to attain to a consciousness and to a contirmation of Ids freedom of choice, and, in fact (according to God's purpose in his determina- tion for good), to a freedom of poW);r — that i.^^, to a true freedom available fur the choice of good or its opposite. It was designed to bring out the necessary seli'-determination of a creature choosing licely, either for or against God, either for the (iod-willed good or the possible evil — and so to make perfect its inde- pendence. The very idea of a free personal being carries with it the necessity that its relation to tiod be a relation of free love" (Diditzsch). It is an en- tire perversion of the meaning of this probation-tree to teach, as the Gnostic Ophites did, that, onlj CHAP. II. 4-26. 2en constantly jiresent to his own mind. The coiisisti-ncy ol impression would be utterly de- stroyed by the rajiiility. Here is a consecution of ereuts growing regularly out of each other, each one preparing the way for what follows. Here are Ibrma- tfonii, (growths, seeming natures, conditioiiB of life. wants growing out of such condition.^, adaptations 1; such wants, preparations for such adaptations, ft course of disciphne for man, a development of know- ledge and of language out of such discipline, the means for such development, a strange state of hu manity called a trance or deep sleep, a wondrous change in the previous human nature arising out of it — all most briefly sketched, but all there, in cohe- rent continuity. Besides this, there is the prepara- tion of a part of the earth for the new inhabitants, a state of conscious innocence without shame, imply- ing some course of Ufe, longer or shorter, to give the representation any moral significance — the ordaining a law indicating some course of Ufe according to it, a divine intercourse and teaching, a probation, a tempt- ation, and a fall into sin. All of this, at least down to the making of Paradise, was on the sixth day, and the rest in consecutive series with it. Now did thif chain of events, or the greater part of them, take place in the afternoon of one solar day V It is not a sufficient answer to say that God's almighty power might have caused such a rapid shifting of scene. It is a question of style, of consistency, of descriptive impres.-ion. It might have been so ; but then the aspect given of causation, of series, of adaptation, would be but a show, a seeming. It would be an appearance of a causation without that consistent nexus that makes it easily conceivable ; it would be a seeming succession without that proportion of ante, cedent and consequent which we find it difficult to separate from it ; events, great events, growmg out of each other — so treated — and yet without any real growth, or that proportional gradualness without which growth has no true meaning. There would seem to be a new formation, or a re-formatitjn of the animal races brought into the picture — or if it refers to the old, a modification of them for the iustructiOD and discipline of man. They are to be the means of develojiing his powers of knowledge and of speech. Through their unhkeness to himself and their unfit- ness tor rational human intercourse, there is awaken- ed in him the desire for higher society. And then that most mysterious trance-state of being, in which there is vaiied from him, as now from all science, that inetJable transformation out of which comes the duality of our human nature. The fact is told us according to the easiest conception, but it was a trance-vision to Adam, and we have no reason to suppose that his narrating descendant had the know- ledge of it in any revelation more objective than was given to his ancestor. Adam had longed for some one like himself, inspired from above, and lifted out ol the surrounding anunalily, yet sharing with him the earthly nature. The language asciibed tu him shows the vehemence of his desire, the deferring of hie hope, and the patience of his waiting: C"5n rST , dii:siital, this now, ipsa tandem — there Ls an intense significance in this small Hebrew p:irticle — come at laxt, bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh. Three times does he repeat this feminine rsT (see De- litzsch, p. 161). Bone of my bone: — can we doubt as to the origin of the peculiar symbolism in which the narrative is clothed ? His want was satisfied, and the vivid picture of his dream becomes the lan- guage, the only possilde language, jierhaps, of a di- vine work which no merely human speech could ade- ([uately set forth — one of the deej) mysteries of God. it,self shadowing forth the still deeper mysteries o( the Incarnation and the Church. Similar suggestions of time present tucmselves ii CHAP. II. *-'io. •21 »hat is said of tlie planting of Paradise : And the Lord God caused to grow, etc. Did the great trees grow in the same time with the herb and the flower ? Confine it all to a few hours and the difference is as nothing ; vet giowth, without proportion according to the natures or products grown, is in itself both conceptioniess to the sense and idealess to the reason. We may conceive it, however, from a picture, or a vision, and such a mode of representation, therefore. oa appearing in the style, is one of the strongest crit- ical arguments for llie vision-theory of the creative revelation. It is perfectly consistent, too, for in the subjective deUneatiou time is given in perspective. But the grouping shows that the great things repre- sented could not have been thus, unlfss the picture itself be but a phantasy, or phantasmagoria, nut supernatural or contranatural merely, but wholly un- natural, according to any conceptions our human faculties can form of time, succession, cause, and effect. Great truths, great facts, incfliible truths, in- effable facts, are doubtless set forth. We do not abate one iota of their greatness, their wonderful n ess, by supposmg such a mode of representation. It is not an accommodation to a rude and early age, but the best language for every age. How trifling the conceit that our science coiUd have fuinished any better ! Her field is induction, and, by this creeping process, though she may travel far relatively, she can never ascend to the great facts of origin that belong to the supernatural plane. Her language will ever be more or less incorrect ; and, therefore, a divine revelation cannot use it, since such use would be an endorsement of its absolute verity. The simpler and more universal language of the Scripture may be in- adequate, as all language must be ; it may fall short; but it points in the right direction. Though giving us only the great steps in the process, it secures that essential faith in the transcendent divine work- ing, which science — our science, or the science of ages hence — might only be in danger, to say the least, of darkening. It saves us from those trifling things commonly called reconciliations of revelation with science, and which the next science is almost sure to imreconcile. It does so by placing the mind on a wholly different plane, giving us simple though grand conceptions as the vehicle of great ideas and great facts of origin in themselves no more accessible to the most cultivated than to the lowliest minds. There is an awful sublimity in this Mosaic account of the origin of the world and man, and that, too, whe- ther we regard it as inspired Scripture or the grand- est picture ever conceived by human genius. To those who cannot, or who do not, thus appreciate it, it matters little what mode of interpretation is adopt- ed— whether it be one of the so-culled reconciliations, or the crude dogmatism that calls itself literal because it chooses to talie on the narrowest scale a language so suggestive of vast times and ineffable causaUties. — T. L.1 DOCTRINAI, ANTD ETHICAL. 1. In respect to the opposition between this sec- tion and the preceding, see the Exegetical and Crit- cal N otes of the former. It must be very clear that Ji the present section the chronological order stands in the iiackgrouud, whilst, on the contrary, the sym- boUcal presents itself in a more signiticaut degree. 2. The present section is distinguished by the aanii» .lehnirah-Klnhini : The meaning is, that Jehovah, the Covenant-God of His people, is also the God ol all worlds, the Lord of uU creatures, who made Adaa for His Brst Covenant-chilu, and appointed him Hil vicegerent in this dominion. Adam is the princej>s, and so the ideal prius of the ereaturely world. This point, of the Covenant of God with Adam, ajipears in Cocceius as the Ibundation of the federal theology. With Schleiermacher, again, it is modified into tha representation of a religiousness overlying the con trast of sin and mercy. 3. Nature presupposes man, if it would be pre- vented from running wild. Only in man, through him, and with him, can it find its glorious transforma- tion. Therefore was man also, in his integrity, the presupposing of nature in her integrity ; his religioua and moral destiny is the condition of her higher des- tiny, his ciillus the foundation of her culture. In pure nature, moreover, are the nobler plants as well as the nobler animals to be regarded as in a special sense an appurtenance of man ; in a special measure, tlierefore, are they conditioned in their being and well-being, by his being and well-being. Whatever, too, there might have been befoi-e man, it was still as though it were not, so long as it found not in him its cosmical destiny. It was all an enigma; the solution was first to be found in man, 4. The moistening of the earth's soil bef'ire the creation of man poiuts to the sh.ire of the nj,ters in the ereaturely formations (and sustenance), especially the human. Through the observation of this camt Thales by Ids system. 5. The creation of man. It is rightly regarded as an entirely new creative act,* and, indeed, as the very highest. And yet it is a falsely literal view of thi^ anthropomorphic and symbolical representation, when in this act of God we are led to regard the earthly nature as wholly passive. Rather does this act, in its truest realization, presuppose the highest excitation and effort of the earth — we may even say * [This is doubtless true of that decisive act of God (whetiier the inspir.ition, or the image, or botli) tliat in a moment constituted the first man, and the species homo, which, a moment before, was not. Bui this does not ex- clude the idea that the human physical was connected with the previous natxn-e, or natures, and was brought out of them. That is, it was made from the earth in the widest signification of the tei-m. That it was not a mere phistio shaping, or outward mechanical structure, is implied in what Lange says just below in respect to the non-passivity of the eai-tb. 't here are immense diificulties connected with the idea of an outward Promethean image, a dead organiza- tion which, although having the appeaiance, is really nc organization at all in the strict sense of the word, any more than the marble statue or the waxen image. No one sup- poses that the making of the human body was an immediate cftaking dc nihiio. It was made from earth, and this earth already had its nature according to its varieties ol carbon, rin-ogen, etc., and these, as natures, connected with other natures, entered into the human body. If it is not a crea- tion de nrtiJo, which is expressly contrary to the language of the accoimt, we must suppose a connection with nature to a certain extent. What difficulty or danger, then, in giving to the phrase "from the earth," the widest sense consistent with the idea of man's having an earthly as weL as a heavenly origin! It is this latter idea, and the higher psychology connected with it, that liunishes to the faith itl shield against all mere theories of development that may proceed, with weaker or stronger evidence, from a natural- izing science. From the one' thus first inspired, and con- stituted hf'mo, came all humanity— (/le one humanity, As « transmission of that one inspii-ation and that one spiritual image (see Remarks, Introduction to the First Chapter of Genesis, p. 156). Even on this view, however, the human body did not precede the human soul, as Lange observes in what follows ; since, whatever may have been the precedenl causation, it was not a human body, any more than it was » human soul, before that decisive man-creating, man-consti tuting act which m.ade the species, or the specific chaiactbr of both.-T. L.l 212 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OK MOSES with Stoffens, its animation. The representation has for its leading fundamental idea: Man the prime tiling of the eaithlv creation ; not that it can or ought to be carried out into its philosophical conse- quences, for then man must liave been introduced before tlie earth-soil, and the formation of his Ijody must liave been before the creation of his sotil. On this account we are not authorized to assign separate- ly the formation of the bodv and of the soul to two acts following each other in a temporal series — as was held in some respects by the Gnostic Satumi- nus. 6. The anthropological, physiological, and psy- chological ideas of the passage. Compare the writings before cited : Von Roos, Zeller, Beck, Delitzsch, Yon Rudolf, and others. Before all things does the passage affirm that man became an indissoluble, that is, a creatively established, unity — a liring soul pro- ceeding out of the contrast, or tlie duality, of the dust of the earth, on the one side, and the divine breath of life on the other (nis'i::), and that these were the sub- stances out of which he was formed. He is, in his one total appearing, a living soul ; that is, the body too, in this human constitution, is only a special ground-form of the whole man, as the divine breath of life, on its side, is the ground-principle of the whole man. Spirit and body are joined together with the soul. These three are mutually inseparable, and they together make the individualized unity of man. To this extent may we deny that man consists alone of body and soul. He is always, and at any moment, body, soul, and spirit; though the outer form of the body may, by death, be loosed from its life, and the spirit, by siu, may smk into a latent state (see 1 Cor. xv. 44 ; Lange's " Dogmatics," p. 1243). As man, in respect to his inner Ufe, is not divided into feeling, intelligence, and will, but is present in each of these ground-forms as the entire man, so also is he ever the entire man in respect to his outer or concrete life ; as body he is related to his earthly appearing, and to the sphere of such a]jpear- ing ; as spirit, in the relation of his principial unity to his unitary ground, he is related to God and divine things ; as soul, or essential form and life, he is re- lated to the world of souls and the life of the wliole universe. Man is a one with himself: individuality in his singleness, personaUty in his universalness, subjectivity in the mode and way of mediating be- tween his singleness and his universal relation. And so far is the passage atomic, as it represents man as becoming a living soul (monade) through the highest and most intensive creative act of God. In rel'erence to the essential elements and rela- tions of human life, however, it is predominantly dichotomic, as other places of Holy Writ (Ecclesiastes xii. 7 ; .Matt. x. 2>i) distinctly represent. Concerning the relation of the corporeity of man to the earthly nature, compare Schubekt's "History '•f the Soul," g 10. The constituents of the animal body : Calcareous earth (bone), nitrogen, oxygen, hydrogen, oxygen gas, iron (in the blood), sulphur, |)hosi)l]oru3 (in the nerves), silica (in the teeth), and, ■ondjined witli this, fluoric acid. In respect to the spiritual nature of man as akin l(v God, compare Gen. iii. 6 ; Matt. xxii. 32 ; Jer. xxxi. 3 ; Luke xv. 11; John i. 49 ; Acts xvii. 28, 29; Rom. vUi. IB; 2 Pet. i. 4 ; Rev. i. 6 ; u. 17, and other places. — Delitzsch disputes against the supposition that theie is in man an uncreated divine ■p. 144); for the word K'^:''! , ch. i. 27, embraces, he says, the essential being of the entire man. Oj the man, certainly, as a whole, but is it so especially of his spiritual nature ? Is man, moreover, as an eternal uidividual thought of (iod, by virtue of his election in Christ, a thought in some way created f We cannot say that God has created the thought oi his love. The older theology was very much afraid of the idea of emanation. If God imparted anythine to man from his own being, it meant either that God must have given away some of His own being, or that something still of His being cotild have sinned in man. We must, by ,\U means, avoid both repre- sentations as we must generally do in respect to every emanation-view. But does there follow from this the pure creatureliness of the human spirit — that is, of its God-likeness (or that in it called divine, oi which is supposed to have come from God)? Or i» it only, as Delitzsch says, the itvotj of the irrtC^a (the breathing of the Spirit) ? Still it is a iri/tG^a, a hu man spirit. And certainly tliis needs the spirit of God for its well-being — for its own life (see 1 Cor. ii 14; Jude 19). The mere existence of the humai soul does not fail from the fact of its unspiritualness (the want of the higher spirituality, or its sensuality Delitzsch touches upon the true relation when he says, "a creative word, although of a divine being, is not the Logos clothed with the eternal being of thi Father." Yet still does the decree concerning hu manity embrace in Christ the individual elect. Be tween the emanation-representations, on the one side, and the pure creatureliness on the other, lies the conception of the free impartation of life in the mys tery of the quickening: life from Ih'e, light fron Ught, spirit from spirit. Man may be begotten of God by the seed of the new birth, which is the word of God ; and when we take this as the basis of our behef that he can receive the J/olg Spirit, we cannot deny that original state of man which corresponds to it. But the passage contains already the germ of a trichotomy-body, soul, and spirit, which impliedly pervades the Holy Scripture, and is most expressly set forth 1 Thess. v. 23; Hub iv. 12 (see Lance's " Dogmatics," p. 307). A similar trichotomy, as is well known, is found in the writings of the Platonists, and so, too, in connection with biblical doctrines and Platonic ideas, among the oldest church-fathers. This continued, until through the heresy of Apolli- naris, the trichotomy became suspected, and in the following time of the middle ages, gave place to the mere popular dichotomy. In modern times, again, in connection with a deeper study of psychology, trichotomic views presented themselves. It must herewith be remarked that the dichotomy, when simply held, is no more in contradiction to the trichotomy, than those dual places of Holy Scripture in which only God and His Logos, or the Wisdom or the Angel of the Lord, are named, contain a con- tradiction of the trinity. The triad just as easily holds together for a dual (soul and spirit being taken as one) as for a monad. Or rather, the monad re- solves itself over all, first into a duality, then into a triad. That the spirit is the principle and the form of unity in man — liis derivation from God, and his lela- tion to God — is declared in Ecclesiastes xii. 7. It is God who has given the spirit. In like manner does the same text of the Preacher say that the body ii the finishing and the form of ajtpeariiig for man, showing his descent from the earth, and his relation to the earthly sphere. But that the soul is the/om CHAP. 11. 4-i!B. 'zn of beinff in man, the configuration and the form of life, his descent from and liis reciprooal relation to Sie whole world, is declared in the very expression '' living soul." The C'^n ntt'J3 (breath of lives), as the divine principle of all life, imparted to man an individual divine principle of life, and in consequence thereof it became, in tne whole, a living soul, and in the vitali- iy, or vitalizing, a conscious self-revealing soul. Man, as related to the eternal and the divine, is »/)>■'■ laar, as related to the universe, is sotil ; ^ao, as related to the earth, or to any particular world-sphere wherein he dwells, is bodi/. Concerning the relation of the psychological system of Delitzsch 0 the conception of Von Rudloff, see " Notice of Re- carkable Writings," in the German Periodical, edited ,y Von HoUenberg, No. 3, 1869. For the various defective and marring statements respecting the triune form of man's being, see Lange's " Dogmatics," p. 307. Gnosticism refuses to regard the corporeity as belonging to the essen- tial being of man (so, too, the Book of Wisdom, ch. ix. 15). Hegelianism regards the soul as oidy the band that connects body and spirit. Later psychol- ogists and theologians (Heinroth, Hofiftnann, and others) have denied to man, in /limself, a spirit-being; he has spirit, they say, only so far as the spirit of God enlightens him. Beck speiks of a .spiritual power, at least, as belonging to the human soul. It must be held fa.st, however, that man could not re- ceive the spirit of God if he was not himself a spiT-it- ual being (" were not the eye adapted to the sun," etc.). It is, at all events, a supposition of the Scrip- ture, that since the fall the spiritual nature is bound in the natural man, and does not come to its actuali- ty (see Jude ver. 10; Laxge's "Dogmatics," p. 311). lu relation, however, to the body of man, we must distinguish between his ncofia, the organism, and his tiesh ffap^, the material merely, the filling out of his appearance. In relation to his soul, we must distin- guish between soul as the animal princi]>le of life, and as conscious form of being. In relation to his spirit, we must distinguisli between his spiritual nature and the element of the spiritual in which the jidividual spirit lives, and which enters into it. 7. For the doctrine of the divine image, see the remarks on the fiist chapter. For what belongs specially to the immortahty of man, see the title Literature hs above given. We must distinguish, however, a threefold conception of immortaUty: 1. The paradisaical immortality of Adam ; 2. the onto- logical immortality of human nature ; 3. the religious ethical immortality which is shared by man tlu'ough ais communion with (Jod — the life in its deeper signif- icance, or the eternal life. As to what concerns the immortality of Adam, the Scripture supposes that he could avoid death under the condition of continued QOi-mal rectitude in the strength of liis communicm with God, or that he might fall ijiio death through n"^normal convluct conlbrmable to his connection with the earth. But the Scripture does not suppose that mat> could have remained immortal without ob- jective conditionings for the eternal rene«';il of his life. These conditionings are embraced in the sym- bol of the tree of life (see below). There is, too, the further disclosure, that man, in the case of the con- firmation of his innocence, must undergo a meta- morphosis resembling death, and yet not death, in order that he might pass out of his first physical Jtate of existence, where there is yet a possibility of his dying, into a second spiritual state of exisleiicf which is raised above the sphere of death. Thii appears from the translation of Enoch, in connectioi with the long enduring of the Macrobii (tlie earl} loug-living antediluvian patriarchs), from the trans- lation of Elias, and, above all, from the glorified form of Christ after his resurrection. It appears, too, from the passage, 2 Cor. v. 2, 3 (see Langk's "Dog- matics," p. 318), and from the doctrine of the apos- tles respecting the transformation of Christians who should be living at the end of the world (1 Cor. x\.). The form of death that proceeds from sin had op- posed itself to this tendency of man to transforma- tion— had changed and subverted it. In respect to the various ecclesiastical views of the original immor- tahty, compare Winkk: "Comparative Representa- tion," p. 4i). 2. The ontological uumortality of man. At the bottom of the wide-spread prejudgment that the Mosaic books, as also the Old Testament generally in its first periods, did not teach the doctrine of a per sonal immortality, lie the following misunderstand inis : 1. In various ways was the ontological supposi- tion of the imperishable continuance of man which pervades the whole Old Testament (namely, in the doctrines of Sheol, of the Rephaim in Sheol, of the conscious condition, and in the expressions lor life, in Sheol), confounded with the doctrine of the ethical eternal life. This has also occurred to one of the latest writers on the subject before us (H. Scucltz; "The Presuppositions of the Chiislian Doctrine of Immortality," Gottingen, 1S61J. As we must distin- guish, however, between the conceptions of tlie ph\ sical and the ethical life in the Scriptures (a fife without God no life, but death ), and between the conceptions of the physical and the ethical death (a death without the sting of conscious guilt no death), so also must we distinguish between the conceptions of the physical and the ethical immortality. Although the Scripture does not acknowledge the physical, without the ethical, as the true immortality, still it denotes it as continuous hidividual existence \\\t\\ the two attributes of consciousness and imperishability (Is. Ixvi. 2i ; Rev. xiv. 11). 2. The pathetic and poetical expressions for the mimrnful condition in Slieol have been regarded purely as dogmas, without calling to mind that there are praises of the rest in Sheol of a directly opposite character (as in Job iii. ), and that, in like manner, the dogma of the perfect nothingness of the present worldly life may lie de- duced from many of the songs of the Church. 3. The fact has been overlooked that the immortality of the soul is just as distinctly a supposition of the Old Testament as the existence of God, and that on this account neither article is expressly taught, but only appears in language on occasions which call it out, ami then wholly as something thus presupposed. 4. Xo distinction has been made between the first germ-form which is peculiar to this doctrine, as it id to most others in the earlier books of the t)ld Testa- ment, and its later development ; and, therefore, too. has there been no distinction made between the rami- fying ontological definitives (such as Sheol, Rephaiir, appearings of the dead, awakenings of the dead, questionings of the dead), the ethical detiiutives (such as covenant with God, confidence in lioJ) and the synthetic, out of which the doctrine of the resur. rection gradually came forth (such as tlie tree of life, the translations of Enoch and Elijah, together with the doctrine of the resurrection that prevailed in the prophetic period). Still less has it been considered how gradually Sheol came to be regarded as a plac« 214 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOR OF MOSES. if life, how gradually the shades come to form two Jirisions, those that are enjoying the holy rest, and those that are the subjects of penal suft'ering — how gradually faith iu the living God becomes faith in that eternal life whith consists in communion with him (Ps. xvi.), and how gradually the resurrection lomes to its most definite form (2 Mace, vii.). The decisive word, as Christ interprets it, Matt. xxii. 32, is the designation which God gives to Himself, Exod. iii. 6. Its meaning is that the doctrine of covenants made with tJie pioufi by a personal God contains in itself the supponition of their own personal imperisha- ble nature. For an explanation of this point it must be observed: 1. That the abode in Sheol is to be re- garded primarily as the continuance of the death-doom incurred by sin. Just as death, the wages of sin ac- cording to I'aul, or the birth of sin according to James, begins in this world with sin (the inner death accord- ing to John), with mortaUty and sickness, so does it also continue on in tlie other world under the relative ideas of nakedness, imprisonment, restlessness — in a word, under the intensified form of a penal or disci- plinary relation to a future redemption. Therefore it is that even in the pious of the Old Testament, the condition beyond the grave is reflected in this world- consciousness, presenting itself in a form for the most part gloomy, sad, trembling, and terrific. 2. It must be kept iu mind that Moses had to establish the theocratic belief of the Jews in direct contrast with heathenism, and especially the heathenism of the Egyptians, from the midst of whom they came, and was therefore led to give the strongest and most significant emphasis to the present life ; because the Egyptian religion was most specifically a worship having relation to the state beyond the grave — that is, 10 death. 3. Add to tliis that it was in entire correspondence with the disciplinary degrees by which Israel was to be educated that Moses should represent the retribution as being principally in this world, and, indeed, as impending every moment, like something that followed close upon every step of hu- man conduct. In entire conformity to truth did he direct the people in this first step of belief in retribu- tion ; for, in fact, retribution is an immediate (or evcr-imijending) thing. Everywhere, however, the hope of a future life gleams out of his doctrine.s and his institutions. The promise of long life was the outward hull of the promise of eternal Ule ; tlie symboUc deatli-ofl'ering was the emblem of hopeful resignation to (iod in death ; and how shall piety in death find its reward otherwise than in tlie time be- yond the grave? Above all, it was the covenant of God that furnished the richest guaranty (Exod. iii. b). [lOKA OF A FUTUKK LlFE IN THE OlD TESTAMENT. — The doctrine of a future life is in the Old Testament aa well as in the New, but in a different manner. In the latter it is for all who read, d(!clared uiuleniedly, if not dogmatically ; in the former it is for the devout and believing. Tliere is thrown over it a vyil of iioly reserve, making it all the more imiucssivc when the truth is seen tlirough it. liut lor tliia the Sadducee had no eyes He could not find texts declaring it preceptively as he found the law laid down for mar- rying a brother's widow. He came to our Saviour with liis puzzle, and doubtless dei-nied it unanswera- ble. The course taken by Christ, iMatt. xxii. 2'.l, is very remarkable, and it is astonishing how little weight it seems t(; have had with writers of Ihe War- burtou school. He does not nieel. the caviller ivitli She texlH we would have expected. He docs not cite such passages as Ps. xvii. 16 : "I shall be wtie fied when I awake in thy likeness;" or Ps. xvi. " Thou wilt not leave my soul in Sheol ; " or Ps. Ixxiii 24 : " Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel and afterward receive me to glory;" or Is. xxvi. 19 where a resurrection seems to be spoken of; or Dan xii. 2, where it is expressly declared. The Sadduce* would probably have been prepared with some ex- planations of these, such as arc now offered by tht modern rationalist. Instead of them our Saviour quotes one of the most common passages in the Old Testament: I am the God of Abraham, of Isaac, ani of Jacob. The Sadducee had heard it read hundreda of times in the .synagogue, but saw nothing in it about a future life. It may have been to him, in '' other respects, a favorite passage ; for though called infidels m modern times they were the strictest of Jews, glorying strongly in their ancient patriarchal descent. "I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob : " this they were famil- iar with ; but Christ's appendix was as startling to them as it was conclusive : He is not the God of the dead but of the living. Godlg^ covenant with man proves His immortality. He does not deal thus with beings of a day. He does not thus solemnly declare Himself the God of things non-existent. Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, are still present realities, not living in their children, simply, but rather their chil- dren hving in them. The divine care of a chosen people thus continued from generation to generation imphes a continued being in the individuals that compose it, and without which the whole series would have no more spiritual value than any linked succession iu the animal or vegetable woild. They still "live unto Him." Let the reader test this by endeavoring to fix in hL« mind the idea that the Old Testament writers all regarded themselves as beings destined soon to de- part into nothingness — in other words, that they were all sheer animal materialists. Let him carry along this impression, and keep it constantly present in reading the Psalms, the Projihets, or even the Hook of Proverbs. What a discord will arise between it and many of their vivid utterances, even though there is nothing in them, dogmatically or didactively, about a future life. Did men who believe in no hereafter ever talk so? "Whom have I in lieaven but Thee, and there is none in all the earth that I de- sire beside Thee : Flesh and heart fail, but Thou art the strength (the rock) of my soul : Thy favor is life : Thy loving-kindness is more than lile : My soul fiunta for Thee, the living God : For with Thee is the foun- tain of life, and in Thy light do we >ee light: Thou art our dwelling-place in all generations : Doubtless Thou art our Father even though Abraham be igno- rant of us and Israel acknowledge us not ; Thou, Oh Lord, art our Father and our Redeemer : Art Thou not from eveilastmg, Jehovah, my God, my Holy One'? we .'^hall not die." Or take that oft-repeated Hebrew oath : A^ the Loril Uveih and a.s /Ay soul liv- el/i ; what meaning in such a connection of terms? How does all this lofty language immediately collapso at the presence o( the low materializing idea I Even the language of their despondency shows how far they were from the satisfied animal or earthly state of soul: Shall (lust praise Thee? Shall Thy loving kindness be declared iu the grave, or Thy righteous- ness in the land nf oblivion '^ it was bidding t.irewelJ to God, not to earth, it was losing the idea of th*j everlasting covenant and its everlasting author, flat imparted the deepest ghjoiii to their seasons of seep CHAP. n. 4-26. 21f >'ci8m. It was in ju3t such travail of the spirit that tie hope was boru withiu them. This was tlie sub jcctive mode of its revelation; and, thus regarded, the very texts whiuh the Sadducee, ancient or mod- ern, would iiuote iu favor of his denial, testify to a '.rue spirituality — to a state of soul most opposite to his own. And this style of language is not confined [0 tlie devotional or prophetical Sci-iptures. It gleams out in expressions interspersed among the historical details of tlie Jewish home-life. What a people, says Kabbi Tanchum {citing the words of Abigail, 1 Sam. xxv. '2'j), where even the women epeak so sublimely, and beyond even the philosophers of other nations, about soula bou/id up in the bundle of life (or hves, o-'^nn m^s). See Pococke's " Notts to Porta Mosis," p. 93. It may be very easy for the rationalizing interpreter to put another face on such a passage as this, but it may be only because iu his case, as in that of the Sadducee of old, there is a vail upon his heart in the reading of the Old Covenant. Such an expanding spiritual sense (in distinction iroru the merely fanciful or the cabalistical) is for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear ; and, thus regarded, it may be said that tlie future life of the Old Testament, even with tliis vail thrown over it, has far more of moral power than the Gre, k Uades, or any spirit-world mythology of other ancieiu nations whom the r.itionalist would represent as sur- passing the Jews in this respect. The latter were doubtless far behind the Greeks in distinctness of conception and locality ; but ihis was because God did not mean to leave Ilis people to their fancies. He gave them, and especially the pious among them, the spirit of the doctrine, but so kept it in holy reserve that they could not turn it into tables. — T. L.] 8. From the circumstance of its not being said that the woman was inspired by the breath of God, Delitzsch is inclined to follow, with Tertulliau, the so-called traducian theory, or the generic propaga- tion of the human soul. This argument, however, de sileiitio, proves nothing; since Adam, in relation -£o Eve, also is the type of the creation of humanity. /(Mud so we adhere to this : The body of man proceeds I Hrom propagation (traducianism), the soul is created icreatiouism), the spirit is pre-existent as the idea of • 9. Paradise. — See the article "Eden" in Winer, and the literary catalogue there given. See also Hekzog's " Real-Encyelopedia." Paradise (Hebrew, "3 ; Septuagint, irajjaSticros, that is, a walUng or fenc- ing round, a place enclosed as a garden), like all facts in Genesis, especially of its earlier history, was, on the one side, an actuality, on the other a s^-mijol ; and the latter, indeed, iu a special degree. In iavor of its actuality there is, first, the fundamental thought : there was a home of the human race; secondly, the territory of this home, the region in which the Euphrates and tlie Tigris had their sources, or West- ern'^sia as appears probable from other reasons; thirdly, the mention of the well-known rivers Phrat (Euphiates) and Hiddekcl (Tigris), together with other 'eatures. In favor of the clear symbolical significance of Paradise there is the figure of the one stream that afterwards divided itself into four diiferent streams running out from thence into the world, as also the inclosure of the garden, and especially the two trees witi their wonderful significance. The theological views respecting Paradise embrace two extremes: vhilst some would regard it as extending over all the earth (Ephraim the Syrian ; and a multitude of sucl extravagant opinions as cited by L'almkt: (Jomment litter, in Genesin, p. 81), others, on the other side would reduce it to one common section so appropri ated as to have a ©ommensurate influence upon thtj first men. Between these lies the sound view of the church, which supposes for the pure a pure sphere oi nature, for the care-needing a motherly bosom of nature, for the innocent a heavenly, peaceful, holj region, for the cliild-like a garden with its fruits (see La.sge's " Dogmatics," p. 396). The exegetical views respecting the passage divide themselves into the liistyiicatj-the aUegorical, aud the mythical. The historical views, again, fill into two classes: thosa that maintain the possibility of yet deterniiuing the region of Paradise, and such as suppose the configu- ration of the earth to have been so ch.anged by the flood that the place of union of the four rivers can- not now be pointed out. Both assume a significant change of the earth, especially since the fall of Adam, or the beginning of the human race. The allegorical views divide themselves into the Gnostic or the theo- sophic-allegorical (Philo, Jacob Bohm, and others) and into the inystic-allegorieal (Swedenborg and others). The mythical views may be divided into the predominantly theological or philosophical, or the predominantly geographical. First Class: a. Oalvin, Huetius, Bocharl, and others: Paradise, they say, lay in the district in which the Euphrates and the Tigris unite (Schat al Arab) ; the Pislion and the Gihou are the two prmcipal mouths of Schat al Arab. b. Uopkinson : Paradise was the region of Babylon; the two canals of the Euphrates form half of the number of the four rivers, c. Kask : The same region probably, oifly let there be added to the two well-known streams the two subordinate streams of the Schat al Arab. rf. Harduin : Gahlee. e. Hasse: Paradise lay in East Prussia. Second Class : Change in the course of the rivers. Cleiicus, and others: Paradise lay in Syria (Kohlreif aud others : Damas- cus). Third Class: 1'hilo : JJe ilundi Opificio ; Jacob Bohm: Mi/sterium Maffnum. Fourth Class: See the article " Swedenborg " in Hekzog's " Real- Encyclopedia." Fifth Class: The mythieo-theologi- cal, or strictly mythological, view, which makes it the story of the four world-rivers that come from the hills of heaven, and wander over the earth (Von Bohleu and others). Sixth Class: The mythico- geographical. Sickler, Buttmaun, Bertheau : " Geo- graphical Views that form the Ground of the Descrip- tion of the Situation of Paradise," Gbttingen, 1848. Wiuer distinguishes a Uteral view (ileugstenberg, Tiele, Baumgarten), a half-Uteral, which attempts to separate the distribution of the streams from the matter of fact contained (Less, Cramer, Werner, and otliers), an allegorical (Von Gerstenberg), and a liierogiyphical, not very distinguishable (J. G. Rosen- muller and others), p. 2u0, wherein he protesM against the conjectures of Hiillmann and Ballen- stedt. According to Verbrugge, Jahn, and others, the one Paradise-stream may be understood of a regioD abounding in streams. We suppose that the stream has a mo.-t special symbolical importance, aud de- notes, generally, the well-ground of the Paradise- earth. With this, however, there is easUy connected the historical view of Reland and Calmct. Accord- ing to this, Pislion denotes the Phasis whicli rises in the Moschian mountains, stands iu coimectioa wiifi thegf)ld-land of Colchis so lamed in auti (uity (Colchii ^ CiiaviUil. and flows into the Black Sea Gihoii is tl» 216 GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. Aras jr A raxes (the Phasis of Xenophon, n'S, to break forth — apdrTu;), which likewise rises in Arme- nia, and flows into the Caspian Sea. But Cush is the and of the Kossaeans, which Strabo and Diodorus place in the neighborhood of Media and the Caspian Sea. According to this, Armenia would have been the terr'.'.ory of the ancient Paradise. Knobel also had tirst presented the grounds (p. 28), wliich are in favor of Armenia, out of which, moreover, the postdiluvian men proceeded. On this accoimt have Beland, Link, Vou Lengerke, Kurtz, Bunsen, and others, supposed it to be Armenia. It is objected, however, to this : 1. That the names Havila and Cush, in otlier places, belong to the South. The name Havila, it may be said generally, is not geogra- phically determined ; but the name Cush, together with the Cushites, can just as well be extended from the north to the south as that of the Xormans (see Kurtz : " History of the Old Testament," p. 69). 2. No Armenian district can be summarily denoted as the native land of gold, bdellium, and the onyx. In regard to tlie gold, however, Colchis presents no diffi- culty. Just as little are the bdellium and the onyx to be denied of tliis district, since it evidently has something symboUcal. Objection Bd : It is said that the cherubim are not to be found in Armenia ; but where on the earth was the home of these V And then, too, must many indications point to a more northern liigldaud. But the places commonly cited for this purpose, Ps. xlviii. 3; Is. xlviii. 13, prove nothing, and Ezek. xxviii. 13 is a pure ideal painting. Moreover, the analogies of the Alburdi, the Medo- Persian mountains of God, and the Indian mountains Meru, appear to be merely reflexes of the Paradise- story ; and the same may be said of the Chinese mountain-tract Kuenlun. In other respects the analogies and combinations collected by Knobel are communications of great interest. KeU states a reason why the Cyrus (now the Kur) should be put in place of the I'hasis (p. 42) ; it is the fact that the rising of the Phasis lies beyond Armenia. Tills rea- son would be decisive, if we had to insist upon the pure literalness of the origin of the Paradise rivers. He holds, in like maimer, that the Gihon is the Araxes : the sundering of the four streams he ex- plaius by changes in the eartii's surface, yet not alone through the flood (Xote, p. 44 J. Finally, ac- cording to Delitzsch, the Pison must relate to the Indus and its river territory to India, whilst the Gihon is the Nile (pp. lit), tJ2U). Afterwards he came to regard the combination of Bunsen as having a good degree of proljability (p. 150), and tlien he represents the mutually opposing dilUculties by the concluding alternative : We must either acknowledge the incomprehensibility of the narration, or aeeom- inodate ourselves with the admission that the certain knowledge of the four rivers has been lost in the disappearance of Paradise itself. — T/w actual and tyinfjotical Inip'/rtfincc of Faradme. J'lw tjardfit in Eden. Jliitlorical. Tke lieat'eidtj carthhtumn which surrounded the new-born man, who is to be regarded, indeed, as lull-grown, and yet childlike and inexpe- rienced. Tile jioint of tlie earth's coiigetiiality, wherein the divine eartii-culture is in unity with tiie earthly nature — wlien the fruitrtrees arc of the noblest (jual'ty, the grain grows wild, the beasts attach them- Belves to men in the domestic state, whilst there is allotted to men an abundance of .simple food (Iruit of trees, the nourishment of eliiklren) to be procured by an easy labor of the body, and a tboughtfui care OD the [lart of the mind. — Syinbolkai uiyiii/u-ance of Paradise. The general correspondence between tht pure, peaceful, serene, and blessed man, and the pure, peaceful, serene, and blessed world of God . oi the inward communion with God, and, corresponding to it, the outward, sensible presence of God in the surroundings of humanity. In its more special signif- icance: 1. The heavenly disposition of the earth, the ricli paradisaical soil ; 2. the objective paradisai- cal aspects of the earth, as the subjective in the con- templation of childi en and of men attuned to a festal ' life ; 3. the promised land, the consecration of the earth through the salvation ; 4. the kingdom of glory above (Luke xxiii. 43; 2 Cor. xii. 4); 5. the earth glorifietl for its union, at some future time, with the heavens (2 Pet. iii. 13; Rev. xx.). — The vocation in -Paradise. Historical : The serene, free activity of the child in contrast with the necessity and the pains of labor proper. The true keeping of entrusted good against a damage yet unforeseen, especially through self-keeping in contrast with the later anxious watching. Symbolical: The calling of tlie pious and blessed, according to its positive and negative sides. A holy office of labor, a holy office of defence, and, through both, a holy ministry of instruction. — The Paradise-rivers: 1. Historical (see above). 2. Symbolic. The four world-streams in their high signilicance, as the streams of lile and blessing that flow conditionally from the paradisaical home of man. — T/te trees in the garden. Historical : The abundance that surrounded the first man still simple and conformable to his childlike degree; food both lovely to the eye and ennobling in its efficacy. Sym- bolical: The riches of the pious and their freedom from want (Ps. xxiii.). — The two trees in the midst of the garden. Historical: Nature in its centre endowed with a wonderful power of health, as also with intoxi- cating gifts of dangerous efficacy, which, through an enjoyment rash or immoderate (or, in general, having ordy the form of nourishment), exert a destructive in- tluence, and both alike represented there by a cen- tral vegetable formation, whether it be tfee or bush. Symbolical : The tree of life : The power of health and life in nature, which, in connection with the word ol God, ruses to a fountain of everlasting life in Christ soteriologically, and to be the nourishment of everlasting life in Christ sacramentally. — The tree of knowUdge of good and evil. Nature as the tree of probation every way, namely in excessive, in dan- gerous, and in forbidden means of enjoyment. — TIte paradisaical cominand. Historical: The warning, inviting, and dissuading signs of Goil in the produc- tions of nature themselves, and the transformation of the signs into miraculous words lor the ear through the present spirit of God. The mention ol all the trees in the garden is in so far a command as the arbitrary aoslinence from permitted enjoyment ha3 for its consequence the inclination to forbidden en- joyment. There is also a reminder in it that he has no need of the loibidden enjoyment. Symbolical: The reveah'd will of liod, in general, not a constraint nor an abridgiiieut, but only a healthful bariier foi the sake of freedom and happiness.- -7'Ae beasts brought before Adam in Paradise, Historical Original sympathy between the animal and the humai worlds. Symbolical: The destiny of man, to learii to understand, through the gospel, the sigliing of the creature, or to have, in general, a right knowledge of the animal-world and of nature, and how rightly to use them. — 'Jhc naming of the beus's. Historical. First exercise of the human sjiirit — ;md especially of speech. Symbolical: The religious and scientific CHAP. II. 4-2S. an levelopment of man through nature. — Human speech. Hinlorical : Hereditary disposition taking root in the very life of the spirit and its plastic organization, awakened through the most excited coulemplations of childhood — such as that of life in the beast. Symbolical : Man's tirst prophecy of nature, a presage of his destiny to know and predict perfectly the law and gospel of nature. — Tlie creation of woman. Historical: The formation of the human pair falls in the period of the physiological creation of the man. Not after the manner of ready-made or at once com- pleted being, but in the way of becoming, does the one developing human form become perfected in tlie contrast of one man and woman. Man, as a per- Bouality, is not conditioned through sexual comple- tion or integration ; and man and wife are not, some- how, only two halves which make one whole in a personal sense, but perhaps in a social. The wife, however, is just as much whole man as the man himself She proceeds not only from the substance of the man, Ijut :ilso from his trance-vision m that deathlike sleep into which he had been cast by God. In respect to substance, as formed from one of man's ribs, she comprehends less than Adam ; in respect to form she is a creation of secondary power in the region of paradise. God brings Eve to Adam. Mar- riage is instituted by God, not only in respect to the divine creation of its contrast, but also in respect to the divine guidance of the individual choice. Man must not anticipate the decision of God, but neither is he to reject the destined one whom God brings before him — the one who through a divine revela- tion, as it were, and a divine consideration, is marked out for him as his counterpart. — Admits salutation and blessing. Si/mbolical : The first of all high and sacred songs of love. Marriage the principle of the family state, superordinate to all other domestic rela- tions. Marriage m contrast with the sins of sodomy and fornication — in contrast with incest (leaving father and motiier, etc.) — in contrast with an arbitra- ry and sinful taking and forsaking. (The paradisai- cal indissolubility of marriage is conditioned upon its paradisaical infallibility.) Duties to father and mo- ther receive an emphasis from the fact that they are measured by the law of love. The greatness and the limit of the parental right. It extends to, but not into, the marriage state. — The nakedness of the Jirst human beings. Symbolical: The childlike simplicity, the freedom, beauty, and majesty of innocence. [ExccRSDS ON THE Paradise Rivers. — The Search for the Gihon and the Pishon in the north is attended with the greatest difficulties. Chief auiong them is the necessity it involves of finding another Gush in the same direction. The language of the writer gives the impression of a territory of great comparative ex- tent, and that could not easily be misunderstood by a reader familiar with the geographical terms employed. BIS y-X hzi a=:on sin: that is, the river that goes round the whole land of Gush — clear round it — 4^de and notable circuit. The sense of winding or meandering throxujh cannot be got from the verb, tnd the references to Is. xxiii. 16, and other places f-fl' ■'20, 1-'3 130 , Ps. xlviii. 13 : Go round about the city — round about Zion), do not support it. Tlie sncient view that the Gihon was the Nile, and Pishon ihe Indus, though having difficulties of another Idnd, .8 more near to what would seem to be the general idea of the passage : four great rivers (waters rather) prominent in the earth, and having their courses, in lomc way, connected with Eden.. Even if the Nile and the Indus are no' the rivers, it is more easy ti see how they came to be anciently, and almost uni versally, so regarded, than to find anything corre spending to this graphic representation in the regioi north of the Euphrates and the Hiddekel or Tigris One thing is clear on the very face of the account: the writer himself had no difficulty, and thought of none for the reader. He is certainly not speaking of things supposed to be obliterated by the deluge, but of places recognized, however vaguely, in the knowledge of the day. To tills assumed knowledge the picture is presented, thougli with that inadequacy of conception, and that generahty or undefinednesa of language, which necessarily marked the tirst geographical notions of mankind. It was very much as an early Greek writer would have done, in a simi- lar case, who had nothing else to go by hut the map of Eratosthenes, or the still older one of Hecataeus. This does not at all detract from the inspiration of the account, whether we adopt the vision-theory, or some more objective mode of raising the conceptiona in the narrator's mmd. In either case such concep- tions would be shaped by his supposed knowledge, as this would also be the ground of presentation to other minds. The picture which St. John had of the Euphrates, in his apocalyptic vision, was doubtless according to the geographical ideas, more or less correct, which he had previously possessed of that river. Geographical language has undergone a great change. Everything now, and for a long time, has been so precisely defined that we need to get out of our modern conceptions to be m a condition to under- stand satisfactorily the most ancient modes of divid- ing and describing the earth. The nomenclature has become greatly enlarged and varied. We have rivers, lakes, seas (the Greeks in Homer's time called these two last by one name, \<.v.vt\), oceans, friths, arms of the sea, gults, bays, sounds, etc. In the eariiest times they were not fixed, and we cannot be always certain, therefore, that a general name Uke nn: , a Jlood or flowing water, presented just that limited conception in every case that we now invariably con- nect with river, flumen, irorauf's, etc. For examples of the wide sense of "ins, see such passages as Ps. xciii. 3 : The floods Uft up their voice, min: , lift up their dashing waves, o-'ST; Ps. Ixvi. 6, it is join- ed with c , and most obviously used of the Red Sea ; see also Ps. Ixxxix. 26. So Hab. iii. 8, where D^'tns: and ca are spoken of in the same way; comp. Is. xlviii. 18. We deduce, too, this wide primitive sense from its employment in metaphors where there is to be denoted width, enlargement, fulness; Peace like a river, "in:3 , Is. Ixvi. 12, like a flood ; so Is. lix. 19, enemy come in Uke a flood. Beyond the floods of Gush, Is. xviii. 1 ; the same expression, Zeph. iii. 10. See especially Jonah ii. 4: ■'Jnao^ in: , the flood went round me (the deep sea); compare with this Homer's wKiavoi' fueipa, streams of ocean, Iliad xiv. 245. So it seero= to be used, not so much of a river, in the limited sense, aa of any great water, in such passages as Job xxii. 16, Ps. xlvi. 6. In Ps. xxiv. 2 it denotes the floods of cliaos, the old Tehom rabbah, or " great deep," and is put in direct parallelism with ca^ : For He hath founded it upon the seas, and built it upon the flood*, mn3 57 . See the same word used in the same way, Ezek. xxxi. 15. Thus the inj , or great water, in the passage be ais GENESIS, OK THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. fore us, Gen. ii. 10. In the Eden territory itself it might have had the form of a lake — an idea, in fact, which the whole aspect of the account greatly favors. It was certainly rot a spring or fountain-head to four commencing streams, but rather a reservoir in which all were joined, whether as flowing in or flowing out. From thence tl'.ey were parted, or began to be parted (inS" , see remark on T^'iV and references, p. 202) into lour C^wS^ . This is rendered heads in our ver- sion, and so the Vulgate, in quatuor capita. But they both mislead in their literalness; the Hebrew CSi never having, like our word, the sense of fouutiiin- head or spring; tlie Shemitic tongues called the re- mote upper part of a stream a font or a finger rather than a head. It became four principal waters or floods, four arms (brachia) or great branches. Two of these were rivers within the modern limits of the term, but very great rivers ; so that one comes after- wards to be almost constantly called 1~3 with the article as a proper name — the great river, the sea or flood. See Gen. xv. 18 ; xxxi. 21 ; Num. xxii. 6 ; Deut. i. 7; xi. 24; Josh. xxiv. 2, 3, 14, 15; 2 Sam. X. 16; Neh. ii. 7; Is. vii. 20; xi. 15; xxvii. 12 and others. From such a use as this, perhaps, came the more common secondary or specific appUcation of ~n3 to rivers proper. The other two, probably, presented a different appearance. Beyond the l^ouuds of the Eden territory they may have become friths, or arms of the sea, or two diverging shores of a great water 80on losing sight of each other, yet each still keeping the name in: as more applicable, in fact, to them (if we may judge from its primary sense) than to the streams on tiie north. Such a view may not, at first, seem in harmony with our preconceptions, but there are considerations to be mentioned which, on closer examination, will more and more divest it of any strange or forced appearance. In the first place, two of these cnns are determined, and we may regard them as furnish- ing the necessary data for the determination of the others according to some sense once clearly recog- nized. They are waters in close and even immediate connection with the Euphrates and the Tigris, not at their obscure sources, or springs, where they could not be recognized as D"'"n3 , but where they both appear as parting from a common junction in the Eden-laud. The two well-known branches are north of this junction ; we must, therefore, look for the others on the soutli, and the region first to be exam- ined in our searcli for Eden is that in which the Euphrates and the Tigris come together. This was near the head of the I'ersian (iulf, where most of the ancient authorities agreed in fixing it, anil to which place also there points a concurrence of Arabian and Persian tradition. Uere Calvin and Bochart find it. But wliere, then, are the two southern a'^n: , one of which goes round the land of Havilah, the land of gold (India, says the Jerusalem Targum), anil the other goes round the whole land of Cush, that is, Southern Arabia (see Gen. x. 7 ; 1 Kings x. 1 ; UoMKK' Odi/is. i. 20)? Tlie branches of the Schat al Arab, which completes the juuciion of the Eu- phrates and the Tigris, fall altogether short of this graphic description. We might regard this delta as the remains of the ancient confluence in Eden, but it will not inswer for I'ishon and Gihon. The key to the dilliculty, we think, will suggest itaelt', if the reader will keep in mini die view here taken of "IMS , and carry it with him in a steady conten.platios of all the waters that meet in this region of tht earth. An ancient map, suoh as that of Ptolemy or Strabo, or the still eariier one of Hecatseus, would be best for this purpose ; but the simplest delineation could hardly fail to awake the thought that in the general contour of the system of waters presented by these two mighty streams as they come down from the north, and the two diverging seas, or shores of seas, that, parting just below their junction, sweep round the land of India on the one side, and Arabia on the other, we have the data that determine for ua the location of the ancient Eden-land. It suggests, too, the origin of the general language, and of %his special naming. Knowledge has not yet introduced geographical distinctions ; the internal wastes of seas and their connections are unknown ; the pioneers or travellers on either diverging shore simply recognize them as two great waters, two mighty C'lns , and they name them according to their most visible char- acteristics and directions. Hence the earliest repre- sentation, which is afterwards enlarged and becomes a fixed tradition. One is the broad-sjireiuUng Pishou, trending far away to the eastern land of gold and diamonds, the other is the deep-fiowing Gihon (com- pare the favorite epithet of Homer's " Ocean-River,' Badvp^oav 'nKiavoio, Odyss. xi. 13; Jliad xiv. 311), surging far round to the south and the west. Ob serve, too, the contrast they present to the other names, the fertilizing Euphrates (DIE), and the swift- darting Hiddekel or Tigris. The inland and mari- time features could hardly have been distinguished by more significant epithets.* But such an opinion should be fortified by histor- ical argument, and this, we think, is found in a fact of Greek archaeology, having much interest for its own sake, but to which sufficient attention has not been given in its bearing on the names, and the primitive significance, of these neharim. Homer calls Oceanus a river. It had been so called, doubt- less, long before his time. He connects with it, in- deed, much wild mythology, but that does not affect the fact, nor the interest, of such a naming. Wh»uce came it? It is not a sufficient explanation to call it poetical. All early conceivings of nature were poeti- cal in this sense of vastness and wonder. The great unknown of things was full of it, and the wonderful was ever divine. Hence Ho.mek's divine ether, divine fire, divine sea (aidepus eV Si'tj^ — .aeiTTiiSaes itxip — ety aKa h'lau, Jliad xvl. 31)5; xii. 177; Odt/ss. v. 261— compare bs ""Tin , montes Dei, Ps. xxxvi. 7). But Homer, though a poet, speaks here in the most mat- ter-of-fact style. He believes in Oceanus as he be- lieves in the Peneus and the Euiotas. Ulysses navi- gates this ocean-river in a black sliip; lie sails along its one shore until he leaves it and enters the Kv^xa daAduir-ns. the swell of the inland sea, Odyss. X. 639; xi. 1. Homer's poetry makes him none ilie kss a good witness for i lie mo.-;t ancient geographical ideas, and to this purpose does the prosaic Stralio speak in quoting him : '• Homer," he .says, 'not only calls the great ocean a river [-noTaf^hv Kal Trorafxoio /^oof), hut gives the same name to a part of it ; otherwi.^'e he would have (absurdly) represented Ulysses as goiiig uul of the occim into the ocean." See Stuabo: \'\h. i. 75 ; also Ub. i. 3 ; ii. 3, 5 ; ii, 18, where he .speaks of the lour great sinuses wliicli were regarded as in- * [The annexed figure woulii presieut the outline appear- ance uf the sapposed Eden-region, with its four great watera or Deharim, atj given by the modem mavK -. CHAP. II. 4-26. •2U lets from the ocean-stream, the Caspian and the Pon- tus on the north and the Persian and Arabian sinus on the south. See, also, how he speaks in other places of the Northern Occiinus, and its supposed conneotious. It is worthy of note, too, how Homer's frequent puos, and Stral)o's use of it in his remarks upon him, corresponds to the primary sense of the Hebrew nnj , as a full, maje.stic flowing rather than B gliding or rapid running stream, like rtvns or amni«. It would take up too much space to cite other passages from the Greek poets, Herodotus, etc., where similar language is used. One reference, how- ever, may be made to Pindar; Pi/lh. Carm. iv. 250, iv t' uinfatfov Trf\dyeaj)), terra wmbrm alarum, that is, as Abulwalid explains it, whose wings or sides are shaded (obscure or unknown) — the land ^"injD ^asB U313 J beyond the floods of Cvsh. The thought gives force and vividness to the passage Ps. Ixviii. 32 : Even Gush shall stretch forth (y^T, cause to run swiftly or eagerly) her hands unto God. The two lands of Cush, '" tlie one at the rising (the Arabian Gush) and the other at the .setting sun " (the African), were distinguished in Homer's day, and it is not ditticult to see how the African jithiopians came from the Arabian, or Sabiean, Cush, by crossing the lower narrow part of the Red Sea (one of the wind- ings of the Gihon), instead of being derived liom the Egyptians abo\'e, that is, from Mizraim, the younger brother of Cush. In thus regarding the Red Sea as a continuation of the Gdioii, as in fact it was, if our view be correct, we may understand how the Nile may have become connected with the name, and afterwards been taken for the Gihon itself The Indian Ocean in the most ancient times was the widest extent of water known. It was, too, nearer the primitive birth-place of man in the East, and, therefore, known before the Mediterranean. Even after men became acquainted with the latter, it was, in comparison with the older water, but a AiAti'7?, or a ^d\aaaa, an irregular broken mass oi bays and islands instead of one long continuous flow. Here, therefore, in this earlier region of the Indian and Persian seas should we naturally look for the origin of that name Okeanos which it is so difficult to deduce from the tireek. This is what Diodorue Siculus does, Lib. i. lit, in what he says of the ,ioiir- ney of Osiris to Inilia. The derivation of Okeanos from wKvs i'ot*>, as we tind it in some of our lexicoua, is wholly untenable, since fdai denotes only the trick- * Our English vtr.sion of Is. xviii. \ mars the ])as.'yig by its rendering of the interjection iir " AVoc to tlic himi etc." It should bo IIo, as in Is. h. 1, S^S hD ■'Tl •'Ho, every one that thirsteth." Whe'.her it is a particU' of tlircittcning, of luracntation, or of invitation, deiiends en- tiiely on the context. Here it is ii call to the far-otT: Ho, to the land of the shadow of wings— the land of the expand- ed vving--i— beyond the (loods of Cash— beyond the Oihon, tha anciout river that went round the whole land of ^'^thlopia Ho, to the remotest Cush I~T. li.i CHAP. II. 4-25. 22 dtp Sow of a fountain, and oikus never enters into »n_v of the many epithets of ocean used by the poets, which it could hardly h;ive avoided doing had it be- longed to the radical idea of the name. 'CtH^avus is BaS^rpf>oos. Ba^vKVLLOiv. /8adi>5irT;s, fvfi^oos^ elC, but never iiKvpfiuos. Besides, the to lias every appearance of a prefix, being cither a privative (turned into cu), as Suidas holds to accommodate it to an absurd deri- vatijn of his own, or, as is far more likely, the ar- ticle lengthened — the kean, or keon. The etymology which traces it to ogyges, ogen, ai77>oi (if there ever was such a word in Greek) has as little support in any traceable signiticance, as in any tenable phonetic ground. A word meaning ancient could never have been a primitive name, although, inversely, such a name as Okeanos, when its primitive significance had been lost, might be used for the old and the un- known. We may disregard, in the same way, what is said of the Coptic oukarne and the Arabic ka7nus. The true explanation of this name will, we think, suggest itself in a careful consideration of tour things: 1. The obvious fact that the iett *r with the eflntoxt, and the view that Lun^e takep of it, Ui refer it to A tim in the Hcnso of judging— iUii ni^iht of tbe mil. i— an oasi y derived secondary sense, appearing in ety { marriage. — The glory of God as displayed ii the first paradisaical world (His power, wisdom, good ness, love). — The creation of man : 1. So grand th« preparation made for him (vers. 4-B) ; 2. so wonder fully and richly grounded (ver. 1), so carefully es- tablished (vers. 8-18), and so gloriously completed (vers. 19-25). — The appearing of man upon the earth as the revelation of its destiny : 1. The presen- tation of its fundamental idea, of its purport, its aim ; 2. the perfection of its structure ; 3. the solving of its enigma; 4. the consecration of its being; 5. the bond of its connection with heaven ; 6. the beginning of its transformation from a state of pure nature to a paradisaical spirit-world. — Man and nature. Man: 1. The elevation of nature; 2. the exaltation of nature, and at the same time, 3. the pupil of nature. — The first transformation of nature through the entrance of the first man a prognostic of its second transformation through the second man, the one from heav.n (1 Cor. xv.). — The history of Adam a history of the heaven and the earth. — The reflected splendor of the glory of the first hu- manity in the glory of Paradise.— The inward connec- tion and reciprocity between man and nature : 1. His innocence, its beauty and its peace ; 2. his fall, its ruin or subjection to the " law of vanity ; " 3. his resurrection, its hope of renewed glory. — The man and his wife as the crowning work of creation. — The bridal of Adam a presignal of the marriage supper of the Lamb (Rev. xix. 7). — The old as well as the new world prepared for a marriage chamber. The First Section (vers. 4-6). — The earth waiting for man, a figure of the humanity waiting for the God-Man. I'he Seco7id Seclimi (ver. 7). — The creation of man. 1. The formation of man the work of God's master- hand ; 2. the nature of man : akin to tlie earth and akin to God, or at the same time earthly and divine ; 3. the character of man as a tmit, a Uving soul. — Man in his unity, in his duality, — in his threefold nature. — The original human dust of the earth in the splendor of heaven. 77ie Third Section (vers. 8-14). — Paradise. — Paradise: 1. As a fact in the e«rth, the bloom of the earth, the home of the first man; 2. as an emblem, of the paradisaical disposition of the earth, of its paradisaical power, namely for children and iu festal contemplation, of its paradisaical prefiguration, as of the new paradise in the other world and in this. The Fourth Section (vers. 15-18). — The first man in Paradise. His relation to the earth-world, to Paradise, to the vegetable world, to the animal world, to Eve. — -The Paradise-life, moreover, not an unrestricted state: 1. Limitation of action: the calling (to dress and keep); 2. limitation of enjoyment (not to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil) ; 3. hmitations in the treatment of nature and especially of the beasts (no enclosing); 4. limitations on human society (regulation of marriage aud domestic life). — The restrictions upon life the measure and the de- other places in the use of this common verb, and beeoming, in fact, predominant in the Rabbinical Hebrew. It is sim- ply the tran-sfi-r that takes place in the Greek ei5-oi5 (tc .s'gff, to knoiv), and ptabaps in most lantniagcs : that Adam uiipht »« ( judee), wliat lie would call them. It denotes nn intuirion or an intuitive judgment — the fiist callinc out of his faculties in the ub..^ervation oi thinu's. It is no olijei.tinr to the other sense tl.at it is nntbroiH)j)atliJc, nlthoucb it would seem to re]iresout sometliint: like einausif y on the part of Deity. The view taken, however, wbieli is equally cor- rect, lo.vically and Kraiiuuaticaily, makes it the betriniiina of the first develojiment of lantniai'C in the perception ol some intuitive fitness between nrrooi and tb'nps named. T. L.1 (;UAF. 11. 4-26. 22S relopment of freedom. The ground features of the paradisaical life : heavenly innocence, festal work, pure enjoyment, clear knowledge, quiet waiting (the deep sleep), inward love and greeting, unconstrained and childlike being. — Single verses and themes. Ver. 4. The history of the heaven and the earth in the history of man. — Tlie rich significance of the Dame Jehovah-Elohim : 1 . Jehovah is Elohim ; 2. Elohim is Jehovah (analogous to the New Testament In respect to the name Jesus Christ, that is, Jesus is Christ, Christ is Jesus). — Ver. 6. The world witliout Qian a desert ; the world everywhere incomplete until man comes (the child of the election). The first dewy rain and its blessing a presignal for all times (children yet believe that they grow from tlie rain). — Ver. 7. The creation of man as, 1. a divine formmg ; 2. a divine inbreathing (so goes the ideal before the life, art before the realization, the sliadow or the type before the truth). — The descent of man, his earthly descent (A Jam from adamah); his divine iescent (a soul from God's breath of life). — The ori- ginal harmony and unity of the earthly and heavenly nature of uiiin. How we ought to be on our guard against those suspicions of matter, of the body, and of the sense-nature, which claim to be profound, and yet are not taught in the Scriptures. — Why tlie church has always held dualism to be spiritually dangerous. Man, in his being an exaltation of the dust, a humility of the spirit. The nature of man a type of his destiny : 1. To build the dust inl,o form ; 2. to reveal the inspiration of God in his hfe. The lowliness and the sublimity of the first man Adam without father and mother, a foreshowing of the wonderful descent of Christ. — Paradise (vers. 8-14, see number 9 of the Doctrinal, etc.). Paradise at the beginning of the world, and Paradise at the end (the tree of life in the beginning and the tree of life at the end, Rev. xxii.). — The rivers of Paradise, figures of the spiritual life that, proceeding from Paradise, spreads through the world. Gold, spices, and precious stones according to their higher paradisaical appoint- ment, or the riches of the earth an emblem of the higher heavenly riches. — The calling of Adam (ver. I.t): In the first chapter he is appointed ruler of the earth. This divides itself here into two as- pects, 1. to dress, 2. to keep. The calling of Adam a type of our calling. The entrusted goods (spiritual talents, outward goods of culture, spiritual goods) : First to dress it, that is, to increase, ennoble ; second to keep it, that is, to guard it against injury and loss. — Ver. 16. In Adam's life, calling and enjoyment are united ; therefore are they both paradisaical ; so in a still higher degree are calling and enjoyment united in the life of Jesus (John iv. 34). — Ver. 17. The paradisaical freedom not without limitation. Outward restraint educates to a free self-restraint. As God binds Himself in His love to man, so also sliould man bind himself in love to God and to obe- dience. "For it is the self -limitation that first shows the master." Freedom and limitation, right and duty, Ujseparably united. The tree of probation, 1. a fact (a hurtful enjoyment of nature, as explained from God's spirit and word) ; 2. an emblem of all natural enjoyment that is hurtful and destructive. Ac- cording to God's will, the tree was primarily only a •ree of probation ; it first became a tree of tempt- ition by the coming of the serpent. The threaten- ag of death is indirectly a promise of imperishable il'e. Death is the wages of sin. — Tlie animal world. €ow the right treatment of these rests upon the ight kno ffledge and naming of them. Peace in the paradisf.ical nature (all the animals are brought be fore Adam). — Ver. IS, etc. It is not good that mar should be alone. God's ji.iignient respecting thf unmarried state, 1. as universal, 2. as conditional.— How all the riches of nature leave man still alone in the failure of kmdred society. Man alone, in the midst of all the beasts, with all his knowledge. Tha true helper of man, 1. As his image; 2. as hia coun- terpart (his antithetical complement). — The marriage of man, how grounded, 1. on the judgment of (iod; 2. on the solitary state of man ; 3. on his deep sleep (trance-vision, see Job iv. 13) ; 4. on the divine creating of the woman out of the side of the man 5. on God's bringing Eve to him ; 6. on the love-greei ing of Adam ; 7. on its rich and noble destiny.— Ver. 25. The clothing of innocence : 1. The purest 2. the fairest, 3. the most substantial. The infinite contrast between innocence and coarseness. The nobiUty of marriage : communion of the spirit, the consecration of the sexual association. Starke (Tcr. 7): Out of the dust of the earth, which by moistening with water is capable of an easy moulding. How thoughtless the conduct of men, who adorn their body made from earth and to eaith again returning, whilst losing all care of their immorta'. souls ! — Ver. 15. Even in a state of innocence man must work, and not go idle. 1. He must be ever ac- tive like God ; 2. he must have joy in the work of his hands, as God has (Gen. i. 31); S. he must have op- portunity to show, as (iod does, wisdom, power, and goodness to the creatures committed to him. — Ver. 17. This is the covenant which God estabUshed with Adam. On the one side was God, and on the other side Adam, who in his own person represented the whole human race. — See that thou dost immediately choose the best way, and hold fast to the tree of life which is Christ. 'Taste this fruit, so shaft thou be- come well. — God the first lawgiver. — Ver. 20. Is the question asked what language did Adam employ in this transaction ? the most probable answer is that it was the Hebrew. — Ver. 21. Since at the present day a man has twelve ribs on each side, some have sup- posed that Adam must originally have had thirteen ribs on one side. It is, however, more probable that God must have given him another in place of the one he took away. Ver. 22. Lcthbr : Therefore stands fast this con- solation against aU the teaching of the devil, namely, that the marriage state is a divine state, that is, or- dained of God Himself. As Adam gave names to the beasts, so also did he name his wife, and that, too, af- ter himself : "wjaMes.'i" (woman); on this ground ia the custom to be defended whereby a wife lays aside the paternal name, and takes that of the husband. — Ver. 24. Some would deduce from this merely a pro- hibition of incest with father and mother. (!) Others would derive from it a proof that in contracting mar- riage children need not trouble themselves about the approbation of their parents. As this, however, is clearly opposed both to divine and liuman commands (it is still more opposed to the divine command, we may add, when parents force their children to a marriage) so is it, on this account, the more strongly indicated that the man as well as the wife, go forth from the fa- ther's house and commence a family of their own. To this we may add that with the vocation of marriagr, the childlike dependence must also cease, though the filial obligations of love, reverence, and care, do still remain. Col. iii. 19; Eph. v. 25 ; Matt. xix. 4 ; 1 Cor. vii. 2. BuRMANN : The rest of God in the week is a typt ■224 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. of the heavy week and lubor of our Mediator Jesus Christ, who in the hard toil of His soul was wearied even unto dejith for our salvation, and, finally, on this seventh day, entered into his rest (Isaiah liii. 11). So are then here also created a new heaven and earth, and creatures, namely, new men ; a new light of the Gospel, new fruits of righteousness, new water welling up to everlasting life. — Wherein does Paradise agree with lieaven ? — And, therefore, is the family state established as the fountain-head and origin of all human society. ScHRdDER; Moses makcs the primeval history of the microcosm follow the history of the macro- cosm.— The hints already obscurely given here and there in the first section (comp. ch. xxii. 21) in re- lation to the fall, assume a more distinct form in the second, as though it were designed as a prologue to that world-historical tragedy which begins with chapter iii. — The hypothesis of the so-called Pre- Adaniites, that is, of men who lived before Adam, is clearly and distinctly excluded by the remark at the end of ver. 5, that before Adam there was no man to till the ground. As a proof to the contrary there is also 1 Cor. xv. 45, and Acts xvii. 26. — The body of man appears, therefore, as a fine artistic structure of God. — " Stand in awe, oh man ! for upon each of thy consecrated members was the finger of God ! " Herder. — -As Isaiah says : Thou art our father. Thou art our potter, and we are Thy clay (Is. Ixiv.). Luther. — The spirit of Ufe comes to the human soul as a gift from God immediately received into the human frame (ch. i. 26, 27). The soul of the beast, at God's command, has its origin in that breath of God which pervades the elements of nature (ch. i. 2, 20, 24). — Only as inspired by God does the soul live its true life, its human life ; only by means of a vitalizing communion with the divine spirit has it true independence, and a blessed con- tinuance.— Vers. 8-16. The whole earth as " veri/ govd" was created to be a garden of God. But the Father, out of His abundant goodness to His human child, plants in this garden a little garden more pecu- liarly His own — a little Paradise in the greater. — God planted : The image is grounded on that of a human gardener (John xv. 1 ; Isaiah v.). — Elsewhere the Scripture gives the name Paradise to the abode of the blest, when we, perhaps, would say " to be in heaven " (Luke xxiii. 43 ; 2 Cor. xii. 4 ; Rev. ii. 7) — A garden ; And what could have been a fairer place for the planting of our nice? " The schools of wis- dom in the East are usually gardens, blooming places by the side of rivers." Herder. " Moses expressly tells us, how this garden was gloriously filled by the Lord with fruit-trees of every kind, that the appetite of man might have no excuse." Calvin. — "Thede- Bcripiion of the fruit of the trees: Captivating to the sight and good for food, is not without its purpose ; it shows that inclination and the j)roof of sense in respect to food and drink aliould be guides to men." Herder. — Among the trees of Paradise two enigmat- ical names strike us. liuth belong to the same place ; both are found in the middle of llie garden. — Ver. 17. The God of the covenant is called Jehovah-Elohim. A covenant rer gives names to the beasts. — As the son ->{ God ht discerns his father's footsteps, that 's, 'he divin* ideas in the things created. — Vers. 21-25. The be- coming many out of one. This is the way of God. Rons ; The sleep of Adam. Rambach : God acts like a painter or a sculitoi who draws a curtain before him when he is working upon an e.\cellent picture or an artistic statue.— Adam's eyes are veiled that God's love may un^ veil itself. The old writers noted six examples in the Scriptures where a miraculous work follows sleep : 1. The case of Adam, 2. of Ellas (1 Kings xix.), 3. of Jonah (ch. i.), 4. of Christ (Matt, viii.), 5. of Peter (Acts xii.), 6. of Eutyches (Acts xx.). " More- over, the Son of God is become weak that He might have His members strong." Calvin. (Eph. v. 25 ; Col. iii. 19). — The wife is from a rib; she is taken from near man's heart. As in man there appears an image of the Creator, so does the wife present an im- age of His providence. The man was created wit/i- out ; the wife was created ht Paradise. Her place ia by the fireside and in the nursery, but nevertheless most true it is that the world is ruled, in a most peculiar manner, from the mother's bosom. God builded. (Ver. 22.) " Designedly does Moses use the expression to build, that he may teach lis how in the person of the wife the human race finally becomes perfected ; whereas before it was like to a building only begun. Others refer it to the domestic economy, as though Moses meant to say, that at that time the right ordering of the family state became complete — a view which does not de- viate much from tlie first interpretation." Calvin. — " It is worthy of note that what Moses adds : and brought her to him, is an elegant description i' the espousal, or the marriage presentation. For Adam does not rashly follow his liliiug, but waits for God, who brings her to him ; as Christ also says : what God hath joined let not man put asunder." Luther. — Ver. 23. "Love here makes the first poet, lawgiver, and prophet. It is the song of songs proceeding from the mouth of Adam." Herder. — Adam makes himself known to his wife, in that he gives her a name in the very act of declaring her origin. With their name the beasts become the property of Adam ; with her name does the wife be come his own (Is. xliii. 1 ; Ps. cxlvii. 4). He names himself man ; the relation to woman causes man now to become a man, in a peculiar sense. Through marriage the circuits of human love are made wider (Eph. V. 25 ; 1 Cor. vii. 3, 39 ; Matt. xix. 6, 9).— In the Scriptures, idolatry and the denial of God are called fornication and adultery. The hieroglyphs of the anti-Mosaic law of marriage have been renewed by Christ in their- full splendoi'. To the Gospel docs humanity owe tlie restoration of its original worth. In our old German speech tire word marriage is the stem-word of all law, fidelity, order, I'eligion, cov- enant ; not so in the new. — Naked. In the nobler class of men the bodily formation still reveals itself through its spirituality. Lisco ; The development of individuals, and of the wlrole race, is grounded on society. The mo- nastic solitariness is not the will of God (Eccl. iv. 9). If man would reach his destiny, he needs help in the sphere of the liodily as well as that of the spiritu»L The root of all other society is that marriage state, establislrcd by God, out of which are evolved tin three relations of the family, the church, and the state ; in like manner', on account of their root (is it UUAP. II 4-26. ^'2l merely on this account?) are they divine institutions. All determinations of God have for their aim the nighest good of man ; but how greatly, through sin, are tl\e blessings of communion, the advantages of society, perverted into mischief ! This peace between man and beast belongs also to the prophetic Para- dise (Is. xi. 6). Before the fall nakedness was moral, modest, chaste ; after the fall it becomes indecorous, remembrance of the fall, an eniiindling of sin, Gerlach : In the Hebrew writings, the fiist man ^ called simply Adam, that Is, man ; for man is just as much the designation of the human race as it is ine proper name of the first man. In the first man there was contained the whole human race, which on that account is called children of Adam (sons of man, or Adam (man) simply (just as it is with the names Israel, Edom, Moab, Ammon). — Adam from adamah. Nature must be ruled by one like herself, but who, nevertheless, belongs to a higher order, even as humanity has for its lord a God-Man. — The breath, the condition of the bodily life, is an emblem of the divine life which is breathed into man.^Just as heaven and earth were originally created as a con- trast whose two sides must more and more interpen- etrate each other, so also in man is there the body from the dust, and the spirit from God. — Man must not be simply a living soul ; he must also have a life- making spirit, even as the second Adam possessed it, and all beUevers receive it from Christ (1 Cor. xv. 47). — As being from the dust, man belongs to the earth, and, therefore, to corruptibility ; like the other animals which die in respect to tlieir individual being and only live on as creations, he has a natural Ufe ; as far as that was concerned he could die, but through the spirit derived from God was he related to Him as an imperishable personality, and, therctbre, also could he keep from dying (there was given to him the possibility not to die) ; for even the dust in its relation to him, as also the earth itself, was cre- ated for a higher life of glory. — -Garden-work in a mild climate is the easiest and the most appropriate for the childhood of humanity. In this may the act- ive powers exercise themselves for the more severe employments of agricultural labor. The oldest known fruit-trees, the domestic animals, and the grain, were the portion that remained to him out of this original time. — For the tree of knouiedge, etc. To know good and evil is tlie conscious freedom of the will (Is. vii. 16 ; 1 Cor. viii. 3). — No want (for he lived in abun- dance), no enticement of the sense merely (for that arose first after the fall (ch. iii. jj), could mislead him to transgress the command, but only his self-ex- altation, his striving after a false self-sufficiency and inaepi.-ndence. — In a way of childlike feeling does Lather regard the tree of knowledge (standing as it 15 did in the midst of the garden) as the church of the yet innocent man. — " This tree of the knowledge of good and evil has become Adam's altar and pulpit, in which he ought to have learned the obedience he owed to God, to have known God's word and will, and to have thanked Him for it ; and so, if Adam had not fallen, this tree would have become like ti) a common temple and cathedral." Therefore must we be on our guard against every view that would rt present the tree as proceeding from the devil's ki;ig dom, or as being hurtful in itself. Calwer Manual : The body from the dust of iht earth, the spirit inbreathed by God ; Thus man be- longs to two worlds, the earth and heaven ; he is akin to the least of all created things and to the highest, the uncreated, from whose efflux is his spirit. — The work in Paiadise : There for them was their desire and joy, which afterwards becomes a burden, care, and toil. — The forbidden fruit. God only for- bids us that which brings to us danger and hurt, and that is often in the proportion of one to many things allowed and right, and which is useful and healthful to us. — The threatening of death. Not a sudden dy- ing like an immediately accomplished fact, but, thou wilt become subject to death ; it means, to become mortal. With us, too, is death only the e/id of dying^ which last begins often long before. That the man was created before the woman, and that, therefore, a precedence is adjudged to iiim, is clear from 1 Tim. ii. 13. — Ver. 19 : God the Creator is also man's first schoolmaster. It is also indicated in this place that before the fall the animal world had been more con- fiding and dependent on man than it is now, and that it gladly yielded itself to his dominion ; whilst now, in part, it stands to him in a hostile attitude (Rom. viii. 19, 2ii). — Not all marriages are from God, decided in heaven, but all can become sharers in its blessings if they seek it. BtJNSEN : There follows now the representation of the thought of creation, in connection with Para- dise and the fall, in contrast with what precedes as the work of creation in its chronological progress. There m.an was necessarily the last thing, here he is necessarily the first. For God as eternal reason can only think Hiniself (or He must ever be essentially His own thought), and, therefore, in creation He can oidy think His image, the conscious finite spirit. What lies between is the mediation of the eternal with the finite. This second history of creation ia neither addition nor complement to the one preced- ing ; it is not, to say the least, its repetition. It is the figurative representation of creation as proceeding outward from the central point of the everlastiug idea (the doctrine of the fall that follows "his [in Bunsen] is Platonising and Gnostical). 426 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. SECOND PAET. THE GENESIS OF THE WORLD-HISTORY, OF THE TRIAL, OF THE SIN OF MAN, OF THE JUDGMENT, OF DEATH, OF THE SALVATION-TRIUMPH, OF THE CONTRAST BETWEEN A DIVINE AND A WORLDLY TENDENCY IN HUMANITY, LASTLY OF THB UNIVKH- 8AL CORRUPTION. S RST SECTION. Til Lost Paradiu. Chapter m. 1-24. A. — The Temptation. Ch. ill. 1 Now the serpent' was more subtle [properly: alone subtle among all beasts] than all th« beasts of the field which the Lord God had made ; and he said unto the woman, Yea, 2 hath God said. Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden. And the woman said unto 3 the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden. But of the fruit of the tree rN'hich is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither 4 shall ye touch it, lest ye die. And the serpent said unto the woman. Ye shall not sure- 5 ly die. For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be ooened and ye shall be as Gods knowing good and evil. B.— The Sin. 6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good' for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof and did eat, and gave also to her husband [to partake with her] and he did eat. C— The Guilt. 7 And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew ' that they were naked, and 8 they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons. And they heard the voice of the Lord God walking'' in the garden in the cooi of the day [the evening breere] : and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the jiresence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. D. — The Jndemeni ara the Fromiae 9 And the Lord God caiied unto Adam, anu said unto h^.H, "*"jere an Aou ? 10 And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because i was naked, 11 and I hid myself. And he said, Who told thee that thou wast naked? Hast thou 12 eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat? And the man said. The woman whom thou gavest unto me, she gave me of the tree and I did 13 eat. And the Lord God said unto the woman, What is this that thou iiast done? 1 1 And the woman said. The serpent beguiled me and 1 did eat. And the Lord God said unto the serpent. Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle,' and above every beast of the field: upon thy belly shalt thou go and dust shall thou eat all 16 the days of thy life; And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed : it [vuigate: ipm u, etc.] shall bruise' thy head, and thou shalt bruise 1 6 his heel. Unto the woman he said, I will greatly nndtiply thy sorrow and thy concep tion; in sorrow slmlt thou bring forth children : and thy desire' shall be to thy hasband CHAP. III. 1-24. 221 "JT and he shall rule over thee. And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast liearkened unt< the voice cf thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree of which I commanded theej saying Thou shalt not eat of it, cursed is tiie ground *cr thy sake [from its connection with ti eej ; ir 18 sorrow shalt thou eat of it [get food from it] all the days of thy life.^ Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field [instead of thi 19 garden]. In the sweat of th}^ face shalt thou eat bread until thou return unto the ground for out of it wast thou taken, for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return, E. — The Hope and the Compassion. 20 And Adam [man from the earth] called liis wife's name Eve" [life, life-giving] because she 21 was the mother of all living. Unto Adam also, and to his wife did the Lord God make 22 coats of skins and clothed them. And the Lord God said, Behold, the man has become as one of us, to know good and evil ; and now lest"^ he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat and live forever [as the everlasting man, according to the idea of the ever- lasting Jew]. F. — The Merciful Decree of Punishment and Discipline. 23 Therefore the Lord God sent him forth " [the intensive Piei form of the verb] from the garden 24 of Eden [the blissful garden] to till the ground from whence he was taken. So he drove out the man: and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden cherubims [cherubs] and a flaming sword which turned every way [yet ever maintaining its place] to keep the way of the tree of life [Seraphlm ; comp. Ps. civ. 4 ; xviii. 10-15 ; Is. vi. 2l. [' Ver. 1. — wJna . Primary sense : keen sight (secondary : intuilion^ divining^. Greek : SpoKcov (SepKuj) o(^is (oi^ojitai). ''D rtX ; expressing great surprise : yea truli/y can it be possible? Comp. Greek jitrj on with its simplicity and abrupt- ness.—T. L.] [* Ver. 6.— niXP rendered desirable: strictly a noun: a desire, a beauty, a lovely thing.— T. L.) [3 Ver. 7.— lyT^I , and tbey knew. Before it was the verb nxi , to see; a higher knowledge than that of sense— ctm'Science. — T. L.] [* Ver. 8. — ^bnp^ may refer to blp — the voice going. It would suit very well the interpretation which would make nin^ b'.p here a name for the thunder, as in Ps. xxis. 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9 ; xlvi. 7; Ixviii. 34; Job xxxvii. 2. This i? the view oj Aben Ezra, who cites Jer. xlvi. 22 ; Exod. xix. 19 (voice of the trumpet, going and waxing) as examples of "^bn joined with bip . It is thus expressly applied to inanimate things, Gen. viii. 3 (the waters going, etc.), in other places to the light, as Prov. iv. 18. Even in the Hithpael form it would suit the description of a long roll of thunder, which seema to go all round the horizon, comp. Job xsivii. 3. What follows can only be interpreted of an actual speaking, but ihis may have been the first thunder they ever heard, coming in black clouds, pf!rhax-»s, towards the evening of their sinning day, and it would have been very startling, even as it has been ever since to guilty consciences. Some of the Rabbis (see Aben Ezra) would connect ^^nriO with Adam : He heard the voice as he was walking in the cool of the day ; but the grammar is directly against this.— T. L.] [* Ver. 14. — n^riwH bzV ; Lange rightly renders it : among all cattle. — T. L.) l" Ver. 15. — ~E"*iJ^ ; for a discussion of this rare and difficult word, see the Exegetical and Critical, p. — . — T. L.) [' Ver. 16.— ^rp'wT . The sense of this word is not libido, or sensual desire, like nij Ver. 17. — ~^^n ; for remarks on the plural form of the word for life in Hebrew, see Note, p. 163. — T. L.] [» Ver. 21.— n^n ) ^Shvvah. LXX. have translated the word by the Greek Za>^ : He called her Zoe, life ; Vulgate '- Heva.—T. L.] [10 Vqy. 22. — "Q , test— only the particle without any verb. This silence, or aposiopesis, is very expressive ; compan the sim^llar Greek use "i tx'rj lor an imperative of caution. — T. L.] [11 Ver. 23. — innr^i;^! . Lange regards the Piel form as intensive, to denote a violent sending forth, a thrusting out; but there is no need of that, the Piel diffexing but little, if any, from the Kal, and being used for an ordinary sending. The word following, Ui"13^^ , may have that sense, but there is nothing in the context of harshness, ^r anything to carrj t bcf :nd the general idea' ol disrais.*tl. — T. 1,.] I continues here also in tlie third ; -ince the subject if EXEGETICAL AND CEITICAL. the primeval history of Adam, iiS it is, at the same time, the primitive history of man, or of humanity. 1. The comparatively stronger symbolical that i The fact of the first temptation is the symbol of tverj appeared in the representation of the primeval facts, | human temptation ; the fact of the firs fall is th< fcnd which we have noted in the second chapter, j sjTnbol of every human transtrression , thr f^ea* 228 GENESIS, OR THE FIRS! BOOK OF MOSES. mistake that lav in the first human sin is the symbol of every eft'ect of sin. 2. Ver. 1. Now the serpent. — The tree of knowledge, a part of the vegetable world, was made by God the medium of probation ; from the animal world proceeds the serpent as the instrument of the tfttptation which God did not make. True it is, that tlie serpent appears as the probable author of this temptation, but such probabiUty is weakened by what is said eh. i. 25 and ii. 20. " It was (though Richers denies it) a good creation of God, though iifferent, as originally created, from what it after- ward" became" (Dehtzsch). Through this supposi- tion, however, of another created quality, he is brought nearer to t4ie view of Richers. Does it ap- pear as the mere instrument of a tempting spirit be- longing to the other world, then must tlie decree of judgment, as pronounced, have regard not so much to it as to the spirit of sin, whose instrument and allegorical symbol it had become. How it could be such an instrument may be briefly explained by its craftiness ; how it becomes an allegorical repre- sentation of the Evil One is taught us afterwards in the orraity that is proclaimed between the woman and l^o. serpent. According to Noek (Etym.-Symb.- Mylh Jieal-WorterbiKh), "the serpent is just as well the figure of health and renovation, as of death ; since it every year changes its skin, and ejects, more- over, its venom. This double peculiarity, and double character, as aya^oBaifjLaji' and KaKoSa'iuitfv, is indi- cated not only in language, but also in mytlis, in sculpture, and in modes of worship." In this rela- tion, however, we must distinguish two diverging views of the ancient peoples. To the Egyptian reve- rence for the serpent stands in opposition the abhor- rence for it among the Israelites (see the article "Serpent" in the "Biblical Dictionary for Christian People"), Greeks, Persians, and Germans. Among the Slavonians, too, does the serpent appear to have been an object of religious fear ; and from them may there have come moditied view^s to the Germans, as from the Egyptians to the Greeks. Concerning the species of serpents mentioned in the Bible, see Winer. It may not be without significance that Genesis (ch. iii.) is in such distinct contrast with the Egyptian views, not only in respect to the serpent, but also in respect to the Egyptian cultus of death and the other world. Delitzsch thinks that the serpent could hardly, at that time, have had such a name as cn3, since this (from lUnj, to hiss*) is derived from its present constitution. In this way the original constitution of the seductive serpent is regarded by him in a more favorable liglit than the nature of the tree of proba- tion. Knobel, on the contrary, is of opinion that " the choice of the serpent was occasioned by the Persian myth, then known to the Hebrews, which • (So Gcsenius — a sihilando. It is far more likely, how- ever, 10 have had for its primary sense that from which «)men tho SfcontLirj* meaning of hra.ss, or rather of tironze— thininff melal. 'I'tiiM pives, as the primary, the idea of splendor, /7/is/^ni»(7. The name may have bei-n ^iven t" the nerijent from its Klossy, shining appeanince, or more liki-ly from the bright glistening of the eye. This would bring it Into analogy with the (ireek &p6.Koiv from 5ep»c — ^ipKo^t-ai. — ■haxu piercing sight. There is the same derivation from the •ye in the (ireek oifrit, or from the general shining appear- •nce (t'l/iK) as a striking ancr se. JJigh state, in their view, was danperous, not because of ita leading to *' pride which God resi.stcth" for man's good, bat simplv as threatening a rever.se destiny (see Uerodotos' *'8tory 01 Polycrates of Samoa and King Amasis," Herod, iii. 40). It was un/jtcAry, and foreboded evil. There was in it a consciousness of something very wrong in man, but how ditiorent this mere jealousy of human prosi>erity from the holy attribute of jealousy against human pride and sin aacribed to God in the Bible 1 Herodotus, as he was more oriental in his style and feeling than the fatalistic dramatic poets, oomcH nearer the .Scripture representation, or the Doripture original, we may say, of the great truth thus dis- torted. Kspeciallv is this the ca.;c In the spis'cbes of Arta- banus dissuading Xerxes from his expedition against Greece, Lib. vii. IIJ, .'). He talk.^ there of the jealous God (o ©eb« ^ovnaof), and his briuging down of human pridu, almost in 'Jus i^yle of iHuiuh.— T. L.I abridgment ; after that she had eaten she gavf it !• her husband to eat thereof after her, jr to eat will her. In the very moments of temptation, as we mut< take the account, there comes in the perception oi the fact, that she does not die from the eating ; and so it is that the wife's power of persuasion, and Adam's sympathy with her, are net made specially prominent. 1. Vers. 7, 8. And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they wera naked. — In the relation between the antecedent here and what follows there evidently lies a terrible irony. The promise of Satan becomes half fulfilled, though, indeed, in a different sense from what they had sup- posed : Their eyes were opened ; they had attained to a developed self-eonsciousness. But all that they had reached in the first place was to become con- scious of their nakedness as now an indecent expo- sure. It is here in this first irony, as appearing in the divine treatment of the consequences of sin, that we get a clear view of that ironical aspect in the divine penal righteousness which shows itself in the Scripture, and in the whole history of the world (see Ps. ii. 4 ; Acts iv. 24 ; Lange's " Dogmatics," p. 469). Knobel would really regard the new knowledge as a pure step of progress. " As a consequence of the enjoyment they knew their nakedness, whereas be- fore, like unconscious, unembarrassed children, they had no thought of their nakedness, or of their per- sonal contrasts. At once did they perceive that to go naked was no longer proper for them. They had attained, in consequence, to a moral insight. Shame entered into men in near cotemporaneity with their knowledge of right and wrong, good and evil ; it be- longs to the very beginning of moral cognition and development. This shame, in its lowest degree, limits itself to the covering of the sexual nakedness." The question here, however, is not respecting a moral reform, but a religious deterioration. The reflection upon their nakedness and its unseemliness becomes, in the light of the symbolical representation, neces- sarily known as the tirst form of the entering con- sciousness of guilt. They have lost the unconscious dominion of the spirit over the bodily and sensuous appearance, and henceforth there enters into the conscience the world-historical strife between the spirit and the flesh — a strife whose prime cause lies in tlie fact that the spirit came out of the comnmnion of the spirit of (Jod, whose form consists in the fact that the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and whose ejfect (the feeling of hateful nakedness) is, indeed, attended by a reaction of the shame-feeling, but which can only manifest itself in the eflbrt to cover, in the most scanty way, the nakedness revealed. In this part of the body the feeling of nakedness mani- fests itself as a sense of exposure that needs covering, not because that fruit poisoned the fountain of human life, or, by means of an innate property, immediately eB'ected a corruption of the body, so far as propagation is concerned (Von ilotJhiann, liaum- garten), nor because, in consequence of the fall, a physical change bad taken place ; but simply because, ill the taking away by sin of the normal relation between the soul and the body, the body ceasee 'o be any longer a pure instrument of the spirit wbiiL it united to God. "This part of the body is called ni"!? (e. g., ch. ix. 22) and niaa (e. g , Lev. xv. 2; comp. Exod. xxviii. 42), because nakeibusa and_/f«A, which shame bids nien cover, culminate in them." Delitzsch. In what tbllows, wheiein he says thai liere the contrast between the suiritual and the uat CHAP. m. 1-24. !i3. .ral, hariug lost its point of unity, 13 of the sharpest kind, :inci that the beastlikc in the human appearance appears here most bestial, Delitzsch is approacliing ag:'.in the tlieosophic mode of view ; although it is true that man, from his demoniacal striving after something too great for him, falls back into a beastly laxity of behavior, which, however, even here shame , contends against, and seeks to veil. As the death of man. in its historical aspect, stand." in counter-rela- 1 tion to the human generations in their historical | aspect, so it would seem that whilst the first presenti- ment of death, in the first human consciousness of guilt, must give a shock to men, there would also be, in connection with this foreboding of death, another presentiment of a call to sexual propagation; but along with this, and in order to this, there would be a feeling which would seek to veil it, with its acts and organs, as by a sacred law. This modesty, or bashfulness, of man, however, relates not merely to natural generation, but also to the spiritual and the churchly ; as though all origin demanded its covering — its creative night. The commendation of the first growths of intelligence in a man's soul produces a feeling of blushing diffidence, and so. too, the church- ly birth hath its reverent and modest veiling. When, therefore, along with the presentiment of death, and of the generic or sexual destiny (whicli, nevertheless, we cannot njake independent of man's historical death), there comes in the feeling of shame in the first men, so also, as a symbolic expression therefor, there enters into them, along with the guilt, an inner death, and the sense of the want of renovation. For the refutation of Knobel's view, that by the tig-tree here is not meant the usual fig-tree, but the plant named pisang, or banana, see Pklitzsch and Keil. See also more particularly, respecting the tree in question, Knobkl and Delitzsch. — And they hejird the voice. — Knobei, Keil, and DeUtzsch ex- plain il^e word b"p here, not of the voice of the Lord, but of the sound or rustling noise made by the Deity as he walked ; and they compare it with Lev. xxvi. 33 ; N'um. xvi. .34 ; 2 Sam. v. 24, By such an inter- pretation is the symbolical element left entirely out of view". For beings in their condition, this sound of God walking must evidently have become a voice; but besides this it is said, farther on, that God called to Adam. At all events, the voice here becomes first a call. " In the cool of the day, that is, towards evening, when a cooling breeze is wont to arise." Keil. To this we may add: and when also there comes to man a more quiet and contemplative frame of soul. So Delitzsch remarks very aptly : " God appears, because at that time men are in a state most susceptible of serious impressions.* Every one ex- periences, even to this day, the truth of what is nar- rated. In the evening the dissipating impressions of the day become weaker, there is stillness in tlie soul ; more than at other times do we feel left to ourselves, and then, too, there awake in us the sentimeiits of sadniiss, of longing, of insulation, and of the love of hotni-'. Thus with our first parents ; when evening comes, the first intoxication of the satanic delusion subsides, stillness reigns within ; they feel themselves isolated from the communion of God, parted from their original home, whilst the darkness, as it comes rushing in upon them, makes them feel that their imer light has gone out." Farther on Delitzsch • [Compare P- dv. 34 : *' My meditation of Him shall be av, Acts -xvii. 27) is the conse- quence of this evening call, n3^S, and of the long- mg for home that is thereby evoked. — I heard thy voice-in the garden. — Knobel : " His slight cover- ing is sufficient as against the familiar wife, but not as against the high and far-seeing Lord of the Gar- den." (! ) The question may be asked, nliy God called to Adam, though Eve had been first in sin ? Without doubt is Eve included in the more universal gigniticance of the word Adam (man), yet still the call is directed to the individual Adam. In a certain sense, however, is this Adam, as the household lord of the wife, answerable for her step, notwithstanding that he himself is ensnared with her. The ethical arraignment for the complaint against the wife pro- ceeds through .-idam. But thus appears also here the additional indication that Adam is denoted as the first author of the hiding, as Eve was first in the sin itself. According to the mere laws of modesty (Knobel) the wife should rather have appeared in the foreground here. According to Keil, " when Adam says that he hid himself for fear, on account of his nakedness (thereby seeking to hide his sin behind its consequences, and his disobedience behind his feeling of shame), it is not a sign of special obduracy, but may easily be taken psychologically ; as that, in fact, the feeling of nakedness and shame were sooner pres- ent to his consciousness than the transgression of the divine command, and that he felt the consequences of sin more than he recognized the sin itself" Delitzsch would amend this by adding : " although all that he says is purely involuntary self-accusation." It is to be observed that here appeal's t/ie Jtrai mingling and confusion of •■il 08 a general as well as a particular iuterrngatui v. (.)r it ;ay be rog.u-ded as exclamatory : What o ''ling ha* j yo* juf ! llow could you do it 1— T L.i CHAF. 111. 1-24. iWS rhe various diversities of interpretation are a conse- :iuence of a want of clearness in respect to the fun- damental exegetical law, that here an historical fore- ground is everywhere connected with a symbolical background. Accordingly, both the historiciil and the symbolical go together through all the three dooms imposed upon the serpent ; it is in the third act, however (the protevangel, as it is called), that the symbolical becomes especially prominent, and casts its light over the whole passage. — First judg- ment doom : Upon thy belly shalt thou go ; that is, as the worm steals over the earth with its length of body, "as a mean and despised crawler in the dust (Deut. xsxii. 24; Micah vii, 17)."' It is a fact that the serpent did not originally have this inferior mode of motion Uke the worm, and it is this circum- stance partly, and partly the consideration that along with his speaking the serpent presented to Eve the ap- pearance of a trusty domestic animal, tliat appears to have given occasion to the expression : ainoiitj all cattle, as a complement to whicli there is added : among all the beasts of the field. And to this effect is the remark of Knobel, that " for the time before the curse, the author must have ascribed to the ser- pent another kind of movement, and perhaps another form. It is reckoned here with the njjn; (cattle), V. 1 with the nTi'n rm (or beasts of the field) " In respect to this, it must be noticed, that there has also been maintained the supposition of his having before gone erect (Luther, MUnster, Fag. Gerhard, Osiandei) and licen possessed of bone (Joseph., Ant. i. 1, 4 ; Ephraim, Jarchi, Merc). Delitzsch and Keil, moreover, favor the view, that the serpent's form and manner of motion were wholly transformed (Delitzsch) or changed (Keil). Delitzsch : " As its speaking was the first demoniacal miracle, so is this transformation the first divine." Instead of that, we hold that this exposition only works in favor of the mythical interpretation (Knobel), since it mistakes the symbolical of the expression; on which, beside, it can only touch in the phrase to " eat the earth." According to Delitzsch, " the eating of dust does not denote the exclusive food of the serpent, but only the involuntary consequence of its winding in the dust." So, moreover, the expression, "On thy belly shalt thou go," cannot denote that he was deprived of bone and wing, but only the involuntary consequence of the manifestation of the serpent's hostile attitude to men, namely, that it should now wind about timor- ously upon its belly, or go stealing about in the most secret manner; whereas, before this, it could, with impunity, perform its meanderiugs before their eyes, yea, even stand upright in some respects, and twine itself round the trees. The older exegesis had some excuse, since it did not always know how to separate the conception of a biblical nUracle wrought for judgment, or deliverance, from a magical metamor- phosis. The assumption, however, at the present day, of such a metamorphosis, has to answer the luestion, whether through it the conception of a nnr- acl»is not ch.anged, as well as that of nature itself That, in fact, in consequence of the fall, and of their c'langed attitude towards men, the forms of animals can undergo monstrous changes, and have often been ius changed, though still remaining on the basis of their generic organization, is shown in the case of iogs who run wild ; but the exposition above men- tior.Nl exten'ls itself inimitably beyond any concep- tion o" detenoiation. As tar as concerns the sym- bolical sidr of I'le first sentence, it is clear that before any wider relation (to Satan), we must hold tc the specific appointment, that the tempting evil shal no longer meander about the world, bold and free, but, in correspondence with its earthly meanness, ant bestial association, shall wind along the ground ir the most sly, and sneaking, and secret manner, eat- ing the dust of the earth, and feeding itself upon the coarsest elements of life, or the very mould of death. This sentence, then, in the next pluce, avails not only ag-Vmst evil in general, but the Evil One himself And therewith is denoted, at the same time, The secona doom. Knobel: " According to the older represen- tations, serpents licked the dust, and enjoyed it as their food. (Compare Micah vii. IT ; Isaiah ixv. 25 ; Bochart: Hieroz. iii. p. 245)." Here it is supposed that Mieah and Isaiah have merely taken Genesis too litenilly ; whereas Knobel interprets: " it is com- pelled to swallow down the dust as it moves here an(^ there witii its mouth upon the ground." As the sei pent, the allegorical type of the temptation, is sen tenced to have its mouth in the dust, so is the genius of the serpent condemned to feed on elements which are a coarse prelude, or a nauseous after-game, ol life. — Third doom of the serpent ; tlte Proteva7igel. The rationalistic interpretation, which is last defended by Knobel, finds here denoted only the relation between the se.pent-nature and the human race. That is, Genesis here, in one of its most ethically significant passages, flattens down into a mere physical anthro- pological observation. It is true that the physical liere forms the point of departure. " Enmity shall exist between the serpent and the woman, and be- tween the descendants of both. Man hates the se^ pent as a creature in direct contrariety to himself^ persecutes and destroys it." (To this point the words of Plautcs : Mercat. iv. 4, 21, aliqvem odisAe aquf atque angues.) It is also hostile to man, and bites him when uncharmed. In Pliny : JS'at. Hist. x. y6, it is called immitvisimum aitimalium genus. Com pare also Ovid, Mcia^i.orph. xii. S04 : calcato immi tior hydro. It appears, as matter of fact, to havt been the creature of the primitive world that was the most absolutely opposed to culture, and which, pro- ceeding from the dragons of the earlier earth-periods, found its way through the last catastrophes into the newly prepared world, or had been organically meta- morphosed— Hke "the den-inliabiting brood of the old dragons," which, in a worse sense than any other beast could have done it, render the earth uncom- fortable, destined as it was to culture ; and therefort is it devoted to destruction in the world into which it had passed over. In connection with this fact, the thought rciidily occurs, how very appropriate that the natural relation between the serpent-brood and the human race, destined ever, and here anew, to the kingdom of God, should become a symbol of the re- hgious ethical conflict between the evil and the good, upon earth. In opposition to the rationahstic stands the orthodox interpretation of our passage, which re- fers it to Satan on the one side, and to Christ, the personal Messiah, on the other. According to most of the older interpreters, the seed of the woman de- notes directly the Messiah. (See He.ngstknbekg: "Christology of the Old Testament," i. p. 21.) In respect to it, however, the Romish interpreters m:ikc a very bold variation. They do this in coiTespond- ence with the translation of the Vulgate: ipm (m- stead of ipse) conteret eapiU tuum^ which is condemn ed, not only by the Hebrew text, and the Sepiuagiut, but in the "Quest. Heb." of Hiekostmus. who wai himself the author of the Vulgate, as also bv Petruf 834 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF HOSES. Chrysologus nnd Pope Leo the Great (see Calmet's Comm. p. 120); whilst Augustine, Ambrose, Gregory the (Jreat, and others, have ranged themselves on the fide of the Vulgate. Calmet interprets : in eundem teiisum namely, the right sense of the Hebrew text) re(ldipote.t vulgata; nequealiter B. Virgo conterere vu- hiii serpoitem quain perjilium suuin Jesum Christum. So alio says Von Schrank iu his " Commentary :" in Uebrjio guidem habelur, ille (S'n) conterei caput Ilium : ergo semen mulieris, i. e. Jesus ChriMus conte- ret, sed res eodem redii : nam neque sanctissima Virgo aliter yuam partu suo, i. e. in virtute Jesu Ckrisli fjii mii, caput serpentis contrivisse credenda est. Both authors, indeed, gave these wrested interpretations before the latest Papistical glorification of Mary. In modern times has the interpretation which refers the seed of tlie woman to the personal Messiah been de- fended by Philippi. In the primary sense, says De- litzsch, it is only promised that humanity shall win this victory, for Xin (he) relates back to nfs "^J. (seed of the woman); as. however, the seed of the serpent has its unity in Satan, so it may be fairly conjectured that the conquering party, the seed of the woman, has also a person for its unity — a con- jecture which, as we readily concede to Philippi ("Treatise concerning the Protevangel in Kiiefoth- Meier's Church Periodical," 1855, pp. 519-548), is the more obvious; since in this second sentence the pronoun Xin has for its object not the seed of the serpent, but the serpent, and in it Satan himself. It is, however, an incorrect opinion, that S^n has im- mediately, and exclusively, a personal sense, and that the organic process of the annunciation of re- demption demands this. The conception of Xin is that of a circle, and Jesus Christ, or, as the Targuiu uavs. King Jlessiaii, is evermore in the course of tlie redemptive history the prominent centre of this cir- cle. So Delitzseli says, too, that Christ is essentially meant as the centre of humamty, or as the head of humanity, especially of the redeemed, as Keil says. We miss here the distmct exposition, whether the prophecy directly applies to Christ as a conscious an- nouncement, or only impliedly, in as far as Christ is the kernel and the star of the woman's seed. Hengsten- berg regards the place as more decidedly relating to the collective posterity of the woman ('■ Christoloj;y," i. p. 22) "Truly hast thou inflicted a sore wound upon the woman (such would be the import of the words addressed to the sei-pent), and thou, Hith thy fellow- serpents, wilt continue to lie in ambush for her de- scendants. Nevertlieless, with all thy desire to hurt, wilt thou be only able to inflict curable wounds upon the human race, whilst, on the other hand, tln^ pos- terity of the woman shall at last triumph over tliee, and "make thee feel thine utter impoteuey. This in- terpi Ltaiion is found, indeed, in the Targum of Jona- tlian, and in the Jerusalem Targum, which, by the seed of the woman, understand the Jews who in the days of the .Messiah shall vamiuish Sammael.* Paul seems to proceed on tliis view, Romans xvi. 20, where the promise is collectively ixd'erred to Christ. More latrly has it found an iicutc ailvoeate in Calvin, and then in Heider." As the interpretation of the whole Protevangel is specially conditioned on the • [In the Tartfum, ancl by Maimonidf.8 in hia Mort Ut^ woehim. Lib. ii. chap, jtuc., Samiiiiiel is called the angel of death, nniSI -[nh-c . Says -MaimonidoB : " Ho took the ancient Kcri)ent for his vehicle, and seduced Eve." Else- where he hiiys, that he Id no other thiin Satan, who caused ieath to the world.— T. L.l choice of expressions in detail, wo apjily ourselves tc the analysis of the passage. .\s it is the third and most important part of the doom, taken collectively, so does it also divide itself again into three parts, whose point of gravity may also be said to be in three divisions. 1. Enmity between thee and the woman. — In place ot the false, ungodly, and man- destroying peace between the serpent and the woman, must there come in, between them, a good and salu tary enmity, established by God. That the woman may have a special abhorrence of the serpent, aftei her experience of the deception which she charge* back upon him, and that the falsehood of the ser pent, which had all along before been enmity, should now l)e unmasked, — this is the point of departure. But, since this enmity, as occasioned by an ethical event, must be itself substantially ethical — since the serpent is denoted as permanently present in his sei pent-seed — since, finally, there is mention, at the end, of one head of the same — so does the whole passage have for its aim the ethical power of tem[)tation, which must have worked in some way through the physical serpent, notwithstanding that a being mor- ally evil is characterized, chap. iii. 1, and throughoul the whole process of the temptation. The woman, however, is set in opposition to the serpent, in the first place, because she has been seduced by him, but then, too, in order to set forth more prominently the ethical character of the human enmity against the serpent. We must take into view here the pre dominant susceptibility of the woman, which, in its curiosity, had become a special susceptibility tc temptation, but which now must become a predomi naiit susceptibility for the divine appointment of en- mity between them ; add to which that, in general, man becomes master of evil only through a feminiin susceptibility for the assistance of God. 2. Be- tween thy seed and her seed. — That is, tlie ap pointment of this enmity shall work on permanentlj through the generations that are to come ; the strife shall never cease. And truly, it thus continues as a war between the serpent-seed in its one totality, anil the woman's seed in its one totality. And now here the symbohcal sense presents itself much stronger ; for In all the occasional confiicts between men and serpents there is no universal and generic war be- tween both. But this indicates a working of the power of temptation as a unit against the unitary moral power of the woman's seed in the conflict. Id general, it is a contrast between the mysterious pow- er of evil from the other world, and the human race altogether in this. Since, however, men alone can belong to the genuine seed of the woman, as it car- ries on the enmity of the woman against the serpent, so it is clear, that fi-om the opposite direction it must be men that fall in with the society of the serpent's seed (that is, the demons and their powers), or in other words, become ethically children of the power of temptation, 'i. It shall bruise. — Here now the <|uestion arises : what is the meaning of that enigmat- ic verb r]i|B ? The .Septuagint translates : cii'Ta\iii' Ka'i -rv TTjpr/freis aiirov trTfpvav; the Vulgate; ipsa conteret cajnit tuum et tu insidiaberit caleuneo ejus. The Septuagint is consistent in having the same expression {-nip-ii^d-s) in both cases, but i"; is the one which, in view of the Alexandrian spirit- ualism, is the weakest of them all. The Vulgate chooses for both members of the sentence interpre- tations of the same word that lie too far apart. This is evidently done in order tha'. on '.he one side, the ipsa (the »Ae, or the Virgin in that translation) mai •"IHAP. ni. 1-24. 23S exhibit the highust possible degree of heroism, wliilst on the other side, under the protecting veneration of the monastic theology, she does not sutler the least injury to her heel. The word Tfl'^ is interpret- ed in various ways: 1. terere, conierere. So the Syr- iac, the Samaritan, and others (such as our (lermau and English versions). So also Clericus, Tuch, Baum- garten, Rodiger ; also, with special reference to Rom. xvi. 20, Hengstenberg, Delitzsch, Keil. In any case, it would be an epexegetical translation, if we would find the e.'cpressions, to tread with the foot, and to pierce^ in one common conception, lying at the ground of both. Moreover, this same word, as used Psalm cxxxlx. 11, and Job ix. 17, raimot denote either to tread, or to pierce. Just as little, on the other side, can it mean insidian., or itihiare, to assail or pursue in a hostile manner — as Umbreit, Gese- nius, and Knobel explain the word with reference to its supposed affinity with r)S\a . The middle con- ception, which suits both places here, and which commends itself as suitable to the two parallel pas- sages, Job is. and Psalm cxxxix., is to lay hold of', seize, hit. Keil : " The same word is used in rela- tion to the head and the heel, to indicate that the enmity on both sides is aimed at the destruction of the opponent — for which purpose by head and lieel are expressed majiix and jnimt.i, or, as Calvin says, superius and iicferins.* Ttds contrast arises, indeed, out of the very nature of the foes. The serpent who crawls in the dust, if he would destroy man walking in his uprightness, can only seize him by the heel ; whereas, man can crush his head. But tuis differ- ence itself is already a consequence of the curse pro- nounced upon the serpent, and its crawling in the dust is a premonition that in the strife with man it must, at last, succumb. Be it even that the bite of the serpent in the heel is even deadly when its poi- son penetrates throughout the whole body (Gen. xlix. 17), yet it is not immediately mortal, nor incur- able, like the crushing of the serpent's head. There * [The general sense in this passage is plain, but there is great difficulty in fLsing on the precise action intended by the word TT— \ in consequence of its occurring but three Cimes in the Hebrew Bible ; and one of these places, Ps. cxxxix. 11, is most probably a wrong reading for '^]37w'^ (from "73'^;), differing from it very slightly, and exactly suiting the context. The sense of braising will do, as used of the storm, -Job ix. 17, but is quite alien to any effect of darkness, as used Ps. csxsix. The difficulty is shown by the variety of special interpretations, though all agreeing in the general thought. Onkelos has two different words for it : "He shall be mindful ( ^^2T ) of what thou hast done to llimof old (taking '.IJX* paraphi-astically for beginning), but ihou Shalt be walclt/ul (T'ISD) for him in the end." From ;his probably, or from some older Ta^ura, came the LXX. i-endering. The Arabic translation, c^unonlv called Arabs Erpenianus, made by an ancient and learned Jew, and ;;en- drally very accurate, also uses two words ; " He shall hrpMk ttty head, and thou shalt sdng liini on the heel," — as though in the 2d clause he had read 122'U;r Gong vowel) from "T 3 to bite ; and such also is the conjectiu-e of Jarchi, who thinks that the variation was made originally to render the expres- sion memorable from such a suggested paronomasia, or re- semblance in sound. Head and lieel are evidently uced to denote a strong contrast, but not the one, we think, pointed out by Calvin and Lange. M,ay it not rather denote that the fight against sin and the perpent is to be a bold and manly one ? " He shall strike thee on the head." So Paul Bays i-jrwjTui^tu, " I strike under the eye," I knock my body dowi. I fight face to face. Thn fcly^■o(7 the heel, on the other hand, denotes the mean, insidious character of the devil's warfare, not only as carried on by the equivocating appe- jtes, but also as waged by infidels, and self-styled rational- "sts in all ages, who never meet Cbrifltianity in a frank and manly wav. — T. Ij.l comes also into consideration : 1. Tho contrast • heaii and heel. The life, like the poison, of the serpeot, is in its head, and is destroyed with it. The hetl of man is the least vulnerable, whilst it is that part of the body which is the most easily healed. 2. Th« conscious, adaptive aiming of the woman's seed, tha blind, brutal, tmd ill-directed assault of the serpent. The seed of the woman seizes the power of enl io its central life, in its principle ; the seed of tha serpent attacks the power of good in its most out- i ward iiud assailable appearance. 3. The very mo- I nient in which the serpent bites at the heel of tha I man, is the one m which the latter brings down the crushing foot upon its head. It is, indeed, not with, out sigiuficance, that the seed of the woman is pre sented in the singular, and in fact, in the last deci sive moment, set in opposition, not to the seed of the serpent, but to the serpent himself — as is pointed out by Hengstenborg and others. Here now must we distinguish between the prophetical and the typi- cal elements of prophecy — as also the prophecies that are strictly verbal. The prophetic element is present in the prophet's consciousness ; the typical element is not, although it may be consciously pres- ent to the spirit of revelation that guides him. Our text appears primarily, indeed, as the immediate speech of God, the all-knowing, who sees beforehand every thmg in the future ; but still, the measure of consciousness in our prophecy can become determin- ate to us only according to the presumable degree of consciousness in the author of Genesis, or, still fur- ther, in those who actually brought down the tra- dition contained in chapter iii. In relation, there- fore, to this human prophetical consciousness, and its germinal state of development, must we distinguish lietween the conscious prophecy of the word and the unconscious prophecy of the typical expression. So in Psalm xvi. the conscious prophecy says, through my commuiuon with God I shall possess immeasura- ble joys of life ; the typical expression, however, ia fulfilled m the resurrection of Christ (Acts ii.). So also says the prophet, Isaiah vii. : the young prophet wife shall, 1. conceive; 2. bear a son, whose name, 3. with joyful hope they shall call Immanuel. The typical expression, however, is a prediction of Christ, the son of the virgin. In this sense, also, does Paul allow himself to interpret the singular, ;'« thi/ seed, as a typical prophecy of Christ. And we doubt not, that here, too, the spirit of the type chose this ex- pression, the seed of the woman, with an Eeonian con- sciousness of its rich significance. If we go back, however, to the conscious prophecy, so it may be safe to say, that with the humanity in general, on its light side, there is also placed its core * — as it is with Jii- dah (Gen. xUx. 10), and Israel (Hos. xi. 1). In trutli, the core, or heart, is ever etnbraced in concrete unity with the hull, but to the biblical view is tins gravi- tation to the unity pecuhar from the very beginning. On the other side, however, according to the New Testament, and the patristic unveiling of its signifi- cance, is the seed of the woman not exclusively to be referred to the individuality of Christ. Christ, as the Christ in the universal humanity, is here to be under^ stood ; especially in the second clause, at least, aa also, therefore, in the third according to Paul (Kcm. xvi. 20). There remains, finally, the question how the tempt * [This is an expression that Dr. Lange is fond of. H« seems to mean by it something representing humanity con« cretely and centrally — or some aspect of humanity ; as J jdat in the prophecy, Gen. xlix. 10. — T Ii.1 W6 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. ttion of the first pair by the serpent ip to be under- stood. According to Knobel there is found in our passage just as little reference to the devil as to the Messiah (p. 48). Consequently would the whole pas- page become a mere physical myth. Von Bohlen goes back to the kindred traditions of the ancients, tnd finds it of the deepest significance that in the printed Samaritan text there is 'iir\2, har, instead of BHJ , serpent. According to one of the Indian myths, Krishna, in the form of the sun, contends with the Evil One, in the form of serpent. In like manner in Egypt, Typhou, whose name is interpreted by Ser- pent, persecutes his brother Osiris, or the sun. Her- cules possesses himself of the golden apple of the llesperides, which the Serpent guarded. According to Bohlen, however, the nearest source of our nar- rative, as of Paradise hi general, Ues in Iran. Ahriman, according to the Zendavesta, in the form of a serpent brought of his fruits to men, who were of the pure creation of Ormuzd. And so, according to him, as also according to Rosenmiiller, must the author of our account have had that as a model be- fore his eyes. And yet, somehow, we know not how he distinguishes from it the simple sense of the IsraeUtish narrator. The reference of Bohlen only shows how our primitive tradition spreads itself in the manifold adumbrations and transformations of the most varied mythological systems, even as the like holds true in respect to the cosmogony, the first human pair. Paradise, and stiU further on in respect to the flood. In opposition to all this stands the traditional view of the Church, that under the ser- pent as instrument and symbol our passage conscious- ly intends the devil (see Hesgstenbekg : "Chris- tology," p. 5; Dki.itzsch, p. 168; Keil, p. 51). In respect to this, there is no doubt that in the Holy Scripture there lies before us a connected line of tes- timonies whose object is ever the same demoniac tempting spirit — a line which, going out from tlie serpent in the passage before us, reaches even to the close of the New Testament in the Apocalypse, ch. xii. 3, 9, 13; ch. xx. 2, 10. The identity is estab- lished by the cited places of the Apocalypse, by 2 Cor. xi. 3 (compare ver. 14) by the Book of Wis- dom ii. 23 ; with which again in connection stands John viii. 44 ; though to this have been oljjected certain weakening interpretations (Liicke, and others). It is so also in Kom. xvi. 20. Here is every where evident the relation of the fall to the serpent ac- cording to its symbolical signiticance. In many more ways, as in the Book of Wisdom ii. 24; John viii. 44; 2 Cor. xi. 3 ; Rom. xvi. 20, there appears the identity of the tempting Spirit, which workeil through tliC serpent, with the figure of the devil as he appears later in the Sciipture. That, indeed, the physical serpent could not have been meant, as the tempter in our passage, shows itself from the dis- tinct ajipearance of consctousness in resjject to the great sejjaration between man and the animal world (ch. ii. 19, 20), as it is rightly presented by Ileng.sten- berg; it also a[)pears fiom the collective declaration that every ereatiter the serpent assumes as a maliciously subtle creature, EB well as from the symbolical background which ever shows itself stronger and stronger in the prim- itive condemnati.x Next to the identity of the tempting spirit behind the scrjient and Satan, comes Dow ius continuity. Before all, in the Old Testament. firtl fkar/e of the idea : IndicatioD of evil spirits, and of one especially as an apostate, pre-eminently u Azazel, Levit. xvi. 8 ; in symbols of the Evil One Deut. xxxii. 17 ; in the Schedim (Septuagint, Sa.ud' fia. properly, master-gods), and the Seirim, U. xiii 21. Second Sta(;e : The appearance of Satan as th» foe of man, as the tempter and accuser. Job i. and ii 1 Chron. xxi. 1. llind Stage: The designation oi Satan as the enemy of God, as the fallen founder of an evil dominion in opposition to the establishment of the divine kingdom, Zech. iii. 1 ; Is. xxvii. 1 ; ser- pents and dragon-forms as symliols of the reign of Antichrist; Dan. vii., the beasts out of the sea. The New Testament clearly introduces the doctrine of Sa tan with a counterpart of the temptation of Adam ii; Paradise, when it represents the temptation of Christ in the wilderness. Matt. iv. After this, in the per- fecting the doctrine of Satan, there is, first, the men- tion, Matt. xii. 43, of his connection as chief with the individual evil spirits in the demoniacs. Then, in the second stage, Satan is especially designated as the foe of man (John viii. 44 ; Matt. xii. 29 ; xiii. 39; Acts X. 38). In the third stage comes forth the fin- ished form of the doctrine, when Satan is represented as the enemy of (Jod and Christ, and the prince of the kingdom of darkness, making complete his reve- lation, first in secret influences, then in pseudo- Christian organs, and finally in one Antichristian organ (John xii. 31 ; 2 Cor. iv. 4 ; Eph. vi. 12 ; 2 Thess. ii. 9, and the Revelation). A chief question here, however, is this : whether we are to suppose that in the passage before us there is already indicated a developed consciousness in re- spect to the nature of the devil. Since in the Old Testament, the New Testament doctrines have not yet come to their full development, and since the be- ginnings of them on the first pages of Genesis meet us tln-oughout in a very dark, veiled, and germinal form, so would it be a gross inorganic anomaly, if a developed knowledge of the devil lias to be supposed in this place. Just such an anom:dy, however, ap- pears to be assumed by Dei.itzsch, along with otliers, when he says (p. 168): "The narrator keeps his po- sition on the outer appearance of the event without lifting the veil from the substance that lies behind He may well do tliis, since even the heathen sages present an express though deformed notice of the truth ; but the author throws a veil over it, because the unfolding would not have been suitable for those people of his time who were inclined to a heathenish superstition, and to a heathenish intercourse with the demon-world (still would there h.ive arisen a super- stition from it, even if the narrator had had the pur- pose to stand ])urely by the literal serpent). It is f didactic aim that determines the narrator to rest sat isfied with the objectivity of the outward event as ii becomes perceivable, and to be silent in regard to its remoter ground." In maintaining this view, De- litzsch himself refers (p. 625) to the ('hnrcli fathers. Keil presents a more striking ground for this " didac- tic aim " of silence in respect to Satan, both, here and further on in the Old Testament ; "it had respect," he savs, "to the inclination which men have to roll the giiilt from themselves upon the tempting spirit; it was to allow them no pretext." We may, how- ever, just as well trust the spirit of the divine revela- tion with a didactic aim in relation lo the narrator, as the narrator himself in relation to his readers ; and it is in accordance with the divine mode ol' instruc- tion, that revelation should unfold itself in exact cor- rcspcmdencc with the human state of development The assumption of an objective ieveloiimeut of e\i' CHAPTER ni. 1-24. 23^ In the spiri rworld has in it nothing irrational ; yet riengstenberg rightly remarks : " moreover, the posi- tion held by most of those who deem themselves compelled to regard the book of Job as origin;iting before the captivity, namely, that the Satan of that book is not the Satan of the later Old Testament bonks, hilt rather a good ang>d, only clothed witli a hateful office, is becoming more and more acknowl- edged as correct ; so that we may wonder how Bkck (Leln-wissenschafl, I, p. 2ifl) can be impressed with the su|iposed fact, and seek to adapt himself to it, through the assumption that the alienation of a part of the angels from (lod, an i their kingdom of dark- ness, develops itself in a progressive unfolding." Yet clearly is the commencement of the tempting epirit, Gen. iii. 1, devilish enough. Moreover, must we distinguish the conception of the development of the demoniacal kingdom, from that ot" the develop- ment of the demoniacal character. The measure of the knowledge of demons, or deinonology, which dis- tinctly presents itself in our text, is the recognition of an evil that stands back of the serpent, and of a malicious spirit of temptation which hencefoith ever, more and more, shall become acknowledged as the crafty, lying foe of man (" and I will put enmity "), but who betrays himself already as the foe of God and the adversary of his counsels, as connected with the human race. The more definite unveiling of this last point, and its wider consequences, such as a fallen angel-prince of a fallen angel-host, and of a kingdom of darkness, belong to the later develop- ment of the doctrine. When, finally, the question is asked, in what man- ner must we think of the working of this foe of man as taking place through the serpent, we encounter again the abstract opposition of the pure actuality as against the supposition of a fact under the relations of a vision. Next to such views as these : the devil epoke in the phantom shape of a serpent (Cyril of Alexandria) ; the devil spoke tlirough the serpent, or made it speak by a diabolical agency (DKLtTZ.-»in's " First Demoniac Miracle ") ; the serpent is only an allegory (Grotius: the representation of an old poem); or, an outward eating by the serpent of the fruit of the tree of knowledge, and a simultaneous whispering by Satan to the soul of Eve, h.appened together (Cler- icus, Hetzel) — next to such as these we place the view that Satan worked through a sympathetic influ- ence upon the mind of Eve, and thereby made the in- determinate ai^tj of the serpent to become speaking signs, to such a degree, that, in the excited visionary temperament of the woman, tliey became translbrmed into a dialectical process of speech and reply. To conclude, it is especially to be borne in mind, against the assertions of DeUtzsch in respect to the imposition of punishment upon the serpent (p. 179), that every application of the idea oi^ punishment to beasts takes away its peculiar conception ; so much 90, that, even on the ground of the Old Testament consciousness, can we boldly affirm that, from the very fact of Jehovah's pronouncing a doom upon the eerpent, the meaning must beiif something more than a serpent. Rather, may we say, that the future of the serpent-brood is announced in a way which un- mistakably expresses the sentence of the man-hating spiiit in a symbolical form. Indeed, Delitzscli him- eelf says; Not as though beasts were capable of the imputation ; but none the less is there repeated the mention of the infliction of punishment upon the •erpent, and we can, therefore, read : the beast that gkve itself for this purpose, to lead astray to an un- godly deed him who is called to be lord of the anl mal world, and his helpmeet, is also to bt punished though in a different way. Delitzseh refers to Lev, XX. 15: "It is truly an Old Testiiment law, thai contra-natural lust must be punished, not only in man, but also in the beast with which it is practised; and, in general, the beast is to he punished through which a man has suftered any harm whatever in bodj or soul (ch. ix. 6; Ex. xxi. 28; Deut. xiii. 15; 1 Sam. XV. 3)." In the passage from Leviticus, thj killing of the abused beast is denoted by 5"n . Tha notion that in this and the other places cited the de- struction of the beast is ordered for the sake of the man, or in company with the man, rests upon tha idea of the personal elevation of man above the beast in accordance with which it is that, in the symboli cal expression, a beast that has killed a man is like wise put to death, and the beasts of multitudes of men devoted to death are put to death with them. It is, moreover, as a symbolical expression of anger and abhorrence, as " when a father breaks in pieces the sword with which his son has been slain." The svmbolical in those acts arises out of the contrast be- tween the New Testament and the Old. The I'etro- brusians treated even the sign of the cross as a sign of ignominy, because Christ had been put to death on the cross. The Christian church, however, ha8 never acknowledged this view. Moses also, at ona lime, established a type in the New Testament sense, in the lifting up of the brazen serpent. Ver. IB. Unto the tiroman he said. — -The sentence pronounced upon the woman contains a painful modification and transformation of the womanly calling, as farther on the sentence pro- nounced upon Adam is a similar modification of the manly, or, we may say generally, of the human calling [since Adam embraces at once the common human nature] ; and so, accordingly, is the earlier mode of life of the serpent made to become a modifi- cation of the sentence pronounced upon it. What they do according to their nature, that must now bring upon them the punishments that are in corre- spondence with theirnatures. Delitzseh distinguishes a threefold reti-ibutian in the sentence upon the wo- man. We follow him therein, only taking the mem- bers in a different way. The punishment falls ; 1. Upon the relation of the womanly organism in and for itself; 2. on the relation to her chddren ; and 3. on the relation to her husband. 1. I will greatly multiply thy sorrow. The expression -Jj'ass ^I'^^rf is generally taken as a hendyadis. "The frequency of pregnancy can be no punishment." The Samaritan translates : The burden that is con- nected with pregnancy. And yet we are not justified here in limiting the whole doom of the womanly distress and sorrow directly to the state of pregnancy. Still it may be more safe to say with DeUtzsch : Thy burden, and especially thy pregnancy with its burden. The womanly calling is an endless multiplicity of little '.roubles, and the womanly destiny is loaded with the most manifold sexual pains. The pains of a woman with child, Jer. xxxi. 8. — 2. With sorrow^. [Lange translate! it, ivilh di^cuUi/^ iioth.] We maintain thst thfl translation of ZS" by trouble or pam is toe weak. It is the state of birth-travail, which is, all at the same time, labor, pain, difficulty, and danger (se« Is. xiii. 8 ; xxi. 3 ; Hos. xiii. 13 ; Micah iv. 9 ; John xvi. 21). " Gravida et paricns,'"' says an old proverb. ^^ fsf .\irut tearnta et nioriens.'''' Delitzseh. The con 238 GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. trast between the lightest fExod. i. 19) and the most difficult births, may help to give us nn idea of the contrast between the normal paradisaical way of birth, and the birth-sorrows that have prevailed in human historv ; and this too without our having to suppose, with Delitz.-cli, a cliaiigf in " the physiohigiciil constitution of the womaii." Hence- forth must the woman purchase the gain of children with the danger of her life, — in a certain degree, witli spiritual readiness for death, and the sacrifice of her life for that end.— 3. And thy desire shall be to thy husband. This sentence obtains its full significance in its embracing that which follows, and in its contrast to it. It is, emphatically, that her desire should be to the man as though she were magically bound to him. npllljn may denote the longing of the woman's dependence upon man. npiun comes from p^Ui , to run, run after, pursue, want.* It is further emphatic that the man shall rule over her in a strong way ; and finally that she, in her bound and destined adherence to man, shall find in him a strong and severe master. The ■voman had specifically sinned, " not for the sake of earthly enjoyment merely " (Deliizsch), but in high-fiuwn aspiring, as though she would emancipate herself from man, get before him, and take him under her guardianship. Her punishment, therefore, must consist in this, that she must become subject in the normal line of her sexual being, her con- sciousness, adhesiveness, and dependence. "The man can command in a lordly way, and the wife is inwardly and outwardly compelleii to obedience. In consequence of sin thus arises that subjection of the wife to the husband, bordering on slavery, that was customary in the old world, as it still is in the East, and which through the religion of revelation becomes gradually more tolerable, until, at last, in the increasing worth of the woman, it becomes entirely evened " (fielitzsch). " Among the Hebrews a wife was bought by the husband (? cli. xsxiv. 12; Exod. xxii. 16 ; Hos. iii. 3, 2). and was his possession (female slave, ? ch. xx. 3; Deut. xxii. 22). He is called her lord (ch. xviii. 12 ; Exod. xxi. H), and he can divorce her without much ceremony (Dent. xxiv. 1). This subordinate and depressed condition of the wife the author (!) regards as the punishment of Bin." Knobel. — Ver. 17. And unto Adam he said. — Sentence against Adam. In the case of Adam (whose name here first appears as a proper name) there is an indictment or declaration of his guilt going before the sentence of condemnation. His guilt culminates in this, that he had listened to the voice of hia wife who was placed under him, and Ihi.s, too, in direct opposition to that obedience which he owed to the voice and the command of his God. Instead of the protector and guide of his wile, to guard her from the fall, or, after her fall, to bring her liack to God, he liecomes, in his cowardly reimnciation of his dignity, subject with her to evil. Mediately is this also a rebuke of his self-exculpa- tion : " the wife whom thou gaveen from this it becomes clear, how, in consequence of the fall, the material in man, the direct opposite of this transforming power, takes possession first of his corporeity, aiul then propagates itself upon the surrounding material, that i.s, the universal nature." It is, however, not wholly correct to say that the doom of the curse is represented as going out from the nature of nisn against the outei' nature ; much rather, according to the representation, does the curse of the adaniah come nigh to man, as a new divine ordering of nature (I'onjp. also Rom. viii 20). We must, there- fore, distinguish those special deti^riorations of naiure which in their ethical causality proceed imniediaiely from man, from that doom of (ind which was pronounced ciillectively upon the ailamitK cosnio.s. In correspondence Whh the above idea Dtilitzsch continues: "This curse of sin consist* CHAP. III. 1-24. 23L firstly in this, that the soil of the earth, now far from pioducing what man needs with its original ease and abundance, demands painl'nl exertion, and this often in vain." Keil makes the point still sharper when he says that "Adam, in the act of lis- tening to the voice of liis sor|)ent-befooled wife, liad renounced his superiority to the creature. On this account shall nature hencelorth array herself against him for his punishment. Through his transgression of the divine command hath he set himself against God ; tlierefore shall he, by falling under the power of death, become conscious of the vanity of his being." Since we have recognized the conception of blessing (chap, i.) as the conception of an endless fertility and multiplication, as an unceasing and wonderful reproduction, so must we here regard the curse that comes in as the opposite, — even as it appears from the divine explication itself The doom of unthriftiness, or of mysterious self-genera- ting unfruitfulness, as pronounced upon the adauiah, unfolds itself unitedly in the ground-forms of detet-i- oratioiiy sickliness^ perishability ; negatively in the ground-forms of impoverishment, disorder, malform- ation, and decay ; positively in the forms of crudity, coarseness^ deformity, and self-destruction. This curse is the adjustment of a causal nexus between sin and evil in its objective, physical, cosmical appearance. As on the one side it is a mysterious fatality, so, on the other side, as matter of contem- plation and conception, is it an ethical consequence. The first ground : the negative side, the spoiling or disordering, presents itself in the first act. — 1. With sorrow shalt thou eat, that is, derive thy food (see Is. i. 7). — 2. Thorns and thistles. I^ITI I'lp terms that occur in connection only here and in Hosea x. 8, where they are repeated from this place ; the ancient ~\'\'\'\ became obsolete, being of like significance with P^C^ n^^'lj as used in Isaiah." Keil. In their ground type, doubtless, thorns and thistles must have already existed be- fore ; but it is now the tendency of nature to favor the ignoble forms rather than the noble, the lower rather th.on the higher, the weed rather than the herb. In place of the ennobling tendency which would produce a fruit-tree or a rose-bush out of a thorn-shrub, or that wonderful flower of the cactus out of the thistle, there comes in a tendency to wildiiess or degeneracy whii-'h transforms the herb into a weed. The sickliness of nature : a falling back upon its subordinate stages, as a punisliment of man for his contra-natural falling back into a demoniacal, bestial behavior. Here now, along with the thorns and thistles, there is, at the same timi', the positive opposition of nature to man. In place of the garden-culture, there is introduced not agri- culture simply, but an agriculture* which is, at the Bame time, a strife with a resisting nature, and in place of the fruit of Paradise, is man now directed to the fruit of the field. There stands, besides, the biffden cast upon the field as an expression for the more universal deterioration of nature, — namely, in the animal world (see the note from Calvin cited by Keil, p. 61). In like manner the burden cast upon file human agriculture stands for that which is im- posed upon every branch of the human vocation. —3. In the sweat of thy face. An emblematical ■lenoting of the daily toil ami burden of labor, even for the necessary daily bread. It shall not merely be e.irned by the sweat of the face ; the sweat shall etind vpon his brow even in his meal; that is, he shall have only a brief respite for recreation. The face is the most peculiar representative of the human dignity. It may reflect the light of a holj spiritual life; on the contrary, like the dark, gloam ing shadow of distress and care, must now the sweat veil the countenance and moisten the bread of toil Therefore is it well said, the sweat of the face. The eating of broad denotes here, as throughout the Scripture, the sustaining of life generally, or the assuaging its wants (Eccles. v. 16 ; Amos vii. 12). — Till thou return unto the ground. That man must return unto the earth, that is, must die, is cow taken for granted, and therewith it is, at the same time, expressed, that now from the power and rule of immortality, he has fallen under the law and rule of death. The appointment of the time: till thou return unto the earth, says not merely that even to the grave his life should be pain and labor (Pg. xc. 10), but this moreover, that it shall be a fruitless effort for the maintaining of his existence, until at last he shall be wholly subdued by the overpowering might of death. — For dust thou art. This is the culminating point iti the penal sentence, expressed nevertheless in the form of a confirmation of what precedes; not as a new or repeated doom; since after the threatening (ch. ii. 17), it is understood of course. The declaration here especially makes clear the fact that death had already secretly couimenced in life. Knobel affirms that *' neither this passage, nor the Old Testament in general, teaches that death belongs solely to the punishment of sin." What else is .said in Psalm xc. ? The possibility, indeed, that Adam might become dust again, that is, that he miylit die, is made clear from this, that he was taken from the earth ; but it does not there- fore follow that before this time the necesxity of dying must have been imposed upon him. Moreover, the terminus in death which is here a|)pointed, must clearly be regarded, not as primarily the limit of misery, but as the culminating point of the neces- sity ; notwithstanding a glimpse of promise presents itself, as well in this place as throughout the differ- ent sentences. Knobel thus explains himsell' further on : " He might have gained immortality through the tree of life (eh. ii. 9), but only as something lying above the plane of his nature, only as some superior excellence of the heavenly powers, just a" it was imparted to Enoch and Elijah." So that, evi according to Knobel, when through his guilt ma>. lost the tree of life, he thereby fid! into death. This is just the way the text presents it, as the nor- mal destiny of man, that he should eat of the tree of life, ami not of the tree of death. It is a per- version of relations, when out of the conditional posse mori we would make a conditional posse vivere. Keil. "The fact of man's not immediately coming to an end after eating the forbidden fruit has not its ground in this, that through the creation of the woman, coming between the death-threatening and the fall, the fountain of human lite was parted, and that the life which in the beginning had been shut up in the one Adam became divided, and thereliy the deadly effect of the fruit in them was weakened and rendered more mild (Hofmank, ' Prophecy and Ful- filment,' I. p. B7; 'Scripture Proof,' I. p. .519). De litzsch seeks some rational support for this poetical fancy, but finds the true reason in the divine long- suffering and grace, which gives space for repent- ance, and so rules and orders even the sins of men and their punishment as may best serve the realiza- tion of his counsels in creating, and the glorv ol hie uo GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. name."' It must, nevertheless, before all things, be maintained, that the text would have us recognize the beginning of death, the root of death, the inward ethical beginning of the same, as the matter of chief moment. 9. Vers. 20-22. The hope and the compnssion. And Adam called his wife's name Eve. — Throughout the pronunciation of doom, Adam had kept liis eye fixed upon the brightest spot, the word of promise in respect to the seed of the woman, and •"ith tliis he consoles himself now against tlie per- ceived announcement of death, in that he names his wife havah. Just as his own generic name had become a proper name (v. 17) in the declaration of pimishment, so now does he give his wife a proper name after the promise as received not only m its generic sense but also in its deeper significance. "According to this, n.|n=n^n is either life, ftuij (Sept.) = life-spring, or it is to be taken as abbre- viated participle : the sustenance, that is, propagation of life [for nina from n5n=n;n (ch. xix. :-i2, :;4), which I prefer as being more significant than yvvj] from yn'ia aud feinina from feo, altliougli essen- tially of like significance. Symm. i'a!o7o^.is." Du- litzsch. Keil declares himself for the former accep- tation, and against the latter. Knobel hints at an expression for the wife: Sil n_'n, to yiiie/cen the seed, that is, to propagate the race, and derides for taking it as an adjective : quiekener, lifc-givei', propagalist, which also is nearer the truth than tlie indeterminate and too extensive ^ojii. In the ex- planatory addition of the narrator, there appears to be indicated, along with the extensive promise of tlie nami' : mother ■;/' all lining, also the intensive : mother of life, as mediatrix of life in tlie higlier sense. With great pertinency remarks DeUtzsch : ■' The promise purports truly a seed of the woman. In the \ery face, therefore, of the death with wliicli he is threatened, the wife is for Adam the security of both, as well for the continuance, as for the victory, of his race; and it is, tlieretbre, a laying hold ()f the promise and of the grace in tlie midst of wrath, and with a consciousness of death incurred ; in a word, it is an act of faith that Adam names his wife r^n, havali — Eve." In distinction from niES (woman) this is a proper name which as a memorial of promised grace, as Melanchthon calls it, expresses the peculiar significance of this first of wives for humaiiily and its history. — For Adam and his wife made coats of skins — Knoliel; •' Clothes of skins, that is, clothes from the skins of beasts, which elsewhere, throughout antiquity, were used as the earliest human clothing (DiOD. Sic. I. p. 43 ; ii. ;i8 ; AiiiiiAN Ini). vii. 2 ; Ldcian. Amok. 34 ; Bundkii 16 in Kl.VAK. Ill, p. 85). In this the clothing makes an advance corresponding to the incieasing moral knowledge." In the connection of events our pa,s- sage is explained by the fact that along with the word of death there is introduced the immolation of the animal for the need of man. They are on the point of being compelled to leave I'aradise ; they lecd now a stronger clothing for their entrance upon >,.,t clitnatc of the outer land. And finally, in place cl the insullicient, easily lading, and easily destroyed co'eiing of their nakedness, as practised in their self-willed, servile shame, there must now be intro- duced, under the divine direction, a sullicient cover- ing, adapted to a freer ami more ingenuous modesty. lu this sense it is (iod who makes their clothing, iltboui^b it is done bv means of th(>ir own hand' It Is an act of inspiration, of divine revelation ani3 guidance, out of which proceeds their becoming clothed as though from themselves. According to Hofinann, Drechsler, Dclitzsoh, this clothing would appear to be a sacramental sign of grace, a type of the death of Christ, and of the being clothed with ' the holy righteousness of the fiod-man (Dkliizsch, p. 192). Keil disputes this, although firmly main- taining that in this act of God there was laid \kt ground of the sacrificial offering of beasts. The idea of the sacrificial offering of animals points indeed to a vast remote ; here, at least, it is an I obvious expression to the effect that the i-estoratiot of the human dignity, purity, and divine acceptable ness, is not too dearly bought even by the shedding of blood, and that it presupposes a suffering of death. It becomes necessary, moreover, that, even before his departure from Paradise, man should see, in the spectacle of the bleeding beasts, how serious his history has become. — Behold the man hai become like one of us. — " That is, a being pos- sessed of a similar attribute, therefore like nie, so far as I belong to the class of higher spiritual beings." (!) Knobel. — As one of us. — According to Delitzsch the language is communicative in rela- tion to the included angels. We are inclined here to be satisfied with the conception of the anthropo- tnorphising pluralis mnjedatis. But in how far has he so become ? Only in relation to the knowledge of good and evil, says Keil. Again, says Knobel, " it is the commencing moral recognition, which, therefore, makes him like God." Says Chrysostom, he speaks this, bv^ihi^wv aiirw koL t^v 6.voio.v ainuv Kw^JLwhu>v (reproaching him and mocking his folly). Delitzsch might find something strange in such an irony. Riehers says strongly : " Irony against an unfortunate, seduced soul ! Satan might cherish such a disposition, not the Lord." The opinion jiroceeds, in the first place, from a misunderstanding of the irony, as also, in the second jilace, of the " poor seduced " soul. Accoriling to (JoscbeH's more cor- rect and protbunder representation, a divine irony is everywliere the second stage in all divine acts of punishment {Zerxtretite Blatter, vol. i. p. 4C8). As the serpent had lyingly promised : ye shall be as gods, so is it clear that (iod cannot siinjily confirm this by saying, his promise is established. When he serves himself, therefore, with the same words, it must be meant ironically. That, however, irony and malicious sarcasm are two quite distinct things, we may learn everywhere, and out of the Scriptures themselves. In this way the expression bi'comea more distinctly clear : he has tieconie one like us, that is, as we become represented in ditlcrent forms and transformations. He is become like Goil ; true, alas ! God pity him, he knows now in his guilt- consciou.sness the difference between good and evil. None tlic less, too, in this ironic word lies the recog nition that he has bioken through the limits of his proper development, and prematurely obtruded iqinn the consciousness of the spiritual realm. — And now lest he put forth. — We do not, with Delitzsch, regard "|B as deiiuling an auakolouthiin, since this is not necet..'ary according to Isaiah xxxviii. IS ; Job xxxii. 13 ; and "ince the assumption of anakoloutha is only allowablo in cases of neccs.sity, — a view wdiicli is specially applicable to the simple diction ol Genesis.* Knobel: "Jehovah is coucerned, leat •[AnaUolouthii r,n(l other idiomatic exprcssious fielocg to tlu; niiniile as welj as to tho rh, *oriciil ur anima'.i 1 Ok- tion. 'I'htsy may thorefore occur in 'innosip ns wt. is uf CHAP. 111. 1-24. ^4 they may be able to enjoy alao the tree of life, and thereby get to themselves the farther advantage of a higlier being (iinmortahty)/' — a wholly paganish representation of Jehovah which we have no right to lay as a burden upon the text. Keil says better: ** Afler he nad become the property of death through sin, the fruit that produces immortality could only redound to his destruction. For, in a state of siv, ttndyingness* is not the (^cch alwi'itis (the eternal life of the soul) which God has designed for men, but endless pain, riever-ceasing destruction (everlasting destruction), which the Scripture calls the second death (Rev. ii. 11 ; xx. 6, 14; xxi. 8). The banish- ment from Paradise was, therefore, a punishment having for its aim the salvation of man, — a banish- ment which, indeed, exposes him to temporal death, but shall be a protectionf to him against the ever- lasting death." Nevertheless there is overlooked by Keil the ditficulty, that there appears to be meant such a mere physical eating from the tree of life as would produce a physical undyingness in contradic- tion with the spiritual state. Clearly, though sym- bolically, is there here expressed the possibility that even sinners, through a mysterious power of health, may attain to a marvellous longevity. In the full sense of the word, the paradisaical tree of life was lost for man. " But the tree of hfe," says Delitzsch, "which takes away the death-power of the tree of knowledge, is already sown in, and with, the pro- claiming of the prot-evangel." 10. Vers. 23, 24. Therefore the Lord God sent him forth, — His new state has also a mission, and before there is mention made of his being driven out of Paradise, is his new t;isk laid before him. He is sent tbrth quickly to cultivate the ground from which he was taken, and as the earth had borne him, 80 must it now nourish him, and as he had his origin his physical origin) from her, so must he now serve ner, and, in the dust of the ground which he culti- vates, have his birth and his future home ever before tis eyes. -Per crucem ad luceia is now the watch- word.— And he drove out the man. — Eastward of Eden God places the cherubim ; on the east, Isaiah or Job. The objection of anthrapomorphism is to be disregarded. It is in just such forms of speech that the strength of language is brought out. The ellipsis shows that the thought is too great, or too strong, for the words. There is more force in the simple particle 'S ilest^beware .esO than in the fullest or most correctly guiirdei I diction. The cases cited, Isaiah Kxxvi. 18, and Job xxxii. 13, are of the same kind, and instead of being opposed to, confirm the propriety of calling it an anakolouthon, or rather, an aposi- cpesis, or expressive silence, here.— T. L.] * rWe prefer this apparently uncouth Anglo-Saxon coin- ing, for Lange's unsterhlichkeit, instead of the word fmmor- lality, which, although etymological ly the same, has, in ^neral, obtained too high and spiritiSa^ a sense to suit the Idea intended. Tliis is especially the case in our English ersion of such passages as 1 Cor. sv. 53, 54 ; 1 Tim. vi. 16 ; Where it is used for the Greek adavturia.—i: . L.] t[In view of this position of Lange and Keil, the an- hropomorphic expression of the divine solicitude by the elliptical particle ^Q becomes perfectly startling. It is as though the thought of the awful consequences of one in TOoh a state of de;ith eating of the tree of life, and thereby Boaking his ruin irreparable, or his death incurable, was so •verpowering as to hide for a moment from the divine mind the consciousness of his perfect foreknowIedLre. As though the thought had suddenly occurred, and with it a sense of be awful danger— What if he should put forth his hand! And now lest he put forth his hand in some rash moment as he put it forth to the tree of knowledge I And then the remedy promptly follows, that there may be no delay in preventing a catastrophe that would have been greater than the other, even as making it remediless. Take away the onthropomorjjhisms from the Bible, and a large share of ta pv>wiT is dutioyed,— T. L.) 16 therefore, we must hold to have been the c rpiirtdie of man from Paradise. Nevertheless, they did not leave the district Eden ; " Cain was the first who did that (eh. iv. 16)." Knobel. First of all, then, is to be noted here, the distinction of a twolohi guard of Paradise : the cherubim arid the flannng sword ; also, that the meaning is not tlie cherubLu wUh the flam ing sword in hand (Knobel), although there are places, sometimes, in which the Hebrews use the comieotiva Vau (a7id) where we would expect the preposition with. In the interpretation of the cherubim, there ii to be first kept in view the Bible analogies, before tailing into account the mythological analogies. When now the cherubim make their appearance, further on, in the two golden cherub-forms which hovered over the ark of the covenant (Ex. xxv. 18; xxxvii. 7), and which also appear in the temple of Solomon, only in greater proportions (1 Kings vi. 23 ; viii. 6 ), though not fourfold (as is maintained bj Biblical Dictionary for Christian People) — we must cidl to mind the command of God, Ex. xx. 4, so as not to be led away by the idea that they are images of some peculiar kind of heavenly angels, as Hof- mann, Delitzsch, Naglesbach, and Kurtz have sup- posed, in opposition to Biihr, llengstenberg, Haver- nik, and others. How would the images of heavenly angels figure here as guardians of the command : " Thou shall not make to thyself any likeness of any- thing that is in heaven above." These two ceremo- nial cherub-forms were winged ; their wings hovered over the ark of the covenant, and tlieir faces, as they stood opposite to each other, looked down upon the covering of the ark, Ex. xxv. 20, or the mercy-seat, whilst between them appeared the shekinah of Jeho- vah's presence (Lev. xvi. 2 ; Num. vii. 89). Their form is not more particularly described ; like the most holy place itself, they appear to have previously belonged to the mysteries of the people. We have here presented to us in worship the first unfolding of the paradisaical form. Just as these cherubim guarded Paradise, with the tree of life that was there- in, and protected them from the approach of sinners, so do the cherubim watch and guard the holy place of God's personal presence, or of the appearing of Jehovah, especially the mercy-seat, and the essential unity of the law that was comprehended in it. The sinner is parted from the tree of life. There is the same meaning here ; he is separated from the behold- ing of God, from the full enjoyment of his mercy, and from the possession of the essential life of the law, that is, the righteousness that .avails with God. Id this sense are they called, Heb. ix. 5, cherubim of glory, 5o{i)s. The poetical and didactic references to the cherubim, Ps. xviii. 11 ; Ixxx. 2 ; xcix. 1 ; civ. 4 ; Is. xxxvii. 16, form the transition to the fully devel- oped prophetic, apocalyptic symboUcal of the cheru- bim, as we find it in Ezek. i. 10 ; x. 4 ; xli. 18 ; and in Eev. iv. 6; v. 6-14; vi. 1-7; vii. 11; xiv. 3; XV. 7 ; xix. 4. The passage, Ps. xviii. 10, 11, appears to have the highest significance in respect to the sym- bolical of the cherubim. Jehovah comes down the heavens, it says — the dark cloud beneath his 'eet. Next, :;^-3J-b? ^BT^i, he rode upon a cherub. God rides, therefore, upon the storm-driven thunder-c)oud, as upon his chariot. On this account, we hold that that derivation of the word is the right one which brings 3'^X in closest connection with ZZ~ to ride, and regards the word as formed by a metathesis of letters* from ;53n = a3"i chariot, team, and not * [ As far as stjTnology Ib concerned. Dr. Lan^e, wt, tlimk. 242 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. from -l^p ?!« -Oso propinguun eat, ei adstat, nor as the same with the -ypvipet of the Persians, as very generally held (see Gesenius' Lexicon). Since here, at all events, the swift-moving thunder-clouds appear as ttie chariot of God, and very significantly, too, in the singular, so also, the fact must not be over- looked, that, in connection with this cherub, there is mention of the wrath of God, of the consuming fire that goeth out of his mouth, of the glowing flames that burn before him, of the fire-flash, of the burning coals, God's arrows, and finally, of the lightning. To this we may add the passage, Ps. civ. 4, where it is said, and in fact with special reference to the creative history; Who malieth the winds his messengers, the flames of fire his servants. Keeping this in view, that the cherubim have their nature = symbols in wind and cloud, and present themselves in coimec- tion with the flames of the lightning, we get light upon the dark passage respecting the cherubun. Is. vi. 1, as seen in the analogies of Scripture. That the seraphim, which appear here in the train of Jehovah, are likewise symbolical angel-forms, is evident from their configuration itself, wherein they appear as en- dowed with six wings, an arrangement which evi- dently has a symboUcal significance. That, niore- ever, they are not to be regarded in connection witli the serpents mentioned Numb. xxi. 6, appears Irom the fact, that these have their name simply from the burning poison. Neither can they (to say nothing of tlie gioundless identification of the name with c^T\U pri/ifipes, nobiUs) mean the burning, the shiu- ■>!(/, according to Kinchi and others ; for »l^iU does not mean to bum, to shine, but to scorch, to burn up, cremare. comburere. When we consider tijat in ch. vi. Isaiah does not set forth his general proplietic inau- guration, but his special calling to ienounce the ob- duracy of the people, and to set before them the judgments that must follow, we understand how it is that he sees the appearance of Jehovah in the tem- ple, and in the midst of the seraphim or burning an- gels, whilst he feels the door-sills of the temple trem- ble at their call, and beholds the house tilled with smoke. The meaning is, that in spirit he anticipates the future burning of the temple as the infliction of Jehovah's judgment. In Ps. Ixxx. 2, it is said ; O 8hei)herd of Israel, appeal-, thou that sittes^ above toe chei'ubim, awake thy power. The cherubim, therefore, are symbols of the actual putting forth of the divine authority. To this corresponds, too, tlie expression, Ps. xcix. 1 : He sitteth above the cheru bim, therefore does the world tremble. Wholly in a simdar sense does Hezekiah, in his extreme neces- sity, call upon Jehovah as the one who rules over all kingdoms, when he addresses him as Jehovah Saba- ia wrong here. Such a metathesis, although it eeems simple, would bo cohtrary to clear phonetic pricriples. Had the (gut- tural come first, it would have been more plausible, but such ■i syllable as HI (riif.-) would hardly pass into ^3 (knr) Be- sides, the piimary sense of Z2~^ is not riding nor molion at &11, \>\i\pmiti(m — superposition, from whence comes I ho oilier idea, as secondary or implied. This is moet clearly sliown IB the same word in the Arabic and Syriac, although it quite plainly appears also in the Hebrew. It is liirmore easy and oatiirat Ut derive the name 3113 , not from anything in the lorm or ofllco of the cbcrubim, but from their being reniiirk- sbleengravedfiguruw, hence called pre-eminently 1 be ei/£;r(/t)- inffi. See the m«ouut of these rcpresenljitions in the tem- ple of Solomon. This would bring them very naturally flora HIS , the sense of which in the Syriac is, to plough, cut, cn- fravt. It is then, clearly, the same root with the Greek ypa*t -r/r«u«— <' RI', Lai. 8(CUiBo). They are the re- markable foims, figures, soulptores — engravings. — T. LI 0th, the God of Israel, who sitteth above the cheni bim. In Ezekiel, the cheruoim are denoted in strong synnbolical, allegorical forms, no huigcr as augels. but as r.i'n , ^"na, living things (Luther; beasts; Moreover, in Ezekiel x. there are again set forth in connection with the cherubim, the coals of ti'C that are to be cast over the city. And, finally, in the tem- ple of Ezekiel, do we find the cherubim again as the key-note for tlie symbolical destruction of thu tem pie (ch. xli. IS). We have in Ezekiel the cheiubiia figures especially set forth m their full development (man, the lion, the ox or bullock for sacrifice, ani the eagle), whilst in the Revelation they are recog- nized as the ground-forms of the divine ruling in the world, as symbolized in the four gronnd-fornn of the ereaturely life (see " Life of Jesus," i. p. 234, Dor/ma- tik, p. tJ03). If any one is disposed to reaird these as the ground- orms of the spiritual life iu the world, because the beasts bear up the throne of the divine rule in the world, or because, according to the anal- ogy of the Apocalypse, they pray unto God, there is no objection to be made to it. But they are not thus denoted as containing the idea of the highest erea- turely life. Thus also here, in accordance with all the related phices of Scripture, must we firmly hold fast the view that the cherubim are only symbolical angel-forms ; as we must also distinguish the sera phim everywhere from personal angels ; although in the manifestation of the cherubim, there was disclosed to the first men a ghmpse of the angel-world. As symbolical forms, they must be here regarded as ap- pointed to form a permanent post of watching, in 01 der to keep men from approaching Paradise, and especially the tree of life. When we perceive the fact that the cherubim everywhere form the accom- panying guard and watch of the divine throne, we are under the necessity of bringing Paradise also, and especially the tree of Ufe, which they are appointed to guard, in special relation to this throne Thereby m;iy it be explained how Jacob says; " 1 have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved (Gen. xxxii. ;;ii), — also how the beholding of God especially brmgs death, because it is through death that the highest lileisattMined (E.X. xxxiii. 2ll; Ps xvi. II; xvii. 15; 1 John ill. 2 ; and the history of the visions, Is. vi. 5 ; Dan. vii. 13; viii. 17; Kev. i. 17). The cloud and pillar of fire which led the children of Israel through the desert was also a sign of the presence of (iod, as well as a dividing between the glory of God and sin- ful men ; in other words, it was the guard that kept off from the divine glory the profane entrance .and the profane look. For that reason, it seems to stand in connection with the cherubim of the ritual sym- bolic, as it is connected with the cherubim and sera^ [jhiiii of the religious symbolic, view. The mythological analogies of the cherubim fig- ures are, in fact, most striking. " On the mountains north of India," says Knobel, '' or, in general, in the region of the mountain and Eden of (Sod, do the ancients (e. g. Ktesias, Jndea, xii ; Arrian, Uitt. Aniin.\v.'l''i; compare also Piiilostrat., Vit. Apoll. iii. -48) place thi; fabulous griffins, which they describe as feathered beings with lions' claws, the wings and beaks of eagles, Haining eye?, &c.,— making them the guardians of the gold that thei e abounds. Oth- ers refer them to the higher North, to the Arimas- piau country, describing them partly in a similar manner, and setting them forth as watchers of the gold, e. g. Hkkoii., iv. 13, 27; yEscii., iVow. 8n4 Pausa.v., &c. — Of these stories the author probabli had some knowledge, as ahso of tlie ^old land ol l.UAP. III. 1-2J 2« Elavilab, which he mentions." Delitzsch cites hesiJcs tlie Persian stories, according to which 99,999 Fer- vers (that is, a countless number) keep watch over the tree horn, which contain- in itself the power of the -esurrection. In regard to the connection between the Bible tradition and this legend, Delitz.gii.a^g of th( human race, that the vvoman was ever more se ducible than the man, that along with .sin came ii, the tendency to sin, consciou.sness of gnilt, aliena- tion from God, and evil in general,— all these are affirmations of the reUgious historical consciousuest which demand the historiealness of our tradition and would point back to some such fact, even tliough it were not written in Genesis. It is then the actual historical influences of our narration, in their world- historical significance, which wholly distinguish it from a myth. The symbolical understitnding of the history appears in this, that the universal existence of sin, of the fall, and of the fall of every individual, are reflected in it. Here come esiiecially into eon sideration : 1. The various mythological analogies of the biblical tradition of the fall. 2. The various exegetical understandings of the Jewish and the Christian theology. 3. Modern interpretations. I. In respect to ihe mythological ajinlogies, com pare Lucken, "The Traditions of the Human Raee," p, 74 n., h.aving the superscription : La chute (U Vhomme degeneri: est le fortdemeitt de la theologie de presgue toutes les ancien?>rs nations Voltairk. Philos. de Vhist. In the first place, Liicken shows why it is that the heathen legends respecting these facts must present themsehes as transformations. Then follow, first the legends of the old Persians. " According to the Zendavesta, or the sacred writ- ings of the old Persians, the peo])les of this race, namely the old Modes, Persians, and Bactiians, as well as all the Indogermanic peoples, had primarily the doctrine of four ages of tlie world. In the first, which lasted 3,000 years, the world was without evil, and Ormuzd, the good principle, reigned alone; in tile second, Ahriman began the conflict with Or- muzd ; in the third he divides with him the domin- ion ; in the fourth he is apparently to gain the victory, then to be subdued, after which is to follow the burning of the world. To the universal legend, how Ahriman brings death to Rajomord, the first man, there is attached the special story of the fall of the Mescliia and the Meschiane (p. 81). So the Indian legends also number four ages. The myth- ical Indian tendency has presented the fall in mani fold myths, as well Brahminic as Buddhistic. Here- upon tollow the Chinese legends, the Grecian legends (the Hesiodie ages of the world: the golden, the silver, the brazen, the iron, the Titan legend, the Prometheus legend, the Tantalus legend), then the Romish legends (the ancient time of Satuin), the Germanic legends (the gold thirst, the fall of Asen, to which may be added the admittance of Lock into the Asenbund, death of Baldur, and other similar things), then JSgyptian legends, as also those of th« Xegroes^ of the polar nations, of the Iroquois, of the Mexicans, &c,, &c." In conclusion, there is a treatise on the dominion of the demons, the origin of sorcery and idolatry, concerning woman and her place in heathendom, the restoration to pardon if the first men. In a shorter method, Delitzsch gives an account of the myths in relation to the fall, p. 169, KsoBF.L, p. 40. — 2. Exegetical understanding of the Jewish and the Christian theology. " It was a universally prevaiUng opinion among the Jews that Satan was active in the temptation of the first men. This is found in Philo, and in the ' Book of Wisdom,' ch. ii. 24 : ' through envy of the devi; came sin mto the world.' In later Jewish writin(!< 244 QENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSKS Pararaael, the head of the evil spirit-", is called ^;"1Sl~n fn:n , the old serpent, because he tempted Eto in the form of a serpent, or IL'n: (the serpent) alone (compare the places in Eisknmenger, ' Reve- ation of Judaism,' i. p. 822)." Hesgstexberg, '■ Christology," i. p. 7. It must nevertheless be ob- derved, that even among the Jews there had alre;idy come m a iwofnld conception of this history of the temptation. Philo {De Mundi Opijicio) saw in the serpent an allegory of the evil lust (^Soi-ri). In the same manner does Maimonides interpret the place allegorically ; whilst Josephus understands the speaking of the serpent as a proper speaking, and other Jews :igain are inclined to see in the serpent an apparent form merely of Satan himself Abar- banel and others connect a directly seductive ad- dress of Satan to the woman with the fact of his winding himself about the tree, and tasting of its fruit. Cyril of Alexandria supposes the serpent to have been only an assumed outward appearance of Satan, whilst Basil, Chrysostom, Augustine, and, in general, the later fathers, regard Satan as having served himself" of the serpent, and spoken througli him. The inclination of the Alexandrians to an allegorizing interpretation continues in a progressive measure, in the school of the Gnostics, namely, among the Ophites (see Muller, " History of Cos- mology," p. 190), and in like manner in the inter- pretations of the later mystics and theosophists. According to Grotius, Moses Ibund the narration before us in the form of an ancient pc«m. Clericus is inclined to agrt-e with those who hold that the serpent di>l not actually speak, bvit only eat of the fruit before the eyes of Eve, and that with this was connected the temptation of Satan (as Abarbanel maintains) ; but it appears to him that in re obscura tutissima ingenun i(f7ioranti(e confessio. Concerning the modern views, an account is given by the author of the article " Sin," in Herzog's " Real Encyclope- die," as follows: The tempter is the devil (John viii. 44 ; Rev. xii. 9 ; Book of Wisdom, ii. 24), who used the serpent as his instrument (2 Cor. xi S) ; the serpent is, therefore, neither alone active as such (T. Miiller, Schenkel), nor is he an incorpora- tion of Satan (Gerhardt, Philippi), nor the mere emblem of the cosmical principle (Martenseu). The influence of Satan upon men was by way of dialogue, wheieiu the peculiar nature of the serpent was taken advantage of and with which his alluring motions may have cooperated (Hengstcnberg, Thomasius, Deiitzsch, Ebrard), not a mere physical influence in that the unrecognized voice of Satan like a vision- reflection passed over upon the serpent (in which case 'he speaking serpent would have been merely a syjnbolical figure), nor something at the time unob- served by the first formed men, but afterwards, in the later recollections ol the tradition, taken for Satanic influence (liofmann). The tree of knowledge of good and evil is neither a poison-tree (Reinhard, Doderlein, Morns) nor otherwise a tree of knowledge of good and evil in such special sense that the cousequences of the enjoyment must have been an intoxication, a disturbance of the pure c(|uilibrium in the harmony of the first man (Lange), nor a mystical tree whose fruit, for the one who enjoys it, bi the reception of evil into his being, and therewith the knowledf,'e of good and evil (Martcnaen), nor an emblem of the wtnld darkened to the perdition of death, in its false influence upon man (Schenkel), but — an ordinary tree, which had 't« significance only through the command of God." In this dry idealless positivism must such an undersfandina come to its stop. We niust, however, distiiiguieh at present three or four principal views: 1. Tha traditional, orthodox, pojiular representation, an cording to which the serpent, under the influence of Satan, Uterally spoke, or Satan, in fact, in the appearance of the serpent-form. 2. The Gnoetie allegorii.-al, farlher developed into the mythical allegoric, and, in fact, at one time in a sense akir A Ophitism (the view of Hegel, according to DEitTiSCH, p. 171), and again, in a more cburehly and ethiial sense. 3. The connection of the definite dialectical speaking of Satan with corresponding motions of the serpent, such as its eating the fruit. 4. An influence of Satan, exemplified in acts of the serpent, inca- pable of being farther defined, and thus becoming a dialogue tlirough the visionary or ecstatic condi- tion of the woman. This is our view (Dogmatic, p 439), for the understanding of which there must b* previously an insight into the essential nature of thii visionary state of soul. In respect to the desigl of our narration, there are, in like manner, various vie"s presented. According to Berger (" PraC' tical introduetion to the Old Testament, continued from Augusti "), who is disposed to see here, nol the history of the first men generally, but only thai of an ancestor of the Abrahamitic race (a hereditary legend, in fact, of the family of Abraham, which pre- supposes an already previous longer existence of humanity ; Kains, Ackerbau, Stadtbau), the most usual decision in respect to the aim of our narration is that which regards it as containing a doctiint of the origin of evil. As a modification of this view, however. Pott, sets forth the proposition that its ami is to represent the transition from the golden to the silver age. For the old narrator this is much too general a view. If he intended, which is the most likely, something more than narrating merely for the sake of the story, — in other words, if he meant also to teach us something along with it, then his purpose could have been nothing else than to show how man may have been led into transgression, und what consequences it must have had (i. p. 55). According to the Jerusalem Targum, Eichborn, and Paulus the design of our narration was to paint the loss of the golden age, whilst Von Bolden, Hegel, Knobel and others, in exact accordance with the Gnostic Ophites, would represent it as an advance (an ad- vance, indeed, attended by calamities) from the siata of savage beastUness. The representation clearly presents itself as the religious symbolical primeval history of humanity, holding the key of all history that follows it, according to the contrast of the fall and the resurrection, or of sin and death, aa also redemption and renovation, whilst it gives the ground for the unveiling of the demon and angel- world, as the appointed means for introducing the deepest understanding of the history of the kingdom of God. According to its most peculiar key-note, it is a representation of the beginning of the king- dom of grace. For a catalogue ot the modem literature in respect to the different interpretation! of the fall, see Bretschneider, " Systematic Devel opment," n. p. 620. 2. 77(« Probation-Tree, the Probation a - (A* Temptation. " The Rabbins and Mohammedans un derstood by the probation-tree, the vine ; the Gre cian church fathers understood it of the fig-tree; the Latins, in the first place, ol' the apple. The tre< horn plays the same part in the Zendavesta. Tlw CHAP. III. 1-24. 241 I Hindoos ppcak of a knowledge and creation tree, the Tibetans of a sweet, wliiti^li herb, or marrow, from the enjoyment of which originated the feeling of shame, and the custom of wearing clothes." Von Bohlen. We have elsewhere alluded to tlie analogy between the falling into sin of the second ancestor Noah, "ho bec;ime intoxicated by the fruit of the Tine, and in consequence thereof lay in ids naked- ness, and the falling into .sin of the priiEiitive ances- tor who became aware of his nakedness after eating of the forbidden fruit. This analogy does not justify us in concluding that it was the vine, but some other fruit, perhaps, whose effect, for tl>e first men, was too strong, being of an intoxicating or disturldng nature. If we do not find in that unknown fruit some immanent ground of the divine command, it is clear that we must adopt the idea of a purely arbi- trary ordinance. Nature itself is, indeed, and in the most general sense, a tree of probation for man ; this pecuharity of it has always had its special types, and there are vet various probation trees for different nations—such as opium, hashiseh, the coco plant, etc. So Beyer, in his sermon on the History of the Primitive World (p. 90), takes tlie contrast between the tree of life and the tree of probation to consist in this, that the first, although it had not the power to make men ever healthy and young, possessed, nevertheless, a heiling and strengthening efficiency ( inalogous to similar medicine trees), whilst the pro- bation-tree was, in these respects, the opposite. He supposes it, indeed, without any ground, to have been a poison-tree ; — without any ground, we say, for the human race is not poisoned corporeally, but distempered and disordered physically through an ethical consequence of its effects. Besides this, the probation- tree is distinguished from the serpent, as the probation from the temptation. The probation is from God, as the temptation is from the evil one. Tlie prol:>ation, along with the demand for watchfulness, presents an alternative for the good. The temptation increases the danger of the alterna- tive with an instigation to the evil. The probation has in view that man should be on his guard ; it is intended to lay the ground of his normal develop- ment. The temptation has in view the fall of man ; its purpose is to entice him into an abnormal devel- opment, or rather, entanglement. Since the time that sin is in the world, has each probation also in itself the force of a temptation, because there is added to it the enticement to sin on the part of the devil, the world, and one's own peculiar evil lusts. In this sense of probation can it be said God tempted Abraham. And just on this account is it that the sins of a man already perpetrated become for him a tempt- ation to future crimes ; therefore do we pray : Lead us not into temptation. Moreover, the liereditary *sm is itself one great universal temptation, which lies as a load upon the human race. From all this it follows that the temptation which was added to the first probation of man came not from God, nei- ther from any physical creature, and just as Uttle from anything withiu the soul of innocent man, but solely from a malignant spirit. In this fact, how- ever, lie two consequential inferences : the first that {here are apiriis besides men endowed with reason (the Kigel world), the second that in this spirit-world there must have been already a fall preceding that of man. 3. The Serpfnt and Satan. The former has bjen thus described : '■ The serpent, a beast like to an embodied thunderbolt that has had its origin in the deepest night, parti-colored, painted like fire, as black tind dark as n j^ht, its eyes like glowing sparky its tongue bhick. yet cloven like a flame, its jaws t cliasm of the unknown, its teeth fountains of \ enoni the sound of its mouth a hiss. Add to this th« strange and wonderful motion, ever striving like a flash to quiver, and like an arrow to flee, were it not hindered by its bodily organizati(jn. It appears among the beasts like a condemned and fallen angel , in the heathen world of false gods, it hath lound and still finds, ever, awe and adoration ; its subtlety has become a byword, its n.ime a naming of Satan, whilst the popular feeling, even now, as in all times past, connects a ctirse and an exorcism with its ap- pearance." F. A. KRU.MMACHKR, " Paragra])hs for the Holy Histtiry " (p. 65). In this splendid painting there is left out the brutal clumsiness and obtuseness of the serpent which stand in such remarkable contrast witli its mobility and its guile. (See R. S-vell, " Phi- losophiciU Observations of Nature," Dresden, 1839.) ReSfiecting the presence and the siejniiicatice of poi.ton in nature. "There are, in inorganic n^iture, a class of substances which destroy life, not through any mechanical injury and rending, but rather by insinu- ating themselves smoothly and gently into the or- gans of the living thing ; — thus forcing their way in with a subtle atid malignant power, they invade the life in its most interior and invisible laboratories, throwing into disorder all their functions, and there- by bringing in sickness and most painful death. And so, too, are there beasts that iiefer attack theii foe with plain and open weapcuis, killiug the organs by mechatdcally breaking them up ; but, on the other hand, with weapons concealed, underhaml, sly-ilart- ing, and apparently weak, seem to inflict oidy a slight injury upon their foe, and, in fact, to be only playing with him, whilst, at the same time, through this insignificant hurt introducmg a horrible |)o\ver of destruction, ever inwardly growing, until finally it breaks out in tormenting sickness, and ends in r wretched death. These beings and products of na ture which thus destroy life, not mediately throug-i an outer breaking of its parts and organs, but by a hostile effect upon the very life functions, and which, consequently, must po.ssess an enmity directly aiming at the life itself, — we denote by the name of jDO«o7io««." — " Schubert has well remarked, that the poisonous beasts are beings that appear to be placed ambiguously and doubtfully between two •otherwise quite distinct classes, each of which, in their own sphere, present a distinct, perfect, and free individuality. In such middle beings there neces- sarily lies a striving for a higher form, though ever cleaving to the lower. Thus shows itself in them, often, an aberration from an otherwise soimd natu- ral tendency, whilst their very enjoyment is, for the most part, attended with pain and disgust. On their bodily side they exhibit a nature, ever, in some re- spects, infirm and sickly, and never rightly attaining to repose." — " It is not to be wondered at, there- fore, that in the collected organism of nature, as well as in individual creatures, there comes in, at tiie tran- sition point, an infirm, ambiguous organization, inter- penetrated by evil fluids, which are able to inocu- late other creatures with the malady of theii- own confusion and disorder. And this i« nothing else, than poison. Since each poison is a sensible sub- stance, or so presented, which has become an origi' nal cause of disease." Under this point of view th< author now treats of arsenic, of meicury, of prussit acid, of spiders, and of snakes. "All poisonous ani nials carry with them a sluggish, and appsrcntli ^46 GEN'ESIS, OR THE FIRST BOCK OV MOSES. loathing life. The most of them seldom or never jet themselves in motion towards the object of their passion, although there is no failure in them, either of strength or swiftness, when they let out upon Jieir prey. This strong contrast of sluggish rest and angry vehemence, produces upon us tlie impression of some irreconcilable bitbrmity in their nature. They are lurking beasts, lying in the darkest and most unclean recess. Along with this they seem lispeeially to love the damp and nioukly place where ieath riots. Tims, for example, do the rattlesnakes love to lay themselves Ijehind some foul stump, whilst others seek the old mouldy wall, or the pile of ruins, or the foul dusty comer. It is worth re- marking that almost all of them have for the lower organization of the belly a greatly disproportioned extension, whilst, on the other hand, the breast and heart, or the organs that correspoud to these, are shrivelled and contracted. In the most dangerous and most poisonous among them, the last trace of any interior breast formation has disappeared, whilst they show not the least rudiments of any shoulder bones. We see them dart with fury upon their prey, then laboring under it with infinite pain and distress, whilst for each gorging they pay with fee- bleness and torpidity. In this condition they gaze around them stupid and blear-eyed, whilst they suffer themselves to be killed with sticks without making any defence." — " These giant serpents, the crocodiles and the alligators, have generally, and in an extraor- dinary degree, the look of a former world. They are the Titans that, under the dominion of the new cre- ated race of gods, are thrust down into the deep, and into darkness, whence many a lin)e still there spits forth the fire of their rage. The croaking of the frogs, the grunting of the toads, the shrill sharp piping of the lizard, the hiss of the seipent, give none of them any special conception of the emotions of which they are tlie expression. The serpents are without doubt the most wonderful, and, so to speak, the most like fable, of any beings of the present cre- ation." Next follows the depicting of the singular contrasts in the nature of the serpent : its rude ele mentary form and its fine, spiritual expression, its subtle look, which never carrifs itself out in action, its enchantment or fascination of its prey, and its capability of becoming transported whilst itself in a state of fascination and torpidity (p. 67, etc.). (See the above remarks and the article '• Serpent," by' Winer, Wdrterbuch fur dax ChrisUiche Volk. — Satan. Between the two contradictory suppositions, one of which is that our text recognizes otdy a tempt- ation of the serpent, but not. at all, of any evil spirit expressing itself through it, and the other, rep- resenting it to contain a full Knowledge of Satan, lies the hypotla'Sts that corresponds to the idea of an organic unfolding of biblical doctrine ; it is, that we have here the first germ of the doctrine of Satan, as we also have before us the first germ of a soteri- ological Chrisiology — that is, of a Christ of salva- tion. Both germs are throughout placed in u re- markable relation to each other ; the destroyer of the serpent is announced in the seed of woman. But the actual cons-ious knowledge, wlii(;h is here expressed in a symbolical form, consists in this, that it represents the serpent as a malignant spirit, ciafiy, Ivin,.^, and rejoicing in miscliief, who shows himself, and will continue to show himself the foe of man and the foe of (ioil. Concerning the farther devel- opment of the doctrine of Satan, see the cxcgetical anuotationB. i. The Temptation of Christ in the Wildemcsi u antetype of the temptation of Adam in Para iise. 5. The Orhjin of Sin. Our text gives us (ht ground of supposing, in the first place, a distinct or* gin of sin, in opposition to the system which would make the oiigin of sin to happen concurrently with the initial constitution of human nature itself. It gives IIS occasion to distinguish a threefold oiigin of sin: 1. The cosmical-demonic : 2. the physiological genesis of sin ; S. the Adaniic-historical. 1. Evident ly is the first human sin to be referred back to a pre- ceding demoniacal temptation ; therefore, also, to i preceding demoniacal sin, and accordingly, too, to an earlier fall in the spirit-world. Nevertheless, the essential origin of sin is not thereby explained, for there comes up the further question : how sin origin- ated in the spirit-world ? According to the Apocry. ' phal book.s, the essential root of sin is mainly pride, " yTTfpTjtf'ai'ia, which is always an assuming of a false god, that is, of idolatry. (This is expressed some- what obscurely. Wisdom of Sirach, x. 15 : i-pxh imep- Tjaioi/ms afxapria. Book of Wi.=dom, xiv. 12; v. 27 : ^PXV TTopfflui eiTii/uta fl5w\wv.'~-Tj yap TUiv avi^ivy.iperadditn, gifts superadded il Paradise ! See to the contrary. Acts xvii. 28. 12. The banishraeiit from Paradise was in i special sense a sending foith to the cultivation of the field (see the Exegetical explanations). Th< divine clothing of the first man. The doctrine of Gratia, prmreniens (see Lange's " Dogmatics "), The clothing of man referred back to the divine revelation and regulation. And yet we cannot, on this account, say with Dehtzsch, that "a pure deligh in the beauty of the divine-formed human figure is now no more possible ; that nakedness is full of sin and tetiipting to sin." If this is so then all pure interest in the human beauty has become impos- sible. 1 3. The cherubim. See the Exegetical explana- tions. 14. The disclosure of a spirit-world. With the consciousness of guilt there is also disclosed to the human consciousness the demoniac deep of its being Man has entered the spirit-world, he has partaken of its knowledge, and has now the first foreboding look into the angel-world, and the world of fallen spirits ("Dogmatics," p. 550). In this place, too, the Scrip- ture opens up to us a glimpse of a spirit-world created before man. Especially is there introduced the doctrine of the angels, although we must not regard the cherubim as personal primarily, but only as symbolical angel-l'orms. 1 5. That with the judgment of God upon man, that is, with the ceasing of the paradisaical covenant, God's covenant of grace begins, is perceived with especial clearness by Coeceius : Summa doctrhur tie ftederc et textamento dei^ 1648. Correctly has Zwin- gli laid stress upon the idea, that the promise of salvation, as given to Adam and Eve, carries tis back to the conclusion that even up to them there extend ed a retroacting power of redemption. 16. The divine appearings in Paradise form the point of commencement for all theophauies before Christ, and, as such, are not to be identified with the actual incarnation (or man-becoming) of God in Christ. They are, however, to be regarded, perhaps, as typical pre-reprcsentations of the same, and as having had, therefore, in the idea of Christ, their principle. Compare Kefl, p. 56, where, however, the vi-:ion-side of the theophanies does not appear to be properly appreciated. HOMILETICAIi AND PEACTICAL. See the literature of which a catalogue is before given, and the remarks, Doctrinal and Ethical. Homilies on the whole section under the general point of view : Paradise lost, or tiie fall, or the origin of .sin and evi!, or the solenm begiiming of human history, or the origin of tlie earthly order of things, or the first disclosure of a spirit-world and the connection between the spirit-world and the Inmian, or, finally, the beginning of tlie kingdom of grace, that is, the gospel — The end of the paradisa ieal covenant, the beginning of the covenant of redemption.— The beginning of the revelation 01 preventing grace, or tlie iinitia ]>rf the flaming sword of an indignant righteousness. — With the separation from the outer tree of life the protevangel becomes the germ of a new tree of life for them aid thei race. — The prospect of the first man in tlu futurt according to its signification for m : 1. A piospeol of immeasurable sorro", and yet, 2. a prospect ot an endless hope. Starke : — Ver. 1. Luther : So did the devil draw and tear them from the word of God. As long as the word stood in tlirir heart, so long was the life and the prospect of its continiiance. — Ver. 3. Vul- gate : Ne forte moriamini. Were this the true sense of the words, Eve must have already trcateo the sentence of death as something most uncertain. — Ver. 4. It was a great sin that Eve turned away from God and his word, and listened to the devil ; but it was a nmch greater that slie fell in with the devil, who gave God the lie, and as it were struck at him with his fists. — Ver. 5. Satm tl e first author and predecessor of Antichrist, who is a disputing adversary and exalieih himself above all that is called God or worshipped (2 Tlie.-s. ii. 4 ; Dan. xi. 3ii). — -Behold now, in the midst of the fair Paradise there appears a crafty and poisonous serpent ! It is here, it may be even by thy side. Be on thy guard against it (Sirach xxi. 2). Unbelief and doubt of God's word are the sins by which llie devil at first sought to cast men down (Matt. iv. 3) Hast thou already obtaitied the victory over the devil ? be not too secure. — The word of the Lord is truth, but that of the devil is lies. — Lange : The conceits of " opened eyes," and of some strange wisdom, are the snares wheieby Satan especially sc'-ks to stum- ble the learned. — Ver 6. Lust of the flesli, lust of the eye, piidc. The garment of righteousness and hoUness was put off. — The fig-leaves. It is not yet proved that they were fig-leavts tli.t Eve gave to her husband. The Hebrew word denotes twigs as well as leaves. — Untimely curiosity brings commonly great sorrow of heart. — God is not the cause of man's fall. — The guile and cozening of woman can often entice the strongest men (Jud. -xvi. 15). — Man is ever se 'king fig-leaves to hide his shame and cover his sins, but they are ever visible to the all- seeing eyes of God (1 Sim. xv. 15). — Ver. 8. The interpreting " the voice of God," of the thunder. — Parallel of the Garden of Adam and the Garden of Christ: 1. Adam's shep in P.iradise and his gain, the wife; Christ'» diath-sleip in tlie gaiden of Joseph, and its fruit in the resurnction, his bride the church. 2. In Paradise' Adam was bound with the cords of the devil ; in Gethseinane Christ was bound, to free the human race frnm their imprison- ment. 3. In the garden of Eden sin began ; in another garden was it buried in Christ's grave. — Ver. 9. Lctiier: Adam and Eve are ruined in them- selves, they can no longer help themselves, they are forsaken of all creatures ; the reason can form no other judgment than that there is no help for them in heaven and earth. Yet here, from this very ei- ample, may we learn that God will help though we may be forsaken of all creatures. And yet He give* such help only for his Son's sake, whom even here He has promised to send to the human race,— (?od called to Adam. Laxge : A proof of the prc-emi- nency of the male sex, and, therefore, also, of the higher obligation which Adam had laid upon him, not to follow his wife into evil, but rather to hold her back, — Though God a long time winks at the sinner, and keeps silence in respect to his sins, yet at the right time does He let him hear his voice, and seeks to awaken him out of his sleep. — Ver. J 3. Sf it ever goes ; disobedience follows unbelief it al •^50 GENESIS, OR THE i'lRST BOOK OF MOSES. the faculties and members of men ; after this comes concealment, exculpation, and, perh;ips, apology for sm; filially, man complains of (iod and would make him the cause of his sins, A frightened conscience tveT mistakes itself the worst (Wisdom of Solomon xvii. 12). Man never, God always, has the blame (Jer. ii. 3.5). — Ver. 15. Luther: Christ crushes the serpeni's head, that is, his kingdom of death, sin, and hell ; tlie devil bites him in the heel, that is, he slays and tortures him and his in the bodv (Rom. viii. 7). Since the woman sinned fir-t (1 Tim. ii. 14), so is she also here named first, and first assured ol' the gospel. Therefore here, also, to this proud aud mighty foe, and for his greatest ignominy and shame, there is opposed, not Adam specially, al- though he is not excluded, but, iu preference, the weaker vessel. Such a piercing of the heel i.s more largely described Psalm xxii. ; Isaiah liii. Among other places this first gospel is described in the ex. Psalm ; also in Is. xxvii. 1 ; John xiv. 30 ; Col. i. 13, 14; 1 Tim. ii. 6 ; 1 John iii. 8 ; Rev. xii. 4, 5. — Ver. 16. The experience here described was that of Rachel, Thamar, the daughter-in-law of Eli, and the wife of PIdnehas (1 Sam. iv. Ill, 20). [The question whether Mary was born without pain is one ihat does not pertain to our salvation ; individuals may affirm whilst otheis deny it.] — Ver. 19. Since human nature, through sin, is so frail and pei ishable, it is a good and wise act of God, that he lets the separa- tion of soul and hody continue for so long a time, even to the reunion and resurrection that is to endure. — It is a great consolation for women in child-' 'earing that their pains before, and during, and alter the birth, are laid upon thera by God. He who smites can also heal again (Col. iii. 18 ; 1 Pet. iii. 1). Man, fear not death, but keep the thought, rather, that it is ordained by the Lord of all licsh (Sirach xli. 4). — Ver. 20. In view of the death in- curred, the woman might rather have been called the dead, and the mother of the dead. Ilcr hiiving been called by Adam havah (Efe), the Ihunff and the mother of the living, is grounded on the foregoing promise of the Messiah (Mark iii. S.")). — It is a con- solation for the poor and the low, that God clothed our first parents with skins. — As often as thou puttest off thy garments, think on Jesus Christ's coat of righteousness, and aspire that thou mayest be clothed therewith (Is. Ixi. lo ; Rev. iii. 17, 18; Ii(mi. xiii. 14). — [.Vdam is become like one of us ; here is indicated his justification, the jnatUia imputaia.'\ — Ver. 23. The puiushmeut here declared was also bencvolenily intended ; for though it is bittcT' to man to obtain his food from the labor of the field, Btill docs this labor, while it supports him, contribute .to the promiition of his health, and to his avoidance of many sins, such as those that proce<*d fi-oni idle- ness.— Ver. 24. Paradise was an ini-ige : 1. Of tlu' kingdom of grace ; 2. of the kingdom of glory. The tree of life pre-eminently lypifies Christ. — Com- parisons betwcet: Adam and Christ. — Agriculture is holy. — O miin, wliat art thou V Earth, and again to become earth. lii^thiiik thee oft and diligently of thi.s : so shall every proud thought be gime. The earthly joy has ceased, yet still we have a heav- enly. Valku. llKKiiKKiiKii : AliKjnalia Dii: Ye shall not die at all ; that was tlnr first lie in the world ; the devil told it; therclbrc Christ rightly calls him « liar -iiid a iimrderer from the beginning (Jolni viii. 44). — " I was afraid." That wax the first lanunila- tlOD in tbo world, and came from sin. — 0 how often must xe, poor men, now say with Eve, the serpen beguiled me ! ScnRooEa; Every creature created for endlesfi perfectibility is also exposed to corruption (Job iv 18 ; XV. 14). Some would place the fall of angels in ch. i., between ver 1 and ver. 2, since they suppose an original creation in ver. 1, and, as a consequence of the fall of the spirits in the same, would read in- steail of the words, " the earth mix waste," etc., ver 2, ^* the earth became waste." tfthcrs look for the angel-fall in the intimation supposed to be conveyed in the account of the second day's work by the omis- sion of the words, " And God saw that it was good." To others again, by reason of ch. i. 31, the time im- mediately after the completed world-creation seema more suitable for this. And some fathers, again, bring the fall of the evil angels into connection with the temptation of man, meainng that the former hap- pened by means of the latter (eh. iii. 14). God bears, with inexpressible long-suS'eriiig, the devil and hia kingdom, because to him the good and right of the development, even in its per»ersion, is a holy thing The good is not to be forced. God's power and lovt bears now the unfolding of the creatmcly life, edu- cates it freely and gradually. — Vers. l-tl. Hirhek: Eve knew not yet that the subtlety of the serpent was an evil subtlety ; it was to her only slire«dnes9 and cunning. She took the seipent for her tutor. The serpent turns it all round, makes the piiohibitiou greater than the gifts, tir allows her oidy to hear the former. The sly attack of Satan is directed against the spiritual citadel of the soul, against faith in God; since %vith faith obedience stands or falls, JIatt. iv. 3 (Ps. Ixxviii. 19), The lusts follow after of them, selves. — Vers. 6, 7. Lutmer: Unbelief is the primi- tive cause and source of all sin, and whenever tha devil can succeed, either in getting away the word from the heart, or in falsifying it, and thus bringing the soul to unbelief, he can easily do in the end what he jileases. Such subtlety and wickedness follow aU false teachers, who, under the appearance of good, would pluck out the eyes of the people of God, blind- ing them to his word, or painting before them another god who has no existence. Whenever, thcrclbre, God's word is changed or falsified, then, as Moses says in his song, do there come in new gods, which our tiitheis never reverenced. He would have man regard his service to God as servile bondage, in or- der, by deluding him with the phantom of his own proper sovereignty, to make him the slave of shi, and, iu this way, like himsell. This gives us a glimpse, perhaps, of the cause of Satan's ruin. Through the desire of sovereignty it may be that he himself be- came a fallen being. — Hambach: The learned snap at such doubts of (iod's word as the cat snajis at the mouse, regarding tlicm iis mo.st excellent dainties, wlicn, in fiict, it is a feeding on death. Out of envy must the |)rohibition have flowed ; thus would he make <;od to be Satan (Wisilom of Solomon ii. 24), aud himself to be God, Satan's [uomise begins like God's llneatening: "in the day ye eat therciif," etc. — Haco: Man alloweil himself to fmcy that the com- man 1 aiul prohibition of (iiid wcie nut the rules of good ami evil, but that good and evil njust ha\c thcil own [irinciplcs anil licginniiigs, and so he lu'ts aftei a knowledge of these laiicicd principles, that he may be no more dependent on God's revealed will, but only on himself and his own pro[ier light rather than on (iod. Pride has overthrown itself (tliat is, Satan). Uis words invite to a liilse self-sufficiency, and to a liold independence; lie preaches rebellion, his mos CHAP. III. 1-24. 251 interior being. — Herder: Thoug'i here an apple l^iv, and tut. ^ the death, whilst in God's hands the bal- ance hung suspi'nded, as soon as it came to subtle, casuisdeal reasoaintr, dowu weigliod the apjile ; the light word die flew up, and in the apple ICve saw uothiug less than divinitv. Xo tree in all tlie garden round had a lool; so lair or so desirable to the woman as the one forbidden. Now is hei unlieliei decided. — The same: 7'o lust nfler. To have the soul over- powered b» the senses, to be allured or lascinated, to bo in a state of fluttering or throbbing agitation. No longer in thy control ; they are beyond ; the soul is off to the other side; thou w'llt. thou ninxt awny to thy parted self, which dwells theie in the beloved fruit. Wherefore, at first, an inward selfish turning away of the soul from that divine coulbrmity which sustains its destination to a higher godlikene.ss. Pride and xelfsii^cletici/. Of this inner state the origin appears as unbehef in God's word, and. there- by, as an erroneous or superstitious belief in an un- known being. Desire follows the tickling of the sense. The first female siimer becomes, after Sa- tan's fashion, the first temptress. — Krummaciier: In the first sin lie concealed the three cardinal sins, lust of the flesh, lust of the eye, and pride (that is, of un- righteous coveting of possession, enjoyment, and power. — (Concerning the time when tlie fall took place, see p. 47). — Ver. 7. By experience, alas ! did they become aware that what they had lost was the good, that that into wljieh they had fallen was the €vil. — They would have become lords, like God, and now they are no longer masters even of tlieir own bodies. Man fell towards evening. At this season, in later times, the paschal lambs were slain as types of Christ (Exod. xii. 16). Their hiding under the trees m the g.irden stands parallel to their making them- selves aprons. What the one was in tlie small, the same was the other in the greater, account. The one betrays their ignorance of the great power and depth of sin, tlie other their lost knowledge of the omnipo- tence and omniscience of God (Ps. cxxxix. ; Sirach xiT. 2; Book of Wisdom xvii. 10-13). Both are a symbol and a sign of their falling away, and, there- with, of tlieir shame. Both, moreover, are a svmbol and a sign of their divine original, and, therewith, of a glimmering hope of redemption from the body of death. Satan is not at all ashamed of himself; Satan does not bide himself before God. — Vers. 9-13. The voice of God still reaches the sinner (Ps. cxxxix. 7-13). Adam and Eve show themselves in tlieir pure sin-nakedness. Dissatisfied with and unjust towards his nearest friend and towards his God, — they who before had been his joy and his desire, ^so does sinner complain of sinner, yea, of God himself, on account of his free ordaining and his very kind- ness (Lam. iii. 3y ; Ps. xviii. 27). — Luther : (Jod fiails to Adam, since to him alone had come the word of God, on the sixth day, not to eat of the forbidden fruit. As, therefore, he alone had heard the com- mand of God, so is he the first summoned to judg- ment. The most loving gifts of God (ch. ii. 18, 20) become an occasion to the sinner, and are used as weapons against the giver. Sin loosens all bands, even the most excellent and the most holy. He calls her no longer, my wife. — Vers. 14, 1.5. Luther: He calls not ujion the serpent; he asks him no questions respecting sins that are past ; there is nothing of this kind to bring him to repentance ; but he is condemned on the spot. (It would appear from this, that a pre- vious fall of Satan is already here supposed.) — KanMHACHER: Ai'ter its work is finished, then is lust divested of its garment of light, then does it appeM in its true form of a sneaking, earth-eating worm, ever crawling upon its belly. He shall be given up (for that is the force of the language as applied tc Satan) to the most extreme conteiufit, to the deepest shatiic ^md degradation, and shall become, in all re- spects, like a serpent, etc., until, at last, lie is cas^ into the fiery lake There is a ditlerenee between the fallen man and the fallen angel ; the former is lyuigly seduced, tt e latter is the lying seducer ; the one be- comes evil from without; the other is tlie author of evil from himself. The fiend has struck us only on the heel ; therefore shall his head be crushed: the woimds which he infiicis are curable ; the wounds in- flicted on him must bring him unto death. — Vers. 16-19. The desire becomes a burden. Through pain does lust revenge itself upon the senses; and yet. too, immediately on these pains there fillowa great joy (John xvi. 21). With gentle force would the wife rule and mislead the man to sin. There- fore is she cast into subjection, into a state of con- stant dependence upon the man. The field upon the small scale is a speaking symbol of man's earthly condition on the greater. Adam's transgression was a breaking of the whole ten commandments taken together (then follows the maimer in which this is deduced, p. 63). — Ver. 20. Here, as earlier, the wife has her name from the man. In a similar maimer does the wife, at the present day, exchange the pater- nal name for that of the man. — Luthek : It is the world, moreover, that in these signs of wretchedness becomes mad and foolish ; for who can easily tell how much of care and expense people incur on ac- count of clothing ? Were the self-made and fig-leaf aprons a figure of our own righteousness, which ex- poses more than it covers onr nakedness, so are the clothings made o( skins the svmbols of the right- eousness which comes through the hfe, at;d suffer ings, and death of the Redeemer and Mediator I Is Ixi. 10 ; Rev. iii. 17, 18). A sharp contrast that be tween the first Adam who would, robber like, demaml of God, and the second Adam, who tliought it no robbery to be like God (Phil. ii. 6). God now un- dertakes the charge of the garden. Earlier it was to be guarded i// men ; now it is to be guarded af/ainst them, — 'There came the day of salvation. 1 1 opened again the door to the fair Paradise. Gerl.ich ; The immediate cousi-quence of the fall is the awaking the feeling of shame, that is, the consciousness that now the spirit, torn away from God, can no more have power over the flesh. In this feeling of shame the awakened conscience now clothes itself; it is the fear that would hide from God, who now appears as an adversary. The devil, whose corporeal appearance is not mentioned in the Script- ure (and which, therefore, m.ay be generally said to be impossible), — what constrained liim to speak through the beast'? It (that is, the serpent) took advantage of man's divinely imparted consciousness, that he was destined to a higher godlikeness, in which he should attain to perfect security against every temptation ; this was for the purpose of blind- ing him by a deceptive appearance, giving him a false glimpse of the glory of this godlikeness in the freedom of choice (that is, an apparent freedom). The origin of sin lies, therefore, not in the sensitiv ity, as this history shows, but in the spiritual aspi ration after a false self-sufficiency, independent of God. AcijcsTiNE : After they were fallen out of the'j lordlv state, and the body bad now received 'nu< 2b2 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OK MOSES. itsi;lf a sickly and death-b<^avin^ coDCupiscence. even then, ill ttie midst of the _ lishment, tlie rational Boul gave witness to its noble oniiin, and was ashamed of its beastly ineliniition. Still, behind this feeling of shame, it evidently seeks to hide the guilt of dis- obedience. The first sin shows itself immediately as the mother of a new one. Instead of acknowledging hie guilt, Adam puts it upon the woman, yea, even npon God himself, when he adds the words, " whom th.r:i gavest to me for a companion." The woman carries it on in the same way of sinful exculpation. At that lime, the labor of the field afforded the sin- gle example of man's outward calling upon the earth ; on every condition, nevertheless, on every calling, on every occupation of earth, is laid the curse, that is, great necessity and tribulation, great vanity and dis- appointment in the most painful toil. Since that time, moreover, a great change has passed upon na- ture. The death of the body is the visible emblem and type of the everlwting destruction. It is the dark curtain hung before the world beyond, and which, to the unconverted sinner, covers nothing else than iiopeless misery. Lisco, B. 1 : It is no less Satanic when Satan uses language respecting God's word and revelation simi- lar to that which is found in the Holy Scriptures. — Sin from sin. — In place of wretched lies, man ought to confess ; in place of sinful exculpation he ought the more to seek forgiveness. — Calwer, Handbook : Christ the serpent-crusher. Ver. 19 : Here, too, again, are punishment and redemption. Ver. 20 : Man clothed in the skins of slain beasts ; how solemn now to him is death thus contemplated ! — As in ver. 6, the beginning of prophecy, so in ver. 21, the be- ginning of sacrifice. — Comparison of the three first chapters in the Bible with the last. — Bonsen : [The true tree of life is the knowledge of liniitr, lions, thai is, in t)ie moral government of the natural world, eic. And this tree would grow ever more in ParaLlise fV). The linulation of the law (positive lawi lay rather in the tree of knowledge.] The nature-side of the figure is the great historical event that laid waste eveiy territory of the e^irth, «hich liad been pre- viously blessed, and drove out the inhabitants to wander forth to other lands. Every word must b' taken as the Indication of a great igneous phenome- non in nature. Natural science lias recognized in those regions the effects of such an old volcanic power, though falling in the historical time. The old traditions of tlie Bactains, too, seem to speak of the upheaving of the mountains, when they tell us that the evil spirit of their fathers made tlie lovely cli- mate almost if not wholly uninhabitable by reason of the shuddering cold. — MiCHow("The Pihiiitive History of the Human Race," 1S58) : The lall. We distinguish three degrees ■ 1. The preparation ; 2. the carrying out ; 3. the nearest effects. — Tadbk (" Sermon on Genesis," 185.5): Marriage. 1. How it was establislied in a stale of innocence ; 2. what changes it underwent in consequence oi (he fall ; 3. how it is again resiored by Christ. — How Adam is the type and an antitype of Christ : 1. Wherein we see the type ; :i. wherein the antiiype. — The history of the fall : 1. How exactly it re|ireseiils the way sin takes in all men ; 2. how it predicts, moreover, the way thai grace takes in us. — W. Hoffmann (" Voices of the Watchmen in the Old Testament," lS5 smitten of God; questionable whether it is not rather, purified, formed by God] : and Mahujael [Hebrew, ilahujiel] begat Methusael [man of God, great man of God, tlB, \B for ntUS, and bs] : and MetllUSael begat Lamech [strong young man; 19 Gesenius]. And Lamech took unto him two wives: the name of the one was Adah [ornament, decoration, elegant], and the name of the Other was Zlllah [Gesenius; shadow; Fuerst: 20 sounding, song, from bbs ; or player]. And Adah bare Jabal [Fuerst : rambler, wanderer, nomade, from 21 hz'] : he was the father of such as dwell in tents and of such as have cattle. And hia brother's name was Jubal [Fuerst: one triumphing, harper, from b^^]. He was the father of 22 all such as handle the harp and the organ. And Zillah, she also bare Tubal-Cain [Gesenius : smith, mason, or lance-maker ; literally, brass of kain, that is, brass weapons], an instructor of every artificer ' [Lange more correctly : hammerer or polisher of all cutting instruments] in brass and 23 iron ; and the sister of Tubal-Cain was Naamah [loveliness, the lovely]. And Lamech said unto his wives : Adah and Zillah hear my voice, Ye wives of Lamech hearken unto my speech ; For I have slain a man to my wounding ; And a young man, to my hurt. 24 If Cain shall be avenged seven-fold, Truly Lamech seventy and seven-fold [Bunsen : seven times seventy], 25 And Adam knew his wife again, and she bare a son, and called his name Seth [flxeil, compensation, settled], for God (Elohim), said she, hath appointed me another seed instead 26 of Abel whom Cain slew. And to Seth also was there born a son, and he called hia name Enos [man, weak man, son of man]. Then began men to call upon [call out, proclaim] the name of the Lord [the name Jehovah, in distinction frouL Elohim, though not accordingto the full couceptioD of the name. See Exod. vi.]. [> Ver. 1. — For remarks on '^p H3p and rS , see the Exegetical, and marginal note. — T. L.] [* Ver. 2. — nbb CjOm can only mean a second bearing, and not the birth of a twin. — T. L.] [* Ver. 4,— mj^l would have been better rendered looked af, with bx ; with '(12 or b^TS, it has just the contrary ■ense, looked away from. Job vii. 19 ei al. — T. L.] I* Ver. 7.— nxtj ; the context and the contrast will hardly allow any other sense to this than that of acceptance, aa denoted by the ?i/finsr wp the countenance ; see the Esegetical. Vulgate, recipies. 1rp"UJn must, refer to sin personified u masculine by the participle "::"1. Comp. Gen. iii. 16, where the same word denotes subordination, that which is ruled over ; only there it is applied to persons, whilst here it means the appetite or passion, represented as awild beast, in ■ubjectiou to the righteous will. — T. L.J [» Ver. 8. — H^^X"^"!. See the Esegetical. The best interpretation is that of Delitzsch and of som^ Jewish commenta- tors, which makes the elliptical subject (or thinff said)thr very action that follows, and which the LXX. and Vulgate hflv« supplied in words. It is not at all probable that they read auy different text.— T. L.] [* Ver. 10.— i7St(, plural intensive; comp. Ps. v. 7, C^BT ^^^S , man of 6?oo(f5, very bloody man, Fs. xxvi. 3 ; Iv. 2^ C^prjl agrees grammatically with C^IOT , and not with b*p, voice, as would seem from our Eng:lish Version. The most dteral, and, at the same time, the most impressive, rendering, would be obtained by taking >1p as the nominative inde- Mudent, or exclamatory : The voice of thy brother's bloods! they cry; or. Hark ! it is the voice of thy brother's blood- drops, — tltey are crying unto me. The separation of the participle frorn the remoter subject gives it such a force, and makes •Ms, though seemingly free, the most truly literal or emoti mat sense. Rashi and Aben Ezra say the woril is plural because it denotes all Abel's possible posterity, thus murdered with him. Other Jewish writers have drawn a still more rir^gulal 254 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. inference. Thus it is said in the Talmud, Sanhedrin fol. 37: ** The plural here is to teach us that every one who destroyi B ginerle lire rrom Israel, there is a wxitine agaiust him as thouirli he hud destroyed a world full of lives." Another Jewish Interpretation (see It^ishi) says that the pluntl form represents the many woun^ls that Cain had given him, be:ai.se he did not know from what part of the hody the soul or lile tthe blood) would go out ; all these bloody mouths crying i)Ut to God •* a tongue in every one." Corap. Shakespeare, Antony's speech over the dead body of Csesar. See also the lixegetical. and marginal note. — T. L.] [' Ver. 22.— IT^H means the smith himself; but this cannot make sense tanless we adopt a different pointing from the Masoretic, wb- n it may read ; a sharpener of everything ( bb), a smith, or worker of brass, etc.— T. I..1 (* Ver. 26. — C'iT^ ; see the Exegetical. They first begao, or there was then a beginning of the invocation or formula n'^n'^"3iIJ3 , 6e«/iemycAoiijaA. Comp. it with the Arabic invocation or formula &AJ 1 ^^j^*^ (bismiltali), A correspond* tag abbreviation in Hebrew would have been rr'^bN'^'CJ- (with X elided n3?3 '^3 ), bishmeloalu or i\ith the other divius name, bishmetjahvch. Il eviaently refers to some solemn form of address, which perhaps came to be denoted by a single abbreviated word, like this and other similar forms in the ancient sister language.— T. L.l EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAIi. 1. The propagation of the human race through the formation of the family, is, in its beginning, laid outside of Paradise, not because it was hi contradic- tion with the paradisaical destiny, but bec.iuse it had, from the beginning, an unparadisaical char- acter (that is, not in harmony with tlie first life as led in Paradise. — T. L.). Immediately, however, even iti tlie first Adamic generation, the human race presents itself in the contrast of a godless and a pious line, in proof that the sinful tendency propa- gaie.s itself along witli the sin, whilst it shows at the same time that not as an absolute corruption, or fatalistic necessity, does it lay its burden upon the race. This contrast, whicli seems broken up by the fratricide of Cain, is restored again at the close of our chapter, by the birth and destination of Seth. In regard lo its chief content, however, the section before us is a characteriziug of the line of Cain. It is marked by a very rapid unfolding of primitive culture, but throughout in a direction worldly and ungodly, just as we find it afterwards among the Hamites. The ideaiitii of art, to which the Cainites in their formative tendency liave already advanced, appears as a substitute for the ■reality of a religious- ideal course of life, and becomes ministerial to sin and to a malignant pride. Not without ground are the decorative dre.ss (the name Adah), the musical skill (the name Ziliah) and beauty of the daughters of Cain brought into view. For after the contrast presented in chapter v. between the Sethites, who advance in the pure direction of a godly life, and the Cainites, who ate ever sinking lower and lower in an ungodly existence, there is shown, chapter vi., how an intercourse arises between them, and how the Sethites, infatUiiteil by the charms of the Cain- itish women, introduce a mingling of both line.s, and, thereby, a universal corruption. According to Knobel the chapter must be regarded as the genea- logical register of Adam, though this docs not agree, he says, with the genealogical register of the Elohist (ch. v.), which names Seth as the first-boin (!) of Adara. The ethnological table (ch. x.), he tells us, can only embrace the Caucasian race, whilst the Cainites can oidy be a legendary representation of the East Asian tribes (p. O!!), the author of which thereby places himself in 0[i|Kisitiori to the later ac- eounl, that repre.-ents all the descendants of Cain as perishing in the flood. The traits of the Cainitic face, as presented by Knobel, belong not alone to the East AsiiLlic people. They are ground-forms of primitive worldline.ss in the human race. In respect to the genealogical t.able of ch. iv. and v., Knobel remarks "that the I'aiiiitic table agrees tolerably well with the Sethic " (p. nl). For the siinilaritiea •ud differcncei of both tables, cump. Kkil, p. 71. These relations will be more distinctly shown in the interpretation of the names. Concerning the Jeho- vistic peculiarities of language in this section, see Knobel, p. 56. 2. Vers. 1 and 2. " Men are yet in Eden, but no longer in the garden of Eden.'' Delitzsch. Pro- creation a knowing. The moral character of sexual intercourse. Love a personal knowing. The love of marriage, in its consummation, a spiritual corpo- real knowing. The expression is euphemistic. In the Pentateuch only, in the supplemeutiiry correc- tions of the original writing. The like in other ancient languages. The name Cain is explained directly from ■'n"3|3 , the gotten* The word m^ * [Ver. 1. ^r^ap. The sense of bearing {purims), pro-creating, heijeUing, seems to be older in this word than that of t/eliuii/t'ov \ ossessing, and if so, it should guide ua in interpreting the language of this very ancient docu- ment It is a case in which, if ever, woi ds A'ould be used in their archaic signiricance. It is, moreo ler, much more easy to see how the latter senses came from the former than to trace them in the opposite duertion. There is the same order in the Latin pan'o, Greek ti'ktw. tcko9, tokos, birflif ojfspriiiff, (jniii {primuni parit. ma(e}\filiuir)—pt'pi'rif da'i- tias). For decided examples of the elder generative sense in the Hebrew word, see I)eut. sxxii. (J. ~:p "j^^S J<'~, thy father that begat thee, where it is used in parallelism with "IC? and TDSI^^, and in precisely the same con- nection as nib"^ and ^bbrf'S in ver. 18 of the same chap- ter. Compare also Gen. siv. 10, 22, where it is used both by Melchizedek and by Al'raham, as an antiiiue designation of the Creator, more solemn and impiessive than X*i3, "El Etinn, God most high, ysl C^ISD rtTp , Gen- erator (Creator, ancient founder) of the heavens and the earth.'* TheLXX. there renders it exTiffc, and the Vulgate creavit ; so interpreted also by Ilashi and Maimonides. In Ps. cxsxix. 13, "^nT^bD n^3p (rendered, thou hast pot- sesstd my reins), the context shows that it must have this older arid deeper sense; .since the reins denote the most interior or fundamental being, and the words following express, iis far as language ain, the fupematural aeative action, esdupively divine, and that supervenes in every human quickening ; 'IIDP , thnu didst ovcrslwdow me, infffKiava^ ptot ; compare Liike i. 35. This is also the best sense Prov. viii. 22, "'SSp irn^ , rendered, the Lord pot. sessed me,— rather, hetjat nic, as the wpcdtotokos, Col. i. 15. To these passages we are justified in addi g the i^t- belore us, Gen. IV. 1. The idea of possession or ac«iui>ilii>n, as outward gain or property, does not suit. Eve liad her mind upon the seed of the woman, Gen. iii. 15. and nothing could be more natural than that she should have uiid this kind of language. She cries out in her joy, I'^p ^n"'3p, Kanllht Kain, TiTOKa t6kov, or Te'«off, tjeMui fjeuilnm, or (jeacratin/iem, I lia\e borne the .sr,(/, a man, the Lord. She calls him a man, B^S ; for the child as a dislinctivo name was as yet unknown, and she saw only the imago of the humanity without regard to size or growth Nothing could I'C inoie subjectively trntlitul. It was a new mint, and she connects with it, as with her own laing, a ueative or gcncrntivt process. So Rashi, regarding rX as equivalent to :J' , para- phi'ases the words: "When God created mo and mv man CHAP. IV. l-2ti. -^» may mean, to create^ to bring out^ also to gain, to atiaih . which we prefer. — I have gotten a man I from the Lord.- — The mterpietatioD of Luther and I oiners, including Pliilippi, uamelv, " the man. t/ic Lordy not only anticipates the unfolding of tlie Messianic idea, but goes beyond it; for the Messiali IS not Jehovah absolutely. And yet the explana- tion : with the help of Jehovah (with his lielpful presence, K^iobel), is too weak. So too the Vidgate is incorrect : per Dcmu^ or the interpretation of Clericus ; nX'O , from Jehovah, that is, in associa- tion, in connection with Jehovah, I have gotten a man. In this it remains remarkable, that in the name itself, the more particular denotation is want- ing. We may be allowed, therefore, to read : a man (^ttJ'^X) he created us alone, or by himself, "t^S, but in this we are sharers with him ; that is, we are iTO-creators," Eind so she says ^r^3p. The new ofiFspring carries the ■^'3,the imagre or species which had been created in the becinning ; and so Aben Ezra says that '• Adam, when he saw that he must die, felt the need of keeping aiive the ■j^lQ , and therefore Eve u?es this lana;uage." Maimonides, without denying this, somewhat modifies it by rendering PX , as Onkelos does, by niH^ -"^Pi "before the Lord : for when we die he shall stand in our pbice to worehip his creator,^^ 'X"!"!-, regarding Cain's birth as a creation, though in a qualified sense. If n]p , then, is tctokc, genuH, peperit, "pp is tokos, Te»cos, s'^uiliis, jtarfwi The derivation which Gesenius seems to favor ( ■"'p, /injcea, 2 Sam. X3d. 16), is utterly absurd. What would maku Eve think of lances, or weapons of war, before there had been a human birth on eai'th ! besides, as thus used, it is evidently a much later word, from whatever source it may have eomp. Oe- senius himself regards T^ip as cognate with "pS, "DH ; hence there is no difficulty in connecting it, not only with the Arabic ,.tO , but also the Greek and Latin ytVt gen. If so, then Kain (Kin, Ken), is equal to yevo^ etymologieally as well ti^ lexically. The particle PX is generally taken by the Jewish grammarians as a preposition = witk ( ZS' ), or as denoting the closest union between the verb and its ob- ject, and in certain cases its subject ; though sometimes they say it is equivalent to Q^? , substance. This is the view of Gesenius. It has the force of a reflex pronoun express- ing ipseity, or selfhood, as individuality, — ^"^Tlwn PX , the very heavens themselves. A close examination always shows some kind of emphasis, or some contrast, strontrer or weaker. Or at least it may be said it calls attention to a thing in some way. The cases where it seems to be used as a preposition, or where it is used to make the sepa- rate objective pronouns, can be easily explained from this. "■^p PX n-n^ PX— itis placed here before both in precisely the same way. This makes it harsh and diffi- cult to give it the rendering with in the latter case, and seems to shut us up to the rendering : I have borne a man, the very Jehovah, or, I have borne a man, the very God, the very -Jehovah. The supposition would not be extrava- ! gant that in this earliest use of the name (earliest as | spoken) there is an emphasis in its futm-e form, H^H^ or | ^^^n'^ (yah-yeh or yah-vah), the one who shall be^ as in ! Exodus iii. 14 ; except that in the latter passage it is in j the first person, P-'nx "l^rx rtinx. The greatness of 1 Eve's mistake in applying the expression to one who was I the type of Antichrist rather than of the Redeemer, should j not so shock us as to affect the interpretation of the pas- . eage, now that the covenant God is revealed to us as a being ' ■o transceudiniily difi"erent The limitation of Eve's knowl- j edge, and perhaps her want of due distinction between the ; divine and the human, only sets in a stronzei- liuht the intensity- of her hope, and the subjective truthfulness of her I language. Had her reported words, at sueh a time, con- ] Gained no reference to the promised seed of the woman, the .-ationaliit would doubtless have used it as a prot)f that she i could have known nothing of any such pr'-diction, and | that, therefnil?. Gen. iii. 15 and Gen. iv. 1 must have been written by difierent authors, ignoring or contradicting each >ther - T. L.) I witk Jehovahy that is, one who stwide in conuection with Jehovali ; yet it may be that the mode of gaia iug: gotten with Jehovah, characterizes the uami itself. The choice of the name Jehov.ih denoieft here the (iod of the covenant. In the blessed con- hdi'nee of female hope, slie wonKl seeni, witli ^^vi~ dt'Mt eagi-rness, to greet, in the new-born, the prom- ised woman's seed (eh. iii. 15), according to hei understanding of the word. Lanieeh. too, although on better grounds, expected something immensely great from his son Noah. We must ol)serve here that the mother is indicated as the name-giver. Id the case of the second name, Abel ( llabel), which denotes a swiftly-dis:ippe;iring breatli of life, ot vanity, or nothingness, nothing of the kind is said. Yet in place of the great and hasty joy of hope, there seems to have come a feaifnl motherly pre- sentiment (Delitzsch, p. 199). That they were twins, as Kimchi liolds, is a sense tlie text does not favor. Abel as shepherd, especially of the smaller cattle ("XIJ), is the type of the Isnielitish patriarchs. Cain, as the first-born, takes the agricultural occupa- tion to which his father was first appointed. Th*' oldest ground-forms, therefore, of the human calling, which Adam united in himself, are divided between his two sons in a normal way (Cain was, in a certain sense, the heir by birth, and the ground-proprietor). It must be remarked, too, that agriculture, as the older form, does not appear as the ynun^.,'er in itt relation to cattle-breeding. *' Both modes of living belong to the earliest times of hum;inity, and, ac cording to Varro and Dictearchus in Porphyry, follow directly after the limes when men Uved upon the self-growing fruits of the earth." Knobel. " In the choice of diflfereut calliufrs by the two brothers, we seek in vain for any indication of a diflerenee uv moral disposition." So Keil maintains, against Hof- mann, that agriculture was a consequence of the cursing of the ground. Delitzsch, however, together with Hofmaun, is inclined to the opinion that in the brothers' choice of different callings there was al- ready expressed the different directions of their minds, — that Abel's calling was directed to the covering of the sinful nakedness by the skins of beasts (Hofmann), and therefore Abel was a shep- herd (!). Delitzsch, too, would have it that Abel took the small domestic cattle, only for the sake of their skins, and, to some extent, for their milk, thoush this was a kind of food which had not been used in Piiradise. It would follow, then, that if Abol slew the beasts for the sake of their skins, and, moreover, oilered to God in sacrifice only the fat parts of the firstlings, it must have been that ht suffered the flesh in general of the slaughtercfl animals to become otiensive and go to corruption. It would follow, too, that the human sacerdotal par- taking of the sacrificial offering, which later became the custom in most eases, liad not yet taken place ; not to say that the supposition of the enjoyment of animal food having been first granted, Gen. is. 8, is wholly incorrect. 3. Vers, 3-8. The first offerings. The difler enee between the offering pleasing to God, ami tha to which he has not respect. The envy cf a brother the divine warning, and the brottier's nnirder. The fratricide in its connection with the offering, a type of all religious wars. The expression C"12" yp^ denotes the passing of a definite and eonsiderabU thne (Knobel : after the beginning of their respective occupations), and indicates also a harvest-season 256 iJKSESlS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. yet to take '*. for the end of the year, as is done by | De Wettp, Van Bohlen, and others, is giving it too '■ definite a sense. — It came to pass that Cain brought of the fruits of the ground, nn:': (from mv ; Arabic : to make a present, " the most general name of the ofl'eriiig, as also "3^;?." Dient, or, taken in its deepi'St significance, a consecrated offering of self ; but man n<'eds, before all things, the expiation of his death-deserving sins, and for tiiis the blood ob- tained through the slaying of the victims serves as a svmbol." it is, however, just as much anticipating to identifj the blood-ollerini; with *lie specific expia- tion offering, as it is to give d'reetly to t' e Uving faith in God's pure promise the identical characiei of faith in the specific mode of atonement. Tin Epistle to the Hebrews lays the whole weight of thj satisfaction expressed in Abel's offering upon hig faith (ch. xi. 4). Abel appears here as the proper mediator of the institution of the faith-offering for the world. As the docti-ine of creation is introduced to the world through the faith of the primitiva humanity, so in a similar manner did Abel bring into the world the belief in the symbolical propitia- tory offering in its universal form ; as after him Enoch was the occasion of introilucing the belief of the immortal life, and so on. Keil, too, contends against the view that through the slaying of an ani- mal Abel already made known the avowal that his sins deserved death. And yet it is a fact that a dif- ference in the state of heart of the two brothers is indicated in the appearance of their offerings. Keil finds, as a sign of this difference, that Abel's thanks come from the depths of his heart, whilst Cain's offering is only to make terms with God in the choice of his gifts. Delitzsch regards it as emphatic that Abel offered the firstlings of his herds, and, moreover, the fattest parts of them, whilst Cain's offering was no offering of first fruits. This ditt'er- ence appears to be indicated, in fact, as a difference in relation to the earliness, the joyfuliies.<, and fresh- ness of the offerings. After the course of some time, it means, Cain offered something from the fruits of the ground. But immediately afterwards it is said expressly: Abel had offered (H^'yn, preterite, Sin'DS) ; and farther it is made prominent that he brought of the firstlings, the fattest and best. These outward differences in regard to the time of the offerings, and the offerings themselves, have indeed no siguifieance in themselves considered, but oidy aa expressing the difference between a free and joyful faith in the offering, and a legal, reluctant state of heart. It has too the look as though Cain had brought his offering in a self-willed way, and for himself alone, — that is, he brought it to his own altar, separated, in an unbrotherly s|iirit, from that of Abel. — And Cain was very wroth. — Liteially, he was greatly incensed (inflamed). (".SX denotes the distended nostril. — T. L.). The wrath was a fire in his soul (Jer. xv. 14 ; xvii. 4).— And his counte. nance fell. — "Cain hung down his head, and looked upon the earth. This is the posture of one darkly brooding (Jer. iii. 12 ; Job xxix. 24), and prevails to this day in the East as a sign of evil plottings " (BfRK- HAROT, ".\rabian Proverbs," p. 248). — And the liOrd said unto Cain. — This presupposes a certain measure of susceptibility for divine rev^ation ; as does also his previous offering, though done in his own way. Jehovah, in a warning m.aimer, calls his attention to the symptom of his wicked thoughts, — his brooding posture. — If thou doest well, &c.— The explanation of Arnheim and Bunscn : Whether thou bringesi fair gifts or not, sin lurks at the door, &c., does not take the word PXSJ in its nearest con- nection, namely, in contrast with the falling of the countenance, as the lifting it up in freedom and serenity. Should we take nsi for the lifting up (the acceptance) of the oftering, still would its bet|er and nearer sense lie in the idea that good behavior is the right offering. And yet on account of the contrast, the lifting up of the countenance would seem to be the meaning most obviously suggestca. We need not to be reminded tliat along with goivj CHAP. IV. 1-26. 267 behavior there is also meant an inward state, yet the eipresBion tells us that tliat inward state will also actualize itself in the right way. — Ver. S. And Cain talked with Abel. — Knobel re(iieseiits tliese words as a crux interpretian. RoseniuiiUcT and others interpret it; he talked with Abel, that is, lie had a paroxysm or fit of goodness and spoke again peaceably with his brother. It is against this that the use of iTjX for ~y![ cannot be authenticati'd by iure examples. Therefore Hieronymus, Aben Ezra, and others, interpret it : he told it (namely, what Jehovah had said to him) to his brother. On the contrary, Knobel remarks : it does not seem exactly consistent that the still euvious Cain should thus relate his own admonition. Here, however, the question arises whether we are required to take ^ax^l iu that manner. The sense of this may be that Cain simply preached to his brother in a mock- ing manner the added apothegm, sin lieth at the door. In a similar manner, to say the least, did Ahab preach to Elias, Caiaphas to our Lord Christ, Cajetan to Luther, &c. The Samaritan text has the addition : m'i'n nsb: (let us go into the field). It has been acknowledged by the Septuagiut, the Vul- gate, and certain individual critics. But even an- cient testimonies show it to have been an interpola- tion.* Knobel, together with Bottcher, has recourse to a conjecture that the reading should be "TSUJ (he watched), instead of TBS. Delitzsch, again, supposes that the narration hastens beyond the oratio directa, or the direct address, and gives im- mediately its carrying out in place of the thing said, that is, he regards the invitation, " let us go into the field," as implied or understood in the act. In a similar way, Keil. We turn back to the above Jiterpretation with the remark that tlie narrator had 00 need to state precisely that Gain preserved the penal words of God as solely for himself, if he meant to tell us that out of this warning admonition Cain had made a hypocritical address to his brother.— Cain rose up against Abol hia brother. — The words " his brother," how many times repeated ! The sin of the fall has advanced quickly to that of fratricide. The divinely charged envy in tue sin of Eve, wherein there is reflected an analogue of ihe envy of man against God, is here again advanced from envy of a brother to hatred, then from hatred to a vile obduracy against the warning words of God, and so on, even to fratricide. Therein, too, it is evident that the tempter of man is a murderer of man. Yet still this is not in the sense as though John viii. 44 had reference only to this fact. In the sense of this latter passage, Satan was the murderer of Cain, — a thing, however, which manifests itself in "the murder of Abel. The fact here narrated will form a connected unity with that of Gen. iii. The working of Satan in Gen. iii. comes fully out in the fact narrated in Gen. iv. " Cain is the first man who lets sin rule over him ; he is eV tuO Trofripaii (of the evil onei, 1 John iii. 12." Delitzsch. 4. Vers. 9-16. The Judgment of Cain. Where r* It is not in the Syriac, which closely follows the Heorew, and there is no reference to it in the Targums. It looks more like something added (supposed to be neces- lary to explain ^ -X^) than like something left out. The feet of its being in the Samaritan Pentateuch, therefore, Instead of showing the superior antiquitv and correctness of that as compared with the Hebrew letter, only proves 'ts later date as copying the interpolatinns of the .Septua- £int. See the conclusive argument of Gesenius as against tike claims of thia Samaritan Pentateuch. — T. L.] 17 IB Abel thy brother? — The divine arrai^nenl analogous to the arraignment of .\dam and Eve Bu* Cain evades every acknowledgment, lie lies, and denies in an impudent manner; then co'iies boldly out with the scornrul expression : Am I iny bro ther's keeper ? " What a fearful advance from th« resort and exculpation of our first parents after the fall, so full of shame and anguish, to this sliamclesa lying; this brutality, so void of love and feeling I* Delitzsch. Irreligioiisness, together with an iuhumaa want of feeling, stand out in continually increasing, reciprocal action. Upon this impudent denial fol- lows the accusation and the judgmeut. The stream* of his brother's blood are represented as his accusers, and the earth itself must bear witness against him. — What hast thou done ? — So we read, since we take the sense of that which follows to be : A voice hast thou made, etc. " The deed belongs to those crimes that cry to Heaven (ch. xviii. 20; six. 13; Exod. iii. 9). Therefore does Abel's blood cry up to Heaven that God, the lord and judge, may punish the murderer. All blood shed unrighteously must be avenged (ch. ix. 5); according to the ancient view it cries to God continually, until vengeance take* place. Hence the jirayer, that the earth may not drink in the blood shed upon it, in order that it may not thereby be made invisible and inaudible (Is. xxvi. 21; Ezek. xxiv. 7; Job xvi. 18)." Knobel. Com pare Ps. cxvi. 15 ; Heb. xi. 4 ; Rev. vi. 9. Calvin : Oste7idit Dens^ se de factis liomlnum cognoscere uf' cungue nuUus queratur vel accuset ; demdesibi niagit earam esse homhium viiani^ quam ut sanguinem in- noxiuni impU7ie effwidi sinat ; tertio^ curam sibt piorwni esse 71071 solum quamditt vivufit, sed etiam post mortem. The blood as the living flow of the Ufe, and the phenomenal basis of the soul (primarily as basis of the nerve-life) has a voice which is as the living echo of the blood-clad soul itself It is the symbol of the soul crying for its right (to live), and in this way affects immediately the human feeling.* — * ['* Crying fnr its right to live.^' The feeling here earliest manifested, and the idea of demanded retiibution that growi out of it, pervades antiquity ; but as eshibitiid in the Greek tragic poetry it becomes almost ten ific. C' >mpare numerool pasfiages in the Eumenides of J^schtlus ; also the Cttaptiom, 398: oAAd voiio? fj.€v i^ofiaf arayova^ XV^eVaj £9 TreSor dAAo TTpoaanfiv al^a. BOA' yip Aoiyoi- EPINNY2 napa Tdv Trporepov titdLfi€V(jiv aTTjP" eTepaf €1Tdyovaa.v en' aTj}. There is a law that blood once poured on earth By murderous hands demands that other blood Be shed in retribution. Prom tne slaia Erynnys calls aloud for vengeance still. Till death in justice meet be paid for death. In another passage there is a similar reference to a very an- cient law, or mythus, which the poet styles TpiyeptitVj &om its exceeding antiquity. /&, 31U : 'AvtI 5e 7rATj-y^5 »os GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOCK Oi MOSES. And now art thou cursed, etc. — The words follow- ing (nan.NH •'C) are explained in different ways: 1. My curse sliall smite tliee from tliis hmd; that is, here shall be its execution (Aben Ezra, Kimchi, k2d others ; Knobel, Keil, more or less definitely). 2. Cursed aica;/ from the district ; that is, driven forth by the curse (Rosenmiiller, Tuch, Gerlach, Dehtzseh). 8. As in the history of the first judgment there appear two cursings, it is proper to look back to tbem. There is the serpent cursed directly as Cain is here. But the earth, too, is cursed foi- Adam's lake. Since now here, in the curse of Cain, the earth is again mentioned, the obvious interpretation becomes : thou thyself shalt be cursed in a much severer degree than the earth. The earth, which through Adam's natural sin has become to a certain extent partaker of his gnilt, shall appear innocent in presence of thine unnatural crime ; yea, it becomes thy judge. — Which hath opened her mouth. — This is tlie moving reason for the form of the pre- ceding penal sentence. So Delitzsch interprets : the ground has drunk innocent blood, and so is made a participant in the sin of murder (Is. xxvi. 21; Numb. xxxv. 31). Keil disputes this, and on good grounds. "It is because the earth has been compelled to drink the innocent blood which has been shed that, therefore, it opposes itself to the murderer, and refuses to yield its strength (n3 its fruits or crops. Job xxxi. 40) to his cultivation ; so that it returns him no produce, just as the land of Canaan is said to have spit out the Canaanites, on account of the abominable crimes with wliich they had utterly defiled it (Levit. xviii. '28)." It is clear voice here spoken of as crvinff from the earth. The words KpetTTofa AoAout^t (Heb. sii. 24) are best rendered speaketh stronger, Inuden, taking Kpeirroi-a. adverbially with its pij- mary sense of sfrcH<7//(, superiority (from (cpdros); and ibis is confirmed by the Hebraism in n-apd, for ""Z , or w com- parative. The blood of Chiist cries louder for mercy than A.bel's did for venpe-ance. The Scripture calls tb.' blood the life, and so it comes to be used for TrS3 or lirvjc'/. Had it meant (as it is no extrav- agance to suppose it diiT pean) that Abel's soul was crying, this would have been t^e most ancient mode of saying it ; aa there is no evidence that in that earliest experience of mankind, death, though an awfully strange and fearful event, was regarded as a cessation or discontinuiinco of being. They could not have had anything like our modem notion of death either in its hyper-siJiritu \lism or in its ma- terialism. There was still a personality, j. so f hood, in the body and in the blood. Abel was not wholV ^one ; he still lived in his blood, lived, at least, unto God, ^ho is not the God ol the dead hut of the living (Matt. xxii. 32). The use of the blood for the life or soul (as life) may help U8 to understand better Kev vi. 9, as ba\'ing some connec- tion with this passage. John saw under the altar (Ou(na rest. If, however, it iji something more than a personi- fication, that is, if we are to regard the J/wx^i ''^*re as real 'orsomU beings, then it is not irrational to take the same Jew of the blood, life, >fy)Ol "^f Abel, as a true personal e3s- Istenoe for whom God stUlcared, and to suppose that such was the view taken by the .ancient author. A mere personi- fication is ineon.--istent with the simplicity of this earliest thinking and feeling, however this kind of language may fall to that in a later time, when poetry (if we will call it poetry) bcronn-s predominantly rheloriciil. If such an idea [b forbidden in the Apocalyptic pi'ture, much more is it alien to the first; and there cjin hardly be a doubt that the two paiwages are connected and mutually suggestive. WasAbe^s Mol amont; tho.^e that were under the altir! The idea is wen in tk.r imagery that follows : "tbere were given unto them »>/.'£< r((b(rs." 'i'hin luhHr. robe is in f^triking conlrast to thd trfi (^irraent of blood, and its being " niade vihifr in the k.'jy*) of tlie Lamb " (lUv. vii. 14) addi to the vividness •J t)j» .<'.«' .-T.L.1 that ill this case there is transferred to the earth ■ miuistrafioii of punishment against Cain. SinceCain has done violence to nature itself, even to the ground, in that it has been conipelleu to drink his brother's blood, therefore must it take vengeance on him io refusing to him its strength. The curse proper, how- ever, of Cain must be, that through tlie power of his guilt-consciousness he must become a fugitive and a vagabond upon the earth. 13" 1*3 , a paranomasia as in ch. i. 2. The first word (participle from J'3) detiotes the inward quaking, trembling, and unrest, the second (from 113) the outward fleeing, roving, restlessness. The interpretation, therefore, of De- litzsch is incorrect, " that the earth in denying to Cain the expected fruits of his labor, drives him ever on from one land to another." The proper middle point of his curse is his inner restlessness. More correctly says DeUtzsch : " ban of banning, wander ing of exile, is the history of Cain's curse ; how di- rectly opposite to that which is proclaimed by the blood of the other Abel, the Holy and Righteous one (.\cts iii. 14)." Knobel, according to tlie view •bove noticed, interprets the words " fugitive and vagabond," as indicsiting in the author a knowledge of the roaming races of the East. — My punishment is greater than I can bear [Lange tenders it my guilt, ■'31?]. — The question arises whetlier this ex- pression means my sin, or my punishment. The old interpretations (Septuagint, Yulgate) render it my sin, and accordingly give Sir3 tlie sense of forgive- ness. My sin is too great to lie ever forgiven. Thia expression of despair into which his earlier confi- dence sinks down, has been interpreted by some as denoting Cain's repentance, which, analogous to '.be repentance of Judas, fails of salvation through self- will and want of faith, or rather, bears him on more fully to destruction. But since "i"? may denote also the punishment of sin (ch. xix. 15; Is. v. 18), and since Cain further on laments the greatness of hia punishment, Delitzsch, Keil, and others, with Aben Ezra, Kinichi, Calvin, etc., take the sense to be: my punishment is too great, that is, greater than I cao bear. But now the question arises, whether there is not here in view a double sense, as mdicated by the very choice of the expression ; and this the more, smce, in fact, there Ues also in Cain's repentance a similar doulJe sense. The sin is evitlcntly acknowl- edged, but only in the reflex view of the pimishmeiit, and because of the punishment [a^tritio in contrast with contriiio). The selt-accusatiou, therefore, that the sin is held unpardonable, is, at tlie same time, an accusation of the judge for having laiil upon him au uuenilurable liurden. The reservation of the heart still unbroken in its selfishness and pride, makes the self-accusation, in this kind of repentance, an accusa- tion of the doom itself ; it is "the sorrow of the world that worketh death." It is, however, the lies bound up with tlie pride that gives the imjKissioned utterance its curiously varied coloring. — Behold thou hast driven me out. — Out of the sentence of his own conscience, through whii'h (iod lets him become a fugitive and a vagabond, Cain makes a clear, positive, divini decree of banislinieni. There- by does it appear to him a heavier doom that he niust go ibrfh from the presence of the adamah in Edi-n, than his departure from the presence of (iod f though before he had put the latter fir.si; . iiid, finally, they are both to him the harder punishment, since now " every one that finds shall slay liim." I» CHAP. rv. 1 ^ti. U59 ]ft the full, unbroken, selfish fear of death, thiit falls upon him like a giant, rather than the wisli tliat he muT *>H ylain by the avenger of blood, whoever he may t)o. But therein does his outer umk-rsianding of it give notiee ol" the sentence: thou shall lie a fugitive and a vagabond. It has changed, for him, into the threatening: avengers of blood will every- where hunt and slay thee (I'rov. xxviii. 1). — Behold thou drivest me forth this day from the face of the Adainali, that is, out of Eden. *' In Eden dwelt Je- hovah, whose presence guaranteed protection and Becurity." Knobel. But would Cain take comfort in the idea of the divine protection ? It is suflering and punishment, in itself, that, as he says, he is directly driven forth (^"^3} from that home still so rich and charming, where, moreover, through his tilling of the grounil lie meant to become a permanent possessor. — And from thy face shall I be hid. — Knobel : "Outside of Eden, withdrawn from thy look. In a similar manner Jonah believed that by his withdrawal from Canaan, the land of Jehovah's habitation, he should escape from his territorial jurisdiction." On the contrary, Delitzsch and Keil : '* from the place where Jehovah revealed his presence." It must be observed that he mentions this sutfering as of second moment. It sounds partly as a complaint, and partly as a threatening; for it is the specitic expression of the morose self-consciousness that it flees from the presence of God, whilst it maintains, in order to have some plea of right, that it has been forced to do so. When I lose the face of my home, then also am I compelled to flee from the face of God. Though in every place he would fain hide from the face of God, yet the obvious sense here is neither the unbiblical thought that God dwelt only in Eden (or in Canaan), nor the loss of the beholding of the cherubim. The idea that man c-in hide himself from God the Scrip- ture everywhere treats as a mere false representa- tion of the evil conscience. It is clearly growling despair that will no more seek the presence of Jeho- vah through prayer and sacrifice, undei" the pretence that it is no more allowed to do so. Cain, however, has still religious insight enough to know, that the further from Gud, the deeper does he fall into the dan- ger of death. — Every one that findeth me. — How could Cain fear lest the Mood avenger should slay him, when the earth was iminhabited? Josephus, Kimchi, Michaelis, have referred the declaration to the rav- enous beasts. Clericus, Dathe, Delitzsch, Keil, and otliers, have referred it to the fiimily of Adam. Schumann and Tuch find in it an oversight of the narrator.* Knobel takes it as embracing the repre- [• If there is a difficulty here, it is one that the writers of thi- account mu.st have seen as clearly as the most acute of modem critics. The Tiarr;itive excludes the idea of any other historic human r.ce tiian that derivoi from Adam. If there had been before this any other cn-ation, or crea- tures bearing a resemblanc<-- to man, either physical or psy- choloirical, or if there were nny such in other and remote parts of the earth, they had no f?eneric connection with the epecies homo, or that Adimic family, afterwards r.-present- ed b\ the three sons of Noah, and from which has come all whom history has rerognized, and now recog:nizes, as prop- erly man, 2TX ''^'2, Sons of Adam, according to the Scrip- tural de'^r^tiation, or Sons of Man. But what reason have we to sui'].o;c that Cain knew all this? The inconsistency of some rniQincut itors here is very strilcing. Thoy hr»hl a? absurd that notion of some of the older theoio-ians, according to wh'ch Adam w;vs a being of surpassiiiL' knowlc^lg.', and yet here, in'order to make an objection to the Scriptuies, they ascribe to Cain a knowledge he could only have had fii»m iome transcendent experience or some direct divine rovc;ii- tion. To establish such a coniradiction, they suppose him to have known, or that he ought to have known, that there were no other beings iik« himgelf anywhere in existence. sentation of their having been primitive iidiabitanti of Eastern Asia (Chinese inimii:rauts, perhaps) witk whom Cain had fought. Dklitzsch says : " It ifl Now, as far as tha account goes, notLmg of this kmJ ha4 ever been revealed to him, and he had no means of leamiai it. There U nutbiug to show that even Adam him^c f had any such know itiii;eof his own eai'thly solitariness. Bf jond hi", own Kdcu iie knew nothing of the earth's vast extent or of what (jod may have done in other paits of it. We are carryin;:: into the narrative our own definite knowledge of the figure, geography, and history of our globe, ami thii some would aid interpreting rationally. We may, iDdeuiL have a high view of Adam's po-ition in its moral aspect and in its spiritual grandeur, but this does not demand fur him a pa-st linowlodge, which could only have been supematur- ally acQuireil, and of which the account gives not tbe slight- est intimation. Awaking to a human consciousness imder the divine inspiration that fii-st made him man, he finds himself the object of a tender care and a guiuing law, pro- ceeding from a being higher tlian himself. His nest esp.'xi- ence is that of a companion mysteriously introduced lo him as one derived from himself. He is conscious of a sereie happiness and a blissful home. Then comes his later knowledge. He remembers the beautiful Eden, his sad transgi-essiou, his fall from that blessed state, and iiis ban- ishment into the wide wilderness world He carrii-s with hjm the thought of some dark malignant power from whom he had received deadly injury, and is consoled by the promise that one of his descendants shall finally triumph over him; but beyond this, nature and history arc all un« known. The vast waste may have other inhabitants. Nothing to the contrary has as yet been revealed to h m or to his children. His geography is limited to the lost Eden and the adamah that lies around it ; hi- ethnology takes in only himself, his companion the motlicr of life, and the chil- dren that have been born to him. To Adam himself there may have been the thought that he was alone with God upnn the earth, but it would not be experience or revelation, —only an inference from the care and government of which he found himself the object. To the lawless, vindictive Cain, on the nther hand, nothing would be more natural than the thought that, somewhere in the imkno^^Ti vvaste, there tnigbt be beings like himself, and who might be as malignant to lumself as he had been to his slain brother. Thus regarded, Cain's language, instead of invohnjig a con- tradiction, or an oversight on the juirt of the nairat'ir, pre- sents one of those inimitable feat ur is of truthfulness that characterise the account the moment we get in the right position for viewing it. Had not the author been writing artlessly and imthfully (that is, in his subjective cons^ ious- ness, whether coming from inspiration or otherwise;, he would have provided against the cavil ; for he could not have failed to see the dilficulty if his stand-point had been the same with that of the modem objector. Had it bocTi a mere fancy, he would have supplied the required knowl- edge, as Milton lias done by the conversation of the angel. We may say, too, as Lange intimates, that Cain's awful guilt gave a preternatural power to his imagination, and peopled the world with avengers. This is perlectly credible and in accordance ^^dth human experience;. The supposition, too, that by "iXSli^ ?r, whosoever or whatsoever finds me, he may have had in mind imagined demonic beings, is not to be rashly rejected. To say nothing now of any outward demonic realm, such as the Bible elsewhere clearly reveals, a subjective world of devils is created by the guilty human ci>ns(.ieuce, which must find an avenger, an dAaaruip, some- where ; and we thus regard Cain as the first human me- dium of this awful revelation, just as other doctrines of a dilferent kind have been brought out, tii-st as emotional consciousness and afterwards as expressed dogma, tlu-ough the action of the human soul itself in its holy experience. This has been the method of their inspiration, or the genn of their first introduction to the minds of men. Thus the doctrine of a hell originated in the human soul itself, just as the hope of some final rest, in holy snuls like Enoch, or of some ■' city that had fuundations," as in the longings of the pilgrim patriarchs (lleb. xi. 10), became (jod's morn- ing star of revelation to the whole uoctiine of a future life, growing brighter and brighter until, in the New Testament, it leaches the ''perfect day." When, in the Eumenides of JEschylus, Orestes sens the "EpifFues everywhere puisuiug him, we recognize it as dra- m itically true to nature. It is indeed a strnnge aspect ol the human soul that the poet presents, but it has its ground in its deeper consciousness, and we cannot ht-lp leeling that there must bo something objective correspondini,' to it. 11 we ack .owledge t!iis fatness in the representations of thu Greek ti-ageilian, tbunded. doubtless, on some nast tradition, why may we not regard it as a ti'Uthful interpretation of thj same human conscience in this account of '.':£ first mnrv dererl— T. L.] 260 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. elear that the blood avengers whom Cain feared, must be those who sl\ould exist in the future, when his father's family had become enlarged and spread abroad ; for that tlie murderer should be punished with death (we might even say that the taking ven- geance for hlood is the fountain of regulated law and Dsht respecting nmrder) is a righteous sentence written in any man's breast ; and that Cain already Bees the earth full of avengers, is just the way of the murderer who sees himself on all sides suirounded by avenging spirits ('Epifvvfi), and feels himself sub- jected to their tormetitings." Kkil adds : " Though Adam, a', that time, had not many grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and great^great-grandehildren, yet, according to rer. 17, ch. v. 4, he must, at that time, doubtless, have had already other children, who might multiply, and, earlier or later, avenge Abel's death." In aid of this supposition we must take the representation that would give to Cain an immensely long life. Cain's complaint was an indi- rect prayer for the mitigation of the punishment. Jehovah consents to the prayer in his sense, that is, he knows that the fear of Cain is, in great part, a reflection from his evil conscience, and, consequent- ly, the destiny which is appointed to him appears to serve more for the silencing (not giving rest to) his frantic excitement, than as designed to protect him outwardly from any danger. For not absolutely Bhall he know himself protected, but only through the threatening of a seven-fold blood-vengeance against his pursuer, whoever he might be, and through the warning of the same as given by a sign. There appears to Knobel a difficulty in the question, Who then would undertake the blood-vengeance on behalf of Cain, seeing he had no companions? Seven-fold shall he be punished, or shall he (Cain) become avenged. — Set a mark upon Cain. — Ac- cording to the traditional interpretation, God put a sign on Cain himself which would make him known ; and hence the proverbial expression : the mark of Cain, On the contrary, the literal language has the preposition b (to or for) Another old interpretation (Aben Ezra, Baumgarten, DeUtzsch) will have it that God gave him a token for his security, in order that he might not be slain. The language, however, does not denote a sign of security for Cain that would make him absolutely safe, but only a sign of warn- ing, and threatening, for some possible pursuer, and which ndght possibly remain unnoticed, though Berving to Cain himself as a conscious sign for the quieting of his fears. According to Knobel, the author had in mind, perhaps, some celestial phenom- enon, which should every time make its appearance and warn away the assailant. Such a divine inter- vention, however, would be a placing the murderer in absolute security, and besides a thing simply in- coitceivable. The warning sign for the pursuer of Lamech, whoever he might be, was the newly in- vented weapons of his son Tubal-Cain. The warn- ing sign that should serve for the protection of (!ain, must disclose to the jjursuers the threatening pros- pect of a seven-fold blood-vengeance. Such a sign, jlthoiigh for Cain, may be, notwithstanding, repre- sented as on Cain in some kiml of threatening de- fence, perhaps, or in the attendance of his wife; it is enniigli that the history is silent, or simply means to tell us that IJod already, ininjediately after the brat deed of murder, had established a modilieation of the natural, im[iul-i\X', and inqjassioned, taking Ot vengeance for blood ; — a warning sign, in fact, (hat the carrying out of the blood- vengeance woulii have for its consequence the extirpation "f the whoU human race. But why this exemption of Cain f To this question every kind of answer has been giveD (comp. Deliizsch and Keil). The chief thing was. that this banishment had in itself the significance oi a social human death. It was a member cut ofl from the human community, as in the \ew Test» ment history of Judas. Besides, -.he unfolding of the Cainitish existence was to reveal an unfolding of death in a higher degree, and, at the same time, to do service to human culture in the dissemination of the Cainitish talent. Finally, there comes into con. sideration, in relation to Cain, what is said by DeUtzsch ; " He was gracious to him in the pro- longation of his time of grace, because he recognized the sin as sin." But at the same time, God himself gives here the first example for the significance of the law of pardon in the later society. To demanp the death of tain was properly the right only ol Abel's parents. But these were also Cain's pai ents The right of pardoning is the right of modifying or mitigating the puidshment in view of special mitigat- ing circumstances. — And Cain tvent out. — " The name nu denotes a land of escape and banishment, and is therefore the contrast to the happy land of Eden, where Jehovah walks and communes with mem" Keil. The land lay eastward of Eden. In other respects it cannot be definitely determined ; for Cain carried everywhere the land of Nod with him in his heart. Knobel thinks here again of China. 5. Vers. 17-23. Cain and the Cainites. — And Cain knew his wife. — Here comes in the suppcjsi- tion that Adam must have already had danghiera too. Cain's wife could only have been a daughter of Adam, consequently his sister, and Abel's sister. She still adheres, nevertheless, to the fearful man, and follows him in his misery, which is also a testi- mony to a humane side in his life. The marriage of sisters was, in the beginning, a condition for the propagation of the human race. At the commence- ment of the race, the contrasts in the members of the family must have been so strongly regarded, that thereby the conditions for a true marriage ".ould be present in the same family ; whilst the most significant motive for the later prohibition of sister marriages, such as the establishment of a new band of love, and the consequent separation of the sisterly and marriage relations, could not yet have become eifec- tual. Keil, moreover, remarks that the sons and daughters of Adam represent not merely the family, but the race ; this is indeed tlie case, even in single families, though on a reduced scale. Some have thought it strange that Cain should have built, a city lor his son. But in this objection it is oveilooked that the main conception of a primitive city is simply that of a walled fortification. The city must have been a very small one. Cain might have built it for an entire patriiirchal race. Moreover, it reads, aa Keil calls attention to it, nsi T''J-"i ^^ '^^ build, ing. It was the thought and the work of his Ufe, in jiroof that immediately after the protection offered to him by God, he longed lor something to fortify himself against the tear of his conscience, and had neeil to fix for himself an outward .station, in oppo- sition to his iniuT misettled cimdititm. • "Even if we do not, with Delitzseh, regard this city as the foundation-st(me of the worldly rule in which the Bpiiil of tlie beast predominates, yet we must not niisapprelmid tbuici:. t le ell'ort to remove the curs* CHAP. IT. 1-26. 861 n banishment, and to create for his race a point of unity as a compensation for the lost unity in society with God ; neitlier must we lose sight of the contin- ual tendency of the Cainitish hfe to the earthly. The mighty development of the world-feeling, and of ungodliness, among the Cainites, becomes conspic- uous with Laraech in the sixth generation." Keil. This comes to be, indeed, the ground idea of the Cainite development, that iu the symbolic ideality of culture, it seeks an offset to the real ideality of the living cultas (or worship), even as this is generally the cbaracter of the secularized worldliness ; that is, St makes a development of culture, in itself legiti- mate, to be its one and all. If after this we take into view the names of the Cainitish line, it will serve for a confirmation of what has been said. 1. Henoch, initiation, the initiated and his city. 2. Irad, townsman, citizen, urbamis, civilU. 5. Mahujael, or Mahijael, the purified, or the formed of God (nnn). 4. Metbusael, the (strengthened) man of God. 6. Lamech, strong youth. His two wives : Adah, the decorated, Zillah, the musical player (ac- cording to Schroder, the dark brunette). [Schroder is all wrong. — T. L.] 6. The sons of Lamech, by Adah : Jabal, the traveller (nomade), and Jubal, the jubilant, the musician. By ZiUah : Tubal Cain, work- er in brass or iron (according to the I'ersian, Thubal ; Gesenius), the lance-forger (accord- ing to the Shemetic, mason) — if not more probably : brass (or iron) of Cain, that is, the forger of the weapons in wliich the Cainites trusted. His sister Naamah, the lovely. Cain and Adam included, this is eight genera- tions ; whereas the line of Seth that follows (ch. 6) embraces ten generations. On account of the like names, Henoch and Lamech, Irad and Jared, Kain and Kenan, Mahujael and Mahalael, Metbusael and Methuselah, Knobel supposes a niinghng of both genealogies, or one common primitive legend in two forms ; Keil contends against this by laying empha- sis on the difference of the names that appear to be similar, and the different position of those that are alike. For the sake of comparison we let the line of Seth immediately follow; 1. Adam (eartli-man). 2. Seth (compensation, or the estabhshed). 3. Enoch (weak man). 4. Cainan (profit, a mere like-sounding of Cain). 5. Mahalaleel, praise of God (only an echo of Mahujael). 6. Jared, descending, the de- scender (only a resemblance in sound to Irad). 7. Enoch or Henoch, the consecrated. Here the devo- ted, or consecrated, follows the desceiuling ; in the Cainitish line he follows Cain. The one was the occupier of a city in the world, the other was trans- lated to God ; both consecrations, or devotions, stand, therefore, in full contrast. 8. Methuselah. According to the usual interpretation ; man of the arrow, of the weapons of war. As he forms a chro- nological parallel with the Cainitic Lamech, so may we regard this name as indicating that he introduced these uewly invented weapons of the Cainites into the line of Seth, in order to be a defence against the hostile insolence of the Cainites. It consists with this interpretation, that with him there came into the line of Seth a tendency to the worldly, after which h goes down with it, and with the age. Even the Imposing upon his son the name Lamech, the strong youth, may be regarded as a warlike demonstration igainst the Cainitic Lamech. Therefore, 9. Lemech •r Lamech. 10. Noah, the rest, the quieter, or I peacemaker. With Lamech, who greeted in his soj the future pacificator, tliere appears lo be indicated in the line of Seth, a direction, |ieacet'ul, yet tmublea with toil and strife. It was just such an .-ige, how- ever, as might have for its consequence the alli;ince# and mingliogs with the Cainites that are now intro- duced, and which have so often followed the exigeu* cies of war. This Setliian Lamech, howev<^r, forma a signilicant contrast with the Cainitic. The one consoles himself with the newly invented weapons of his son Tubal Cain, as his security against the fearful blood-vengeance. The other comforts him- self with the hope that with his son there sliall come a season of holy rest from the labor and pains that are burdened with the curse of God. In regard to both lines in common, the following is to be re- marked ; 1. The names in the Caiidtic line are, for the most part, expressive of pride, those of the Sethic, of humdity. 2. The Cainitic line is carried no farther than to the point of its open corruption in polygamy, quarrelsomeness, and consecration of art to the service of sin. Tiie Sethic line f'urms in its tenth period the full running out of a temporal world-development, in which Enoch, the seventh, properly appears as the highest point. 3. Against the mention of the Cainitic wives, their charms, and their art, appears in the Sethic line only the mention of sons and daughters. It serves for an introduction to the sixth chapter. Concerning the repeated appearance of like names, compare what is said by Keil, p. 71. Zillah can just as well mean the shadowy as the sounding, yet the latter interpretation is commended by the context. By the invention of Jubal a distinction is made between stringed and wind instruments. Iii its relation to Tubal Cain the word ttJ-ih must be taken as neuter ; since otherwise Tubal Cain would appear as the smith that forged the smiths. The song of Lamech is the first decidedly poetic form in the Scriptures, more distinct than ch. i. 27 and ch. ii. 23, as is shown by the marked parallelism of the members. It is the consecration of poetry to the glorification of a Titanic insolence, and, sung as it was in the ears of both his wives, stands as a proof that lust and murder are near akin to each other. Rightly may we suppose (with Hamann and Herder), that the invention of his son Tubal Cain, that i--, the invention of weapons, made him so excessively haughty, whilst the invention of his son Jubal put him in a position to sing to his wives his song of hate and vengeance. This indicates, at the same time, an immeasurable pride in his talented sons. He promises himself the taking of a blood-ven- geance, vastly enhanced in degree, but shows, at the. same time, by the citation of the case of his ances-[ tor Cain, that the dark history of that bad man had become transformed into a proud remembrance for his race. The meaning of the song, however, is not, I have slam a man (Septuagint, Vulgate, &c.). He supposes the case that he were now wounded, or now slain ; that is, it looks to the future (Aben Ezra, Calvin, &c.). We may take the "S with which tht song begins as an expression of assurance, and the preterite of the verb as denoting \he certainty of th« declaration (see Delitzsch, p. 214). We think it better, however, to take it liypothetically, as Nagels- bach and others have done, and tins too as corre- sponding to the sense as well as to the grammatical expression. In respect to the inventions of tlie Chonese, and the discovery of music as coming ou( 262 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES •f the shepherd-life, compare Knobel, p. 66. In regard to tbe conjectuies couceriiiiig these genealo- gies, see the Catalogue of Literature, p. 66. Thus, for example, Jubal is connected with Apollo, and Tulial Cain with Vulcan. The siniilaritj of particu- lai forms in popular traditions cannot ju^tii'y us in tonl'ounding them. Knobel refers here, in the view he takes, to the bloodthiisty cruelty of the Mongo- lian tribes. Ewald finds in the three sons of Laniech (Noah y) thf representatives of three prinoiijal states according to the Judiean conceptions (see Delitzsch, p. 212; also similar interpretations of Ewald, p. 211). 6. Vers. 24-26. Seth. — And called his name Seth. — Seth may denote compensation for Abel (Knobel, Keil), — one who comes in the place of Abel who has been slain and taken away ; and in this way he is said to be fixed, established. Eve called the giver Elohim, according to Knobel, because the Seth- ites were elohists ; acooi dii.g to Keil it was because the divine power had compensated her for what hu- man wickedness had taken away. The fact that the name Jehovah, as mentioned further on, came to be adopted in connection with Enoch (weak man), may lead to the thought, indeed, of a lowering of hopes, and yet there lies an expression of hope in this, that Bhe regards Seth as a permanent compensation for Abi 1. — And to Seth, — to him also was born a ■on. — Enoch, — a designation of weakness, frailty ; probably a sorrowful remembrance of Abel (Ps. viii. 6; xc. 3). — Then began men to call. — 3 i*^P, primarily, to call on the name of Jehovah, and then to proclaim him, to announce. Men had before this prayed and called upon God, but now they begin to reverence God as Jehovah. But why not before, in the time of Seth ? God as Jehovah is the covenant God of a pious race, of a future full of promise. First with Enoch does there appear the .'ure |iros- pect of a new line of promise, after the line of Cain had lost it. With a new divine race, and a new be- lieving generation, there ever presents itself the name Jehovah, and ever with a higher glory. Now it is for the first time after Eve's first theocratic jubdee-cry of hope. Delitzsch is inclined to think that men now called upon Jehovah in the direction of the Ea^t (where the Cainites made their settle- ment). .Moreover, it must be that here is narrated the beginning of a formal divine worship. In re- spect to this, as also in respect to the two pillars of Seth's descendant* of wliich Jose|)hus speaks, com- pare Delitzsch, p. 218. The langu;ige undoubtedly refers to a general honoring of the name Jehovah among the pious Sethites. Concerning the name of God, compare the Kibelwerk, Matt., p. 125 (Am. ed.). In relation to Jehovah is the name of special signifi- cance, because Jehovah is tlie God of the covenant, or of the revelation of salvation, and because the name of God, whilst on the one side it denotes his revelation, does, on the other, present the reflex of his revelation in the human religious recognition, that is, m relir/ion itself. In respect to the supposi- tion that the primitive religion was the true religion, as wc find it in Uom. i. 19-21, Knobel gives an ac- count in its historical relation (p. 67). According to a Hebrew interpretation of the word "H^n, as though from the word bbn,to profane, and which HiiTonymus mentions, though ho rejects it, there must have begun, in the days ol' Enoeli, a species of image-worship, us a profanation of the name of Je- hovah (sec RAUiiiia, " The Hebrew Traditions in the Works of HIeronymus," p. 20). It is a Ribbinical figment, resting upon the misinterpretation of ■ word, and of the whole text. DOCTRINAl AND ETHICAI. 1. The propagation of the human race is ont side of Paradise, not because it is first occasioned by sin, but rather because it sujjposes a distinct development of mankind, and is tainted witli its sin. 2. The human pairing is not an act of natural necessity, but a free ethical love, a knowing, as its fruit is a begetting, a witnessing. 3. The first mother's-joy after the first mother'* anguish, is a spirit of high enthusiasm, and, there- fore, an expression of believing hope in the coming salvation. It takes the form of womanly precipi- tancy, and may mean that now she has bome the serpent-crusher (gotten him, or brought him forth). This is the first misieckoning in respect to the times and hours of God, and the person who is to bring salvation, but the Ijelieving hope itself is not a vain thing. Upon this high soaring, as it appears in the mother's naming of Cain (tiifniKa, see John i. 42), there follows, after the human fashion, a great lower- ing of hope, as shown in the naming of the second son, wherein there appears to be indicated a fearful motheily foreboding, which may have been already occasioned by the conduct of the young Cain. 4. The formation of the family : the fundamental law of human relations ("next to the conjugal the parental, the sisterly and brotherly, the general rela- tion of kindred," Delitz.-ch) and of all human ordi- nances. Church and state, with their binding ce- ment, the school, all in the embryo form. The offering. The sentence upon Cain for his brother's murder. The first moral lesson, an admonition or wai'ning to Cain. 6. In the bosom of the first family there appears the first contrast between the two ground-forms of the human calling, — between worldly power and a divine endurance, between an ungodly and a godly direction, between one who was godless and one who was pious, between one who was loaded in life with the curse of God and one who was slain for his piety, yet whose death, blood, and right, had still an abiding value in the eyes of God. 6. The religious oll'ering is indicated and intro- duced as early as humanity in the state of sin, ch. iii. 21. It has its origin in thankfulness for God's gifts, and the acknowledgment that all belongs to him and must be presented or consecrated to him. It is, moreover, an expression of the feeling that the failure to present a real and perfect obedience of the heart and will, and of a perfectly holy hfe with prayer, is attested by the symbolical offering, which, as such, denotes a longing for, and a craving need of restoration to, that perfect condition wherein life and oll'ering unite in one. Concerning the offering, see Exodus and Leviticus. 1. God's pleasure in the one offering, Ids displeas- ure at the other. See the Exegetical notes. 8. God's wannng to Cain. Sin evidently appear* in Cain in an advanced stage of pmgress, and this Uulieates hereditary sinfulness. The divine warning, moreover, cliaracterizes litis hereditary tenilency to sin, in its most peculiar being, not as a f'al>iiisu< force, but as a seducing inclination to evil, a^ i CHAP. rV. 1-26. 263 tempting power which already, like a ravenous wild beast, was crouching at his door, and ready to spring upoL liim. Therefore does God ascribe to him a cupaorty to rule over sin by the aid of the warning word of God standing as security to hirn for such assistance. It does not depend upon his clioice whether he shall be tempted or not, but it does be- long to his choice, whether he will let sin have its will ir him, or whether he Idmself shall rule over it. Sin (though feminine) is presented in the figure of a male beast, or of a masculine nature, — as a lion, dragon, or serpent. On account of a supposed strangeness in the express>n : rule over him (or it), Ewald takes it as a quest; n : Wilt thou be able to rule over it ? And Delitzsch holds that it does not mean the ruling over the sin that is lurking for him, but only over tlie inward temptation. But this in- ward temptation, in so far as it is temptation only, is just the sin that is crouching at the door; for the door denotes the entrance to his inclination, or to his will. Keil corrects Delitzsch by saying : " it is not the holding down of the inner temptibility wliich is commanded, but the withstanding of that power of evil which invades man from without,'' — a view which here gives no proper sense. The personitica- tion of sin, and what is said about its desire and its craving after men (as though to devour them), ap- pears not without significance, yet still the remem- brance of 1 Pet. v. 8 should not lead us to find here, as Dehtzsch does, a conscious intimation of Satan. More rightly does the Book of Wisdom make a distinction between men's being raised out of the fall, on the one hand, or their permitting sin to charm them, increase in strength, and so give power to the hereditary sinful tendency, on the other (Wisd. of Solomon, i. 13-16; ii. 24 ;" x. 1). What is said Rom. v. 12: "Death has passed upon all men," bears alike upon all ; but what follows : 6^.' V irdi/Tft ritiapT(i>, allows an endless diversity of indi- vidual character, and within the ratios of its grada- tions, forms that contrast between the pious and the godless, between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent, which the Scripture everywhere Bets forth. fl. The Fratricide. "Thus sin attains to its do- minion, and in tlie outward act reveals its inhuman, beastly, diabolical nature. DeviUsh hate, brutal sav- ageness ; it is in these two together that murder has its origin. At the same time there comes out openly here, tor the first time, the conflict of the two seeds in the relations of man to man. It is the serpent- nature of Cain under whose stab in the heel Abel falls — the first example of martyrdom ; in appear- ance a defeat, but in truth a victory. From the in- nocent murdered man, there goes on, even to the case of Zachariah the son of Jehoiada, one great stream of blood throughout the whole history of the Old Testament (Matt, xxiii. 36). At the very head of the New Testament history does the bloody deed of Cain against his brother Abel again repeat itself in its counterpart, the bloody act of the Jewish peo- ple as committed against God's most ' holy child Jesus,' their bi other in the flesh. Thenceforth flows ot the stream of martyr-blood through the whole history of the Church. Death and murder proceed- hjg from him who was av^^wiroKTovos ott' dpx^s (a murderer from tlie beginning, John viii. 44), become indigenous in the history of man, and of the world, and rule in a thousand forms." Delitzsch. 10. The deuth of Abel ; the second powerful proof •f the proph'jtic significance of his bloody offering. Abel appears as the special prophet and mediator ol the peculiar idea of the Old Testament revelation, of as the one who introduces into the world the typical sacrifice — that is, the symbolical representation of a yielding up of the individual will and life to God through death, in order to the taking away the sepa> ration between God and man ; and which represeuta tion (as it unfolds) must >,ver become more and mor< tlie t)'pe of the real propitiation as set forth in tb< New Testament. Therefore would Abel be justified by hill act of faith, even as Abraham was (ileb. xi. 4) ; and to such an extent must the offering of Abd be n^ferred back to a divine occasioning, or some divine institution. 11. The first murder of a brother proceeded fron a strife concerning religion. It appears to be pre- supposed that Cain, in his sacrificial worship, had wilfully separated himself from Abel. This would be the first separation. The second is that his offer- ing, whilst it appeared in a stinted form, remained throughout an unbloody sacrifice. Communion in the offering would have made it of richer value. Th« mark of servility, legality, joylessness, and an envioui jealousy of his brother's altar, appears quite promi- nent. Therefore it is, too, that he fails of the bless- ing, and the seal of the divine acceptance. The effect, however, is not repentance, but envy, fanati- cism, hate, obduracy against God's word, and, finally, the murder of his brother. The first war was a re- ligious war. From thence have all the wars in the world's history had their motive and their coloring. Kven with the most modern wiirs religion has more to do man is commonly thought. The altar, the cen- tre as it is of all holy sacrificial acts, is the centre also of all that is horrible in the history of the world ; sino'. It is the religious idea, in some form, that is the moving power of human history. 12. Already has the first-born lost his birthright, through a proud confidence in its prerogative, out of which is developed envy of his brother's prelerence, and from this, again, in the course of its progress, scorn and hate. In this form goes the story through the history of the world, through the history of reli- gion, of the church, and of the state. Thus, many a time does the prerogative of birth, which in itself and normally is a blessing, become transformed into a prerogative of hereditary sin and guilt (Matt. iii. 9). 13. As chapter 3d presents to us the archetype of the genesis of sin, even to the evil act, so does chapter 4th give us the form of the genesis, and of the unfolding of obduracy. The commencing point is irreligiosity, that is, an offering worthless and hypo- critical in its idea (Rom. i. 21). The consequences that immediately follow are unfriendliness, envy, brotherly hate, rage, grudging, and moroseness. To this succeeds an impenitent demeanor towards thij divine voice of warning, as shown in a wicked silence. Then comes the consummation of his evil behavior towards his brother. The first example of this was probably a mocking perversion of what God had said into a presumptuous retort upon his brother ; theu the bold throwing off the mask in the murder itself^ as it took place in the field, upon the boundaries of their respective callings. Now again, on God's ar- raignment, his impudent, diabolical lying, and Titanio presumption, butwhicli becomes, after the imposition of the penalty, a howling despair. Thus it is that while in his presumption, and in his despondency, ha becomes an enemy of God, so is he also a foe of man ( seeing that his disordered imagination peoples th* M4 GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. world with human beings who stand to him on a foot- ing of deadly bostihty. When iu this spirit he goes foith as a fugitive and a vagabond from tlie land of Eden to a land ot^ soHtary exile, and there builds a city, the main significance of it lies in Its walls. It is d^fortnss to defend himself against any of Adam's future children who may not belong to the Cainite race. 14. The judgment on Cain, a parallel to the first judgment, ch. iii., just as the behavior of Cain is a counterpart, and a parallel, to the behavior of his par- ents. As a parallel it reminds us of the behavior of the serpent, *' CUvnitat ad ccelum vox sa^iguinU^ etc. ; it is like the old saying of the tour heaven-crpng sins. When the Epistle to the Hebrews tells us that by means of his faith, Abel, though dead, yet speaketh (AaAf?), it muj-t mean that the cry of his blood, re- garded as still heard, is a proof that even after death he is stiil an object of the divine care,* one still un- ♦ [Critth unto me, Gen. iv. 10, cJamal ad me, complains unto me. This is one ot the texts which the blind Sad- ducee had often read, but with the veil upon his heart, lie had seen nothing in it. It w;is no proof to him of anything vital and personal in man after death. But what a flood of light is poured upon this, and similar language in the Old Testament, by the divine interpieter : " He iw not the God of the dead, but of the living." Matt. xxii. 32. It must be liJfe that cries unto God, and that he hears. Abel yet lived ; he yet spake; AoAel, in the present, he speaketh still. To Christ, iu whom the veil is taken away, it was no figuie merely, or rhetorical usus loquendi, as it was to the Sad- ducee, and as it has become, in a great measure, to the mod- ern interpreter wiio carries back the deadness und fripidity of worn-out modem speech to chill the waimth and vitality of ancient language. In isuch primitive forms there is noth- ing unmeaning, or merely rhetorical. To the spiritual miud of Christ it was all made real by that intimation of a divine interest which guaranties a real personal being in those for whom it is expressed. The soul of Abel, of which the blood was the nearest material garment, was un-OKOTn) toO Bvaia- WTTipiov, *' under the altar" of the Divine Justice, "^rpa 'j1'*b", in *'the secret place of the Most High;" it was "lodyifig, tarrying ("(alSn"" Ps. xci. 1), under the shadow of the Almighty." It was not for Cain's sake that this is eaid, for his reformation, or for his punishment merely, or for any preventive benefit of a police kind in the checking of future murders among a race all of whom, if only the worldly aspect is regarded, were soon to perish in someway and be no more. It was not this, solely or mainly, that made that voice effectual in its call. It was for Abel's sake, as a pious son of God,— the still liWng Abel, in whom the image of God had been assailed (ste Gen. ix. 6 ; Ps. cxvi. 1 ■'»). And so we may say of other expressions in the Old Tes- tament, now become mere metaphors, or dead forms of speech, but anciently full of life and reality, representing Bouls, especially the souls of the pious, as yet having some kind of being, known at least to God "to whom they live," as our Saviour adds, Luke xx. 38. They are " gathered to their people;" they have "gone to their fathers;" they "yield up the ghost," not as a thing that perishes, but as a most precious deposit ti> be kt-pt (laid up, or treasuretl in Sheol, Job xiv. 13), "until the set time when God shall call and they shall answer; for he will have a regard (C^OS^ Job xiv. 15, 16, will have a longing desire) to tlie woik of his hands." They call themselves " pilgrims and sojourners upon eailh"— a phrase that has no meaning except as con- nected with the idea of another state of being, a homeland, a rtst. This is the snlvatioji, as one of these pilgrims says at the very close of his earthly life, when all thought of a more worldly deliverance is necessarily exclndrd, and there can remain only the hope of something beyond : " I have wait- ed for thy salvation, 0 Lord." S'O how it breaks from the dying Jacob in the very midst of his prophetic contomphi- iion of the future worldly (h'stiny of his sons. Gen. xlix. IS. Wliut could they mean 7 There are here no imagined bounds of (fpaco and lime, no localitiew ; it is all pure sultjtetivene.ss, h may be said ; but such a hope, indefinite as it mny seem, OEM far more of mora'; power than any ]01ysi:in or Ilcspeii- dean fancies. It was security, it was blcsseilriL'ss, and witli this thoy were content. It wan tlie idea of protection, a" cov- tring of wings," being under " the shadow of the Almighty." It was all that wati contained in that mout mysterious ex- pfeasion ri^3D IPO, "the secret of thy presence," Ps. forgotten, not lost — still living." Delitzsch. At tht same time is the cry of this martyr-blood the first signd of that voice, whether of the blood or of th« spirit, wliich ever calls for (lod's judgment, first upon Jerusalem (Matt, xxiii. 15; comp. ch. ii. 18), and finally upon the whole world (Rev. vi. 10). Only the call of the blood of Christ it is that transforms this judgment into a jutlgment of (ItJivoiancfc for all who shall receive salvation (Heb. xii. 24). 15. The chief points in the sentence against Cain. He is cursed from the ground. The very nature of the ground, so to speak, becomes an angel (or min- ister) of penal vengeance against the unnatural lran» gressor. He hath aroused it against him in its inner^ most nature, in forcing it to drink his brother's blood. Henceforth will earth deny to him its fruits. Where the murderer perpetrated the murder, the grass grows no more. The fratricide makes the ground the place of judgment. The war desolates the land. The curse proper, however, lies on the conscience itself. His heavy consciousness of guilt, incapable of being healed, and in its deceit, its presumption, and its despondency, driven to despair, nmst make him a fugitive and a vagabond upon the earth. He is ban- ished beyond any protecting enclosure, from every place of rest ; and though he may surround himself with walls as high as heaven, he is still a banished Azazel (Lev. xvi. 22) — the prince of exiles. There lies in the passage before us a germ of the church's ex- communication and of the civic outlawry. The ban- ishment into immeasurable space appears as a warn- ing prelude to the endless exile of damnation. We may ask : Why was not the punishment of death im- posed on Cain, as is demanded by the later law, ch. ix:. 6, instead of exile ? It is not a suffieient answer to say, that the parents of Cain could not execute such a sentence; the cherubim might have crushed him. But it becomes evident, already, that the re- ligious social death of absolute bani.shmciit from hu- man society, constiiutts the peculiar essence of the death penalty (see Langk, Die Gesetzlich-Catholiache Kirvhe altt Sbmbild^ p. 71). 16. In respect to the repentance of Cain and Judas, see the Exegetical annotations to v. 13. 17. The Caiuitic race. Development of the ear- xxxi. 20, "the hiding (11203) in God's paTiUon," where they have that unimae:inaltle bein^ which Christ calls "living unto God," iravTe^ yap avTtZ ^Cjtrtv, Luke xx. 38. Some may see in such expressions nieri-ly the hope of tem- poral deliverance, and yit even the most unspintual inter- preters can hardly avoid the feelint; that this lower idea, how- ever it may be partially aceonmiuiiated to a seeming' secular context, does not satisfy the holy earnestness of the lan- puage, or fill out that idea of blessedness and protection so far beyond what could be afforded by any earihly taberna- cle, or in any temple made by hands : " U how great is Thy goodness which Thou hast ia I rf U;p(ri!E2I comp. Job xiv. 13) for those that fear thee ! Thou wilt hide them in the sr.crcl of thy presence, thou wilt treasure them in thy pa\'ilion," away from all the strife and ccnsuie of this presi-nt life, P(~. xxaa. 20, 21. We cannot be wn'np when we have our Saviour to guide us in the interpretation of such language, as proving a b( 1 ef in immortahiy, or a continuoa-^ being, from the ex- pression of the divine care and protection Inr the pious liv- ing and the pious dead. Identity, contiimily, iHrsonalily, are inseparable from the idea of such mi intnest, ami we must HUiipose that the thought was vivi'liy jaesenf tn thB minds of those in early times wlio so jiasviunately expn'sseij it. Ono thing is certain, that SaddueeriMii or mateiialism Would never have given rise to t^mit modes of speech, al- tliough they may be satisfied with them after tney have divested them of all meaning. We may >ay, inu, tlmi alter surh an exposition as Christ has given us, the denial ol llu-re beinu^ any idea of a future life in the Old Testament is lie-A^- ritrhl inl'ul'lity, however it may be presented bj piolensed Christian theolof^iaQs, or even by learned biiihop'} in tlu Church.— T. Ii.1 CHAP IV. l-!it). :^^^ llest world— culture in its reciprocity with the ad- vancing Cainitic corruption. Delitzsch finds it sig- nificant that Cain gave the same name, Henoch, to his son aud to the city which lie built tor him, and «hat he must have had regard in both to the funda- mental beginnings of a peculiar and special histori- cal development. He cites the words of Ao'Gusti.ne, De Civitate Dei, cb. xiv. 28 : " Fecermit ig'itur civi- tates duos amoves duo, terrenam scilicet amor sui ttsgtie ad contemptum dei, coeleslem vera amor Dei u»gue ad contemptum xui ; ilia in .sc ipsa, Jucc in Domino gloriatur." Yet still even Delitzscli makes prominent the value of each Cainitic advance in cul- ture. In writings which set forth the origin of all things, there could not fail to be something in rela- tion to the origin of trades and arts. At a later time would these inventioas come into the possession of God's people. Still the Cairutic race has the honor of every important advance in worldly culture ; be- cause this race of the promise has suffered in the ruin of the world, whilst the race of the curse falls naturally into it, or make it their home. We can only say, however, that the one-sided, worldly ten- dency, favored a precocious development of every power of culture among the Cainites — or that the children of this world are mser in their way than the children of light. It is not the inventions them- selves, but their morbidly active development, and their abuse, that have on them the mark of the curse. Again, it is in the direction of tbe dualistic, theosophie assumption of a deeper, or hidden sense, when we read (Delitzsch, p. 21.3): "Even to this day the arts cannot disown the root of the curse, out of which they spring." " There is, moreover, re- maining in all music, not only an unspiriluali/.ed ground of material naturalness merely, but a Cainitic element of impure sensuality" (p. 213). Neverthe- less, through the subjectivity of the artist shall " that fundamental being of art which in itself is sinless " attain that to which it is morally destined," p. 215. Further on Delitzsch well says : " With a deed of murder began, and with a song of murder closes, the history of the Cainites. In the seventh generation all is forgotten — immersed in music, revelry, luxury, decoration and outward show," etc. Again he says : " This is the genesis of the most spiritual art, such 13 poetry, music, etc." (p. 216). More happily, at least in respect to its outer consequences, did there precede all this that pious song of jubilee at the cre- ation of the first man (p. 123). Thus much is true, that as art, and especially poetry, points out the dis- tance between the real and the ideal on the side of culture, so does the sacrificial offering do the same on the side of cultus, or reUgion. 18. Concerning the worship of Jehovah as begin- ning among the Sethites, see the Exegetical explana- tions. HOMTT.F.TICAI. AND PRACTICAl. See Doctrinal and Ethical. — Adam's Family. His guilt, his suffering, his salvation, and his hope. — The first family picture in the Bible. — The tragic sorrow in every family (indicated in the baptism of children) — The family the root of every human ordi- nance— both of church and state. — The first form of education as it makes its appearance in the firsi sac- rifice, and in the varied callings of Cain and Abel. What education can do, and what it cannot. — Unlike children of like parents. — Pious parents may have »ickei children (.Caiu — Abel). — Eve's precipitancy even in the utterance of her faith. — Eve's materna, joy, in its divine trust, and in its human mistakmgs. 1. The divine truthfulness in her hope of salvation j 2. the moumful disappointment in her expectationa of Cain ; 3. the happy disappointment in respect t« Abel (not a vanishing vapor : Abel "yet speaketh"). — The two ground-forms of the human vocation. — The acceptable and the rejected ofl'ering. — The contrast between Cain and his brothers in its significance: 1. Cain lives, Abel dies ; 2. Cain's race perishes, tbt race of Seth continues (through N'oah), even to th« eml of the world. — Cain the first natural first born (like Ishinael, Esau. Reuben, the brotliers of David, etc.), Abel the first spiritual first^buriL — Cain and his pride in the carnal birthright and prerogative, a world-historical type : 1. For the reUgious history, 2. for the political. — Cain and Abel, or the godless and the pious direction inside the common pecca- bility.— Cain and Abel, or the history of the first sacrificial offering, a prefiguration of the most glori- ous light-side, or of the darkest and most fearful aspect in the world-history. — Cain and Abel : the separated altars, or tbe first religious war, or tho divinely kindled flame of belief and the wrath-en kindled flame of fanaticism. — Cain, or the world- history of envy. Abel, or the world-history of mar- tyrdom.—The brother's murder. — Tlie brother's blood. — The first slain. — -And death with sin. — The first appearing of death — War. — The obduracy of Cain, or Cain warned by God in vain. — Cain's free- dom and bondage. — Cain's sentence. — The curse of Cain. — ^Cain's repentance (first presumption, then despair). — The evil conscience in the history of Adam and in the history of Cain. Comparison. — The b,anishment of Cain. — The sign of Cain. — Caia and his race, or worthlessness as regards religion and worldly spiritual power, a reflected image of the Satanic kingdom. — The progress of corruption in the Cainitic race. — It was not the worldly cultivation of Cain that was evil, or from the evil one, but its worldliness. — The first city. — Lamech, or the misuse of weapons, or the misuse of art, or of all culture. — Polygamy. — Seth, or the on£ ranaining, established, compensation for Abel. — The Sethites, or the first beginning of a new and better time indicated in this, that men begin to proclaim the name Jeiiovah, the God of the covenant. — Enosh, denoting frail humani- ty, a name of htmiihty. — When God becomes great at any time, or in any race, then man becomes small. — Does man fiist become small, then God be- comes to him great. At the birth of Cain, Eve was hasty in her joy ; at the birth of Abel, hasty in her despondency ; at the birth of Seth, quiet and confid- ing.— Seth, or the established people of God ; " And the gates of hell shall not prevail against them." Stakke : Ver. .3. God himself instituted the offer- ings, as we see from Heb. xi. 4, that as the belief of Abel in his offering had for its necessary ground the divine command, promise, and revelation, so the ^offerings themselves must be types of Christ.— ver. 4. We cannot doubt that from the very be- ginning God reserved to himself the firstUngs oi first-born. Such a command He repeated, Exod. xiii. 2 ; Numb. iii. 13. It was for j type of Christ the first-l)orn before all creations. — Ver. 5. Cain ever oppresses aud murders Abel. What else is it than the strife between the flesh and the spirit, the enmity between the seed of the woman, and th* seed of the serpent ? Arndt's " Christianity." — 7'ub. Bible: Wouldst thou that thy service be accept- able to God, perform it with unfeigned belief, and t ZG'i GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. pure heart (Matt. t. 23, 24 ; ix. 13 ; 1 Tim. i. 15).— Cramer : Wlieu God builds a church, then does the devil build a eliape! close to it (Ps. xxvi. 6). — How beautiful and lovely is it when brothers dwell togeth- er in harmony (Ps. cxxxiii. 1 ) ? but how rare ? — Envy and je.alousy have their origin from the devil, and are the root of aU evil deeds. — When the godless ought to be allured to reforn]ation by the example ofthe pious, they often become thereby only the more embittered (Acts vii. 54). — Ver. 8. Accord- ing to the Jews, Cain maintained that there was no juilge, no judgment, no reward of the good, no pun- ishment of the wicked, no eternity, all which Abel contradicted ; wheretbre Cain became so embittered that he slew his brother. There is no ground for the pretence of the Masorites that there are wanting here tweiuy-eight verses, which contain the speech of Cain with Abel. — Abel prefigures Christ. As Abel was a shepherd, so also was Christ. — Freiherg Bible : Cain is an exact type of Antichrist. — Osian- DER : The preaching of repentance avails not with all men ; especially is this the case with those who are given up to a reprobate mind (Acts vii. 49, etc.). — Cramer : Sin grows rapidly, and after a small beginning takes wide steps (Wisdom of Sirach xxviii. 13,14). — Where there is an evil heart, there is an evil eye, and wliere both these are, there is also an evil hand. — T!ie Wiirtemb. Bible : It is a very an- cient stab in the heel by the malicious devil, that the false church hates the true, and persecutes it even unto blood. — Hed-inokk; How early the date of martyrdom in the world ! The first man that dies dies for the sake of religion. He whose offering is acceptable to God, becomes now himself the victim. — ^Ver. 10. When Cain thought that he had won, that he was now alone the beloved child, that Abel was wholly forgotten, then did the latter still live, stronger and mightier than before. Then does the Majesty on high assume his cause ; He cannot bear it, lie cannot keep silence when His own are op- pressed. And thouL'h they are crushed for a little while, they only rise to a more glorious and stronger state; for they still live. — Cramkr: There is nothing secret that shall not be made manifest (Matt. x. 26; Exod. ii. 12, 14 ; Josh. vii. •.!2 ; 2 Sam. xii. 9).— Ver. 13. When ni:in should humble himself, he goes rather into despair, and rejects the means of grace. He falls, therefore, into a bitter enmity towards God, and into an ever-deepening unbelief, since he refuses to acknowledge the grace of God, and the service of Christ, or to let tliem avail for his salvation. — It is in this way that Satan plays his game ; he sets the sins before the conscience in their most frightful fonn, whilst he takes from the eyes Ihe grace of God. — Mark the steps of sin, how imperceptibly they advance I 1. Cain was arrogant ; by reason of his birthright he thought bin. self better than he was ; 2. he thereupon falls from arrogance into mocking hypociisy, and secret presumi)tion ; 3. thinking that there i.s nothing hke him, he becomes envious; 1. from the foregoing sins he falls into nmrder, even the (laying of a br— T. I,.] ['Ver. 29.— 121; n:'^. The Jewish interpreters regard this as explan.^tory of the name Noah (rest), but not its etymological ground. 'Otherwise, says Eashi, he should have been called cnir, Menahem. They also distinguish between etymology in the sound, and in the sense. They say (see Aben Ezra) that Noah invented instruments of agri- culture (as the son of the Cainite Lamech invented weapons of war), and thus delivered their atrriculturt-, in some measure, from the barrenness which had been brought upon it by the curse, and by bad tillage. This is grounded by "them on the words of Lamech, and on what was said of Xoah after the flood, that he was n^"xn tl*"X, vewpybs, agricola, Gen. ix. 20, a husbandman. !|3'Cr3^, shall comfort, rather, shall rci'i're, restore, make us breathe again, liks the Greek ivaifivx". Compare Ps. xxiii. 4: '"Thy rod and thy staff shall revive me." It is the good shepherd festering to life and vigor the fainting, dying sheep— to bring back the gasping breath. Hence the Syriac ^a.aaj fop the ruurreetton. It is not the sense of consolation, as some give it, but resuscitation, revivification. — T. L.] EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL. 1. The line of Seth, as the line of the pious wor- shippers of God, is carried on to Noah, with whom the first humanity from the stem of Seth, now puri- fied in the flood, passes over to a new age : so that the name Seth, as in verification of Eve^s maternal not the superscription placed before the 25th verse of the fourth chapter? The documentary hypothesia answers : it is because here again the Elohim docu- ment takes up the history. We let that question rest, though here verse 29th, wiih its name Jehovaii, does not have the loolv of an interpolation. It must be remarlvcd, nevertheless, that in the preceding prophecy, becomes established in contrast with .\bel section it was necessary for Seth to appear as the the mere breath of life, and the hne of Cain drowned . representative of Abel. But here again begins the in the flood. The question may be asked. Why is | history of Seth as the history of Adam himself: s'ncf «70 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. only through Seth does Adam live on beyond the flood, and even to the world's end. In respect to its inner nature, therefore, is the section Eloliistic ; that is, it presents the universal grounding of the whole human race, not merely that of the line of Shem or of the theocracy of Abraham. Kiiobel represents the section according to the doeunientary hypothesis : " The Elohist ranges the genealogical table of Adam immediately after the account of cre- ation, ch. i. (?), and connects witli it directly his history of the flood, ch. vi. 9, etc. ; it forms, conse- quently, an essential part of his work, without which it would have had a hiatus (rather with it, we may add). From the same author who concerned him- self with the connected genealogies and chronolo- gies, as being predominantly Elohistic, whilst the Jehovist took little notice of them, originated also the other genealogical tables and chronological series that are introduced in their order throughout the Peutateuch." The section before us, in its entire contents, evidently presupposes ch. ii. and iii. There is special proof of this in verses 3, 24, and 29, as also in the constant rel'rain : and he died. 2. Ver. 1. The book of the generation of Adam. — The genealogies of Adam liecome perma- nent and continuous alone through Seth. 3. Ver. 2. In the likeness of God. — This is expressed here by ~, not by 3, as in ch. i. It means, when Ho created him He 7nade him in the likeness, etc. ; that is, the divine ideal form was the model of his making^ — or of the Jinishing of his human form in distinction from its creation. The name tnan (Adam) is ascribed here in common to both man and woman. The creation in the divine image is repeated, because the line of God's sons is grounded on its divine origin (see Luke iii. 38). 4. Ver. 3. Seth. — For the significance of the name in relation to the names of the Cainitic line, see the preceding section. Of Seth it is said. He begat him in his own likeness, after his image. 'That is, as his image, Seth was similar to him, indeed, but not identically like ; he was distinguished from him individually, he was like him in his Adamic nature. And tills is said, doubtless, with a consciousness of Adam's fallen state, although in the ground ideas of this fifth chapter the nature of Adam as made in the divine image, and its pious direction, are still made prominent. Even if the names further on denote, in the average probability, the first-born of the gen- ealogies (although this does not always hold good, as is sliown by the examples of Ishmael, Esau, Ken- ben, etc.), yet it does not follow that Seth also is to be regarded here as a first-born ; just as little as the three sons of Noah, taken together, can be thus regarded. Seth has become the spiritual first-born of the Adamitic house ; he is the continuance of tlie line of Adam in its pious direction, and in its his- torical duialion. 5. Ver. 4. The ages of the Patriarchs who lived before the Hood are individually staled in the fol- lowing manner: 1. Adam 9:iii years, 2. Seth 912 years, .3. Enosh 905 ypars, 4. Cainan 91ii years, 5. Mahttlaleel 895 years, 6. Jared 9(12 years, '7. Enoch 865 year-, then translated, 8. Methuselah 9tl9 years, 9. Lwrnecli 777 years, 10. Noah, before the flood, (idU years (cli. vii. 6), ii., the whole 950 years (ch. ix. 29). In relation to the dates, the following things arc to be remai'ked. Adam is IHO years old at tlie beget- ting of Seth, whom Cain and Abel naturally pre- ceded. Seth begets Ennsh when \Kt years old. V^»ai. w nrAoanta/i to US as a tixther at the age of 90 years, Cainan 70 years, Malialaleel 65 years, Jared 16S years, Enoch 65 ye:irs, Methuselah' 187 years, La- mech 182 years, Noah even 500 years. Since, ninre- over, there is mentioned in each case the begetting of other sons and daughters, it becomes veiy quea. tionable whether we are to understand all these gen- ealogical heads as being firsi-born. The numbeis, as given, do, indeed, indicate late marriages hnviug proportion to the length of life. That, however, no ascetic idea is necessarily bound up in this, is shown by the case of Enoch, who with Malialaleel had a son the earliest of all the patriarchs. Even between the repeated mention, moreover, that he walked with God, It is said that he begat sons and daiighters. The age 65, as a year for begetting, is also worthy of note, as showing to be impossible every attempt to reduce these patriarchal years to shorter sections of time. This numbering of their years is of richest significance. It expresses clearly the blessing of longevity as emphatically exhibited through the Sethic piety ; it is the history of the devout Macro- bii, or long-livers of the primitive time. In Enoch the line reaches the highest point of its life-renova- tion ; since in him the peculiar death-form falls away ; he departs without dying, and by a divine translation. In Methuselah this grand march of life reaches its extreme longevity in this world. The line then sinks down in Lamech, as is indicated by his sighing over the labor and pain that comes from the curse-ladened earth. The whole line, in ics ap- parent monotony, is a most lively expression of a powerful strife of life with death, of the blessing with the curse. They advance far in yeais, these pious sons of God ; the numbers leach a high figure, but ever again there comes that tragic word r"'"! : and he died Once, and only once, is there reached the silver glance of the life-renewing, and of that Ufe-transl'ormation without death, which conies up to the original form. Tliis is in the life of Enoch, the seventh patriarch. It nmst be observed, in ac- cordance with what is inii>lied in the following clnip- ter, that the line of Seth, in its development, sutlers a gradual disturbance, which does not permit it to reach the ideal aim, — a fact which seems to be indi- cated by this name Methuselah, and the sighs of Lameeh. When in respect to this long life-endur- ance, we add the consideration of the enormous breaking up that was suddenly occasioned by the flood, it must not be overlooked that Noah, allhough already six hundred years old when the flood took place, survived its storms three hundred and fifty years. Two main difficulties are objected to the forego- ing statement : 1. the length of life ; 2. the authen- ticity of the chronology. " 'I'he highest possibla age," says Valentine ('* (.'ompendium of Physiology," ii. p. 894), "appears to be from about 15o to lOO years ; and in fact, none of the highest ages which men are known to have reached attain the height of 200 years (Pritcliard's 'Natural History of the Human Haee'). It cannot be shown that men after the flood dilTcred in any remarkable nianiuT from those who lived before. In ch. xi. 10, moreover, the narrator represents some as attaining, even after the flood, to the age of 4110 or COo years." Kuohel. Special treatises on the preceding ([ucstion are con- tained in the writing of Uk Lapassk : Kami siir la conseri'ation tie la f/e, Parvi, Maamv^ ISOlt. In general, there is no deciding this (lufstion by any iippeal tf) strong constitutions, simple modes ol" life, unweakoned powers of life, &c. i'irst of all, d« CHAP. V. 1-S2. a7l both extremes of humanity need to be settled ac- cording to the Scriptures and theciiristological ideas; and, in fiiet, in con espondeuce with tlie middle point of humanitj'. The truth of ("hrist's resurrection, not ds a return out of death to the lite of this world, but as a transition from the first form of human life into a second imperishable form, casts light as well upon the paradisaical beginning as upon the es- chatological end of humanity. It testifies to an ideal capabihty for the preservation of life even to the point of a death-like, yet not deathly transforma- tion into the incorruptible. To this testifies also, in Bymbolical form, the paradisaical tree of life, as well as, in its dogmatic acceptance, the words of Paul concerning the longing " to be clothed upon " (2 Cor. V. 1-5) that hes in the depths of human nature (compare Lange's Miscellaneous Writings, ii. p. 232). So also what he says of Christ as the Ufe- giving spirit of man from heaven, and of the trans- formation that awaits those who live long :it the world's end (1 Cor. xv. 45, 51). The christological idea that lies at the foundation is this : As the his- torical death, the death of corruption, in its gradual course first breaks through from the spiritual sphere of sin into the province of the soul, and from the province of the soul into the corporeity, so also does the healing ofl the new Ufe make its passage ; first in renewing the spirit-Ufe, then the life of the soul, and finally becoming visible in the restoration of a new corporeal capacity for transformation at the world's end. Thus the decreasing longevity of the primitive time furnishes the contrast to the increas- ing longevity at the end of the world (see also Is. Ixv). But it was not only through the original power of a corporeity not yet wholly shattered that the death of the Sethites was retarded ; it was also kept back through the progress of Ufe in the Jeho- vah-faith of the Sethites, as it culminated in Enoch, and had, therefore, already, as its consequence, a typically prophetic pre-representation of the trans- formation and the resurrection in his mysterious taking. The difficulty which is found in the suppo- sition of such long Ufe in the Sethites, has given rise to various hypotheses. Some have supposed that along with the patriarchs named their races and peoples are meant to be included ; Rosenmiiller, Friedreich, and others, think that from these orally transmitted genealogies, many names had fallen out; Hensler holds that the expression naiT (year) denotes among the patriarchs lesser spaces of time, namely, three months, till the time of Abra- ham, thence to the time of Joseph eight months, and afterwards, for the first time, twelve. Raake: from Adam to Xoah the year was equal to one month. See against this, Knobel, p. 68 ff. To the first sup- position is opposed the definite characterizing of single persons; to the second the fact that in the same manner the son always follows the father; to the tliird the constant signification of the year as tropical, periodical.* *' No shorter year than the period of a year's time have the Hebrews ever had. •'Besides the reasons given by Lange gainst the idea •f any lesser time being denoted by n3C , there are others arising from the etymology of the word. This makrs it the most fixed and most distinct of all the min^ures of time. Xot only in the Hebrew, but in the Greek, the radi- tal idea of the word for year is rcpetifwn, or a corning over igain in a second recurrence of the same astronomical •eries. Thus the primary sense of the verb nSlU is to re- pea/, to do a s&iond time ; hence the word for the numeral *v>n. In Greek there can be ao doubt that croc has the Against any shortening of the n:ir stands the fad that in that case some of the patriarchs must have begotten children at an age in which they were not capable." Knobel. By him and many of the mod- erns it is explained as a mythical conception, with reference to the old represcntatiou that in the irore happy primitive period, men lived lunger, but were ever becoming weaker and ot shorter Ufe. " This representation ^of the brevity of life) presents itself very clearly in the Old Testament. In the historical time a man among the Hebrews became 70 or 80 years old (Ps. xc. 10) ; in the Mosaic and patriarcha* time, when there meet us statements of luO, 120, 123, 133, 137, 147,175, and 180 years, man reached an age between 100 and 200 years; for the time of same idea, aa we see it in Hom. Odi/ss. i, 16, «to5 ^Afl« irepi7r\ofi.evtitv fviavTojv. Compare it with the particlL' en (Lat. et, iterum, iterare, Saxon yet, addition, repetition). So also in the word ii'iavTos (that which leturus into itself), an eljTnology which, though condemned by some, is not to be rashly rejected. In harmony with this is the Latin annus, a ring, or circle. 8o the Gothic tar, jar, Jer, the old Anglo-Saxon gear, German ja/ir, English year, seem all to carry the same thought, that which comes again.^ being connected witli the Greek iap (Lat n ver), the spring^ the repetition, the new life, and not with the iiidt-tinito Greek icoipos, as some lexicographer.-* suppose. So marked a word carrying this distinct concepiion in all these lan- guages, would be the last one to be used for any smaller, or less marked dinsinn, and this view is confirmed b\ the fact that neither iu the Hebrew uTitings nor anywhere else do we ever find any such substitution. Years in the plural, ni3C! , seems sometimes to be used for larger designations, or lor aeonic time; as in such expressions as 'j'^'a'^ nlSO V??? t " years of the right hand of the Most Iligh,'' Ps, Ixxvii. 10, or "thy years, Tt'^PI^lli, are for ah genera- tions," Ps. cii. 24 ; though even in these cases it may have its fixed astronomical measure, denoting God's doings in time and human history. We get a c infirmation of these views by considering how the whole idea of time is divided for us into the as- tronomical and the seonic, — the former measured by the sun and other heavenly bodies, the latter above such measure- ment, entirely independent of it, having its division fi^-om inward evolutions, and thus presenting a higher and an independent chi'onolog> of its own. In astronomical tim& the day is the unit, complete in itself with its dual evolu- tion, and having no smaller astronomical subdivisions, although it may be cut up into hours and watches by arbi- trary numbering?. In aeonic time, the sii gle aXiltv or olam is the unit, and the greater measures are made by it^ redu- plications and retriplica ions, its ages of ages (aiotves twk axilivtov) and worlds of worlds. We see from this why, of all astronomical measures, the day is used to represent the Eeonic unit, and to stand fur an aiiov or an olam, as in the i)tj.epa aiwco? of 2 Peter iii. 18. From its pecubar po^vitioii as the iinit in the one department, it heeotnes the most easy and natural term for this purpose in representing the higher chronology on the earthly scale. For the opposite reason, year and month are less fitted for such a parallelism ; ani hence we find the usage referred to so strongly verified ia so many, perhaps in all, languages. A year is noi only as- tronomical in itself, but internally divided by astronomical periods. Hence it is generally used for nothing longer or shorter than its own solar measurement. Everywhere, however, day is thus employed, not only in I'hilosophical language where a mognus annus is arliiJcially spoken oi^ but in common idioms, where we feel its natural propriety as used to denote any long internally completing, or sell- evolving time, series, or cycle ; as in that lii.e of Viroil» ^n vi. 745 : Douec longa dies perfect© temporis orbe, or in that peculiar Latin phrase venire in diem, to be boro, to come into the world, or in the stiil greater Scriptural phrases "before the day I am He,'* Is. xliii. 13, or th» ijMe'pa atui'os already Cited. We should feel it as a philo- logical discord if year were thus used, whether in poetry, or in any other animated language. On the same grouna it must appear as forced when any one would inteii^ret n:'i! , Ito?, iviavTOi, jahr, rear, of any shorter period. Be- sides, the Hebrews had two distinct names for months, neither of which is ever used in giv ng the lengths of lives, or ill keeping the record of genealogies, aJthnuBLb on-.r i-vw*^ in tL;** 'designation of festal times.— T «- 272 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. Abraham, and thence up to Xoah, the dates maintain themselves, with one exception, between 200 and 600 years (ch. xi. 10-32) : whilst in the time from Noah to Adam (there too with one exception) they are between 7Uii and lOUO years. According to the Hebrew belief therefore, in respect to tlie duration of human life, it became worse with men in the course of the times. Thence the hope in a restora- tion of the old longevity in the Messianic time (Is. Ut. 20; XXV. 8). So also the rest of antiquity as- sumed a greater length of life for the oldest time, and JosKPHCS (Antiq. i. 3, 9) names Manetho, Bero- Bus, Moschus, llesticeus, Hieronymus, Hesiod, &c., as giving accounts similar to that of Genesis." In the number ten of tlie patriarchs, there is, in truth, a symbolical significancy (the Chaldeans, too, accord- ing to Berosus, number ten antediluvian patriarchs), but a symbolical number is not on that account a mythical number, and under the mythical point of Tiew Knobel does not know what to do with the un- like and uneven numbers. Concerning the clironological treatises that relate to our section, namely the assumed rectification of the Bible chronology through the ^gyiJtian, com- pare Delitzscii, p. 220 if. For the motives which lie at the ground of the chronological clianges of our text in the Samaritan Pentateucb iind the Sep- tuagint, or their deviations (as well eh. xi. as ch. v., compare Knobel, p. 70) the reader is referred to Keil, p. 76. According to our chronology, from the creation to the flood there were 1G56 years,* according to the Samaritan text 1307 years, and ac- cording to the Septuagint 2242 years. The time after the flood until Abraham was, according to the Hebrew text 365 years, according to the Samaritan 1015, according to the Septuagint 1245. "The translation of Enoch falls nearly in the middle point of years from Adam to the flood, — that is, in the year 9S7 after the creation of Adam. At that time Seth, Enosh, Cainan, Mahalaleel, and Jared, were etiU living, as there was also living his son Methuse- * [In the excellent commentary on Genesis by Dr. James G. Murphy, of Belfast College (p. 196), thrre is a very c'.ear and convincing comparison oi the Hebrew test chronology with that of the Septuagint, the Samaritan, and Josepliiis. The internal evidence is shown to be de- cidedly in favor of the Hebrew from its proportional con- eisteney. The numbers in the LXX. evidently follow a plan to which they have been conformed. This does not appear in the Hebrew, and it is greatly in favor of its being an authentic genealogical record. The numbers before the birth of a successor, which are chiefly important fur the chronology, aio enlarged in the LXX. by tlie addition of just one hundred years In each of six cases, making ,\dam 230 years old at the birth of Seth, Seth 205 at the birth of Enosh, and so on, whilst the sum-total of each life remains the same as in the Hebrew, with a slight exception of 25 years in the case of I-aniech. The interest, here, is evi- dent, to extend the total chronology without changing the other numbers of the macrobiology. It is not e,isy to ijna^ne what motive could have led in the other direction, or to the shortening, if the original had been as given in the SeptuaL'int ; evince all ancient nations have rather ehown a disin.sition to lengthen their chronology. On phyhiologicai grounds, too, the Hebrew is to be preferred; eince the length of the life does not at all rcf|uire so liiTe a toanhood at* those numbers would seem to intimate. There in no proof that these were all first-bom sons. It was the line of the pious, of those that had the spiritual birth- right, The unevennesa of the Hebrew birth-iigures, vary- ing from 6tj and 70 to 157, shows this, whilst the added 100 veare, in each ca^e, by the Septuagint, shows a design to DrinK them to some nearer proportional standard, grounded on some Bupposed physiological notion, and the unwar- ranted idt-a thai each is ii natural firsl-bom. To all this muKl be iuided the fjiet that the Hebrew has thi- best claim to l>e regarded as the origirial text, from the well-known KTUpulous, and even Riipei.stitious, care with whi/'h it has been textoally prwerved.— T. 1^] lah, and his grandson Lamech, then 113 jcais old; Noah only was not yet born, and Adam of all th« line was the only one dead." Keil. We will remark m general, in relation to our treatment of the chro- nology in the Introduction, that the genealogical clironology throughout corresponds to the funda- mental biblical ideas, or to that significance of per- sonality which determines everything as actual tact. In their experience, however, of the way in which the blessing of piety advanced their length of Ufe, tlie Macrobii must have found a special warning to number their days, and in the uusymbolical form of the numbers it was easier to admit misreckouinga in single eases than any arbitrariness in respect to the whole. In consideration of the extraordinary impression which the year-period must have made upon the first men of our race, in consideration of its symbolical dying and living again with nature, as well in the change [in the length] of day and night, as in that of summer and winter, they could have had, in general, no occasion or inducement to learn the reckoning of numbers more vivid than that which was furnished by these annual vicissitudes. 6. Ver. 1. This is the book. — " ^ED means any finished writing, whether it c insists of only one pair of leaves, or even of a single one ; as, for exam- ple, tlie book (or bill) of divorce. Deift. xxiv." De- litzsch. — The generations of Adam. — The nearest bound to this book of the generations of Adam, ia the genealogical register of Noah. In a wider sense, then, does this register of Adam go on in the genea- logical register of Noah (ch. x.) and in the genealo- gical register of Shem (ch. x.), even to Abraham. Alter that it goes on through the whole Old Testa, ment, until it becomes the genealogical register of Jesus Christ (Matt. i.;. 7. Ver. 4. And Adam lived. — " The narrator reckons the years of each forefather unto the beget- ting of his first-born, who carries on the main line, then the remainder of his life, and after that he reck- ons both periods together, so as to give the whole length of his Ufe and name." DeUtzsch. — Begat in his likeness. — Adam bore the image of God. Seth bore the image of Adam: 1. according to its dispo- sition in res])ect to the image of God ; 2. according to the measure of its deformity by sin ; 3. according to the hereditary blessing of his piety. " In that primitive time the births did not rapidly follow each other — a fact which had not a physical, but only an ethical ground," says DeUtzsch. There is, however, a phvsical cause, since in exact correspondence with the increasing degeneracy and rankuess of human life, is there, in a literal sense, the increase of a nu- merous and wretched oflspring. 8. Ver. 5. And he died. — Baumgarten : " In its constant return does tliis expression ri:^" prove the dominion of death, from Adam onward, as an immutable law (Rom. v. 14). Still, on this dark backgiound of a conquering death shows still mora clearly the power of life. For man dies when lie has already propagated anew the life, so that in tha midst of the death of the individual meniliurs, tha life of the race holds on, and the hope grows .strong, er and stronger in the seed that is to conquer the author of death." The unceasing refrain, and kt died, denotes here also the Umit of the long and ele- vated line of life that seems to be ever mounting towards heaven, but ever breaks oR' in the end, — with the exception of Enoch. And so we get a clear view of the battle of Ufe with death. CHAP. V. 1-32. 278 9. Vers. 22-27. And Enoch walked with Qod. — This expression, which occurs once more in respect to Noah, ch. vi. 9, is afterwards enlarfjed. It becomes (ch. xvii. 1 ; xxiv. 40), " to walls before the face of God," — "to follow Jehovah," Deut. xiii. 5 — and similarly, Malachi U. 6, it occurs in respect to the priest. It denotes the most intimate inter- course with God, or, so to speak, a permanent view of a present deity, a continual following after His guidance. The word occurs here twice. In its first usage it denotes the character of his life, and gives assurance of the perseverance and soundness of his piety ; lie walked with God three hundred years, he begat sons and daughters. In the second, it gives confirmation of the wonderful translation of Enoch. According to the Jewish tradition, Enoch had, in all probability, borne witness against the Cainitic anti- DOmists of his day, and had annoimced to them the judgment which came with the flood. From this Jewish tradition the book of Enoch and the epistle of Jude took in common (Dillmann, Buck Henoch); for there is no necessity of referring the place in Jude to the apocrvphal book, since the apostles, as is well known, have cited popular traditions in other places, although even DeUtzsch seems to connect the epistle with apocryphal story. With this prediction, and in correspondence with fundamental biblical principles, does the epistle of Jude make him the type of the prophetic testimony against that anti- Christian Antinomiarusm of the New Testament day, which is comprehended in its unity as " the last time," and also a typical prophet of the last day itself. The translation of Enoch has two sides. 153'S1 means, in the first place : he was no longer there, he had disappeared (ch. xlii. 13, 36). There- by is it indicated that his people had missed him, as the sons of the prophets missed Elijah when he was taken away (2 Kings ii. 16, etc.). Luther has pic- tured in a most vivid manner this missing of Enoch, as reflecting itself in the case of Jesus in His death, and on Easter morning. According to Luther, they had some thought that he had perished, had prob- ably been slain by the Cainites, and then received a special revelation concerning his taking away. — God took him. — This word Pipb is also used in the taking up of Elijah (2 Kings ii. 9, 10 ; Ps. Ixxiii. 24 ; xlix. 16). A death so early in a line of men for whom life was a blessing, could only be regarded, in this connection, as a punishment. It would seem to make Enoch of least worth among the patriarchs, whereas, on the contrary, he was the most eminent. It is clear, therefore, that there is narrated here a transition which did not go through the form of •death. The Christian tradition (Heb. xi. 5), as well as the Jewish (Sirach xliv. 16; xlix. 16), hold fast the umnistakable sense of the text, in which here, in place of the ever-returning " and he died" there comes in that other expression, "/or Qod took him." It is also confirmed by the analogous representations of the Bible (Elijah, Christ, the transformed, 1 Thess. iv. 17 ; 1 Cor. xv. 51). But whither? and to what atate was Enoch translated ? Dklitzsch : " To a closer nearness with God, with whom he had hitherto walked ; not that he became a partaker of that glori- fication which awaits the justified in the resurrection ; for in this glorification Christ is the first fruits." On the contrary, Keil : " Not in the glorification is Chi-ist the first fruits according to 1 Cor. xv. 20, 23, but in the resurrection." By a transformation, or bv a clothing upon, were Enoch and Elijah trans- 18 lated into everlastirg life with God. We must di» tinguish, however, between the transformation and the glorification, between the heavenly region of the pious, that is. Paradise, and the perfect heaven of Christ. " His 365th year of life corresponds prob- ably to our 33d," remark Delitzsch and Knobel : " Enoch lived ae many years as the year has days." In respect to the legendary parallels in the extra biblical antiquity, comp. Knobei,, p. 72 ; in which it is clear that we must distinguish the biblical tradi- tion from the kindred stories. According to Knobel the motive for the translation was probably to rescut Enoch from the age in which he lived, — with relation to ch. iv. 10. Beyond a doubt, however, the main reason was the fact that he had become personally ripe for transformation, and that through his faith there might he introduced into this world the faith in a new life in the world beyond (Heb. xi. 5, 6). If we would seek farther, we must compare the translations that follow in sacred history. Elijah ig translated because his consistent legalism must be- come a judgment of fire, and a Last Day for the apostate Israel ; Christ is translated, because His staying longer in this world must have come to a sudden conflict of life and death with the old world, — that is, must have had for its consequence the Last Day ; the believers at the end of the world are translated, because now the Last Day has actually appeared. Judging from these analogies, we may conjecture that the translation of Enoch denoted a decided turning-point in the life of the old world. At all events, he had not m vain announced the day of judgment before his departure. At this time, it is probable, there was the beginning of the corrupt alliances between the Sethitcs and the Cainites. It is the probable middle time between Adam and the flood. The Jewish and Arabian fables, according to which Enoch is said to have discovered the art of writing and book-making, together with arithmetic and astronomy, must rest, for the most part, on his name, TJn, from "|3n (to initiate, educate), and upon the astronomical significance of the number 365. 10. Ver. 27. Methuselah. — The highest age, 969 years. 11. Ver. 28. Lamech "At so great an age did these pious forefathers, who had renounced the self-created worldly lust, confess their experience of the burden and painfulness of life, in all its gravity and in all its extent ; and it is easily explained how it is that the history of the Sethites closes with lan- guage of such a different sound from that of the Cainites. Lamech the Cainite is full of an evil drunken confidence. Lamech the Sethite, on the contrary, is filled with the most extreme dejection in respect to the present, and has no other joy than in the promise of the future." Delitzsch. The name nb, which he gives to his son, is put in relation to ens , from which it does not follow that this relation is etymologically significant. The confident hope of the wearied is ever some bringer of rest. Without doubt does the life-labor and toil of the Sethitci stand in relation to the pride of the Cainites, even as it forms a contrast to their confident and false secu- rity. It is this pride which has power to trouble their life more than the unfruitfulness of the earth. In respect to Lamech's language in which he greets Xoah as the bringer of rest, Lcther remarks : Sicut Heva fallitur, ita quoque desiderio restitutionit mundi fallitur etiam bonus Lamech. Still is he mi» 274 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. taken in supposing that Noah was to bring in the closing sabbath of humanity ; that there came with him a great reelioning, and a preliminary new world, he correctly anticipated. 12. Ver. 32. And he begat Shem. — Ranke : " The naming of the three sons of Noah leads us to expect that whilst hitherto the line ha.s moved on ever through only one member, in the farther course of time all three of Noah's sons must simultaneously lay the foundations of a new beginning." "The order of the ages of Noah's sons is Shem, Japheth, Bam (see ch. x. 21). In the enumeration, however, Japheth ever stands hist, because his name of two Byllables mates the best close in the collective ar- rangement.' Knobel. The series of the three sons, however, in regard to their age, makes a difficulty in relation to ch. x. 21. (See Keil, p. 104.) Accord- ing to the pawiige before us, Noah begat Shem first when he was 5i)0 years old. According to ch. vii. 6, he was 600 years old when the flood came. Ac- cording to ch. XI. 10, Shem was !00 years old two years after the fiood. Either then must we here re- gard the lOii yeati* of Shem as a round number, or the word bnj, ch. x. 21, must relate to Japheth, as Michaelis and others think. On the contrary, see the remarks of Knolll, p. 120, and of Keil, p. 104. Keil, however, would lake "lupn as merely a com- parative designation of Ham, ch. ix. 24 : the young- er instead of the youngest; so that the series Shem, Ham, Japheth, would be the actual order of their ages. This consequence 7) uhinos, the eternal life, reve.aled by Christ. Great confusion arises from confounding the two, and the distinction becomes of great importance in refuting the reiisoning of those who teach the annihilation of the wicked. The word npb here, though a common one, is to be noted as used in a strikingly similar connection in the account of Elijah (2 Kings ii. 9, n- fes), Ps. xlix. 15, " God shall redeem my soul from Sheol, for He shall take me," "JniSI , and Ps. Ixxiii. 24 : " Thou rilt guide me by thy counsel, and afterwards take me (to) glory." It is worthy of note, too, how ex- actly in Ps. Ixxiii. 24 the Hebrew nnx corresponds If the use of the cognate Arabic «'., ^{ (Heb. n"'^n!< Numb, xxiii. 10 et al.), the frequent Koranic and ante- Hohammedan word for the after or future life. In these two passages from the Psalms, npb may not denote the hope of a translation, yet the similaritj of context, which strongly seems to be suggested by the passage in Genesis, takes them clearly out of th« Rationalist's limitation to a mere worldly deliver- ance.—T. L.] DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL. 1. Concerning the line of Seth, see the Exegetical aimotations. No. 1. 2. Concerning the meaning of the image of Adam, see the Exegetical annotations. No. 3 ; as also for the significance of the names that here occur. No. 4. 3. Concerning the Macrobii, or the long-lived of the primitive time, see Exegetical annotations. No. 5. It ought to be considered that not only had death, as yet, fiiiled to make his full breach upon them, but that, on the other hand, through their inward intercourse with God, their life-power had been wonderfully advanced in the opposite direction of the transformation form. Concerning the chro- nology, see No. 5. 4. For the meaning of Enoch, see No. 7, Exegeti- cal annotations. Enoch, the seventh from Adam, is a very ancient witness: 1. For the degrees of piety ; 2. for the truth of the mystical or the mysterious core of religion, communion with God ; 3. lor that assurance of eternal life that wells out of a life of faiih and peace in God. In this is he, in a special sense, a type of the life of Christ: 1. His divine human walk ; 2. his glorification and translation to heaven. Concerning the language of Lamech, see No. 8. 5. For the meaning of Noah, see the extracts from Starke below. According to Heb. xi. 1, Enoch is the mediator of the idea of a revelation of deliv- erance, or of salvation from judgment. 6. A main point of view of the Holy Scriptures and of the religion of revelation, is the significance of the personal life. This presents itself in the genealogies as they stand in their simple grandeur even to this day. It is like the granite of the earth in a highland landscape. 7. Enoch, Elijah, Christ, three stages in the un- folding of the facts of the world beyond, of the higher fife of the world beyond, of its region of glory, and of the wonderful transition to it, as well as of the belief in those facts. In Christ the per- fection of what is here prefigured. 8. Noah and his house a figure of the pious of the last time (Matt. xxiv. 34). HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL. The race of Adam, according to the ground- features of its life: 1. Birth; 2. marriage and the family ; 3. death. — The constant repetttion, and fu died, a powerful memento inori. [Through this con- stant refrain, atid he died, the reading of this chapter is said to have awakened men to repentance.] — .\dam, through Seth and Noah, the ancestor of the liumau race: 1. In the continuance of the diiine vocation, 2. of sinfulness, pain, and labor upon the earth ; 3. of strife with sin : Seth, Enoch, Lamech, Noah ; 4. of the prospect of the future of the perfected Seth (meaning compensation and established), of the perfected Enoch (devoted), of the perfected Noah (rest-briiiger). — The conflict of life with death in the line of the Sethites 1. How it holds back death 276 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. through the blessing of piety (the long-living) ; 2. how it ever opposes to death new generations (and he begat sons and daughters) ; 3. how it finds a way of life beyond death (Enoch). — Seth as the again- risen Abei. — The time of Enosh, that is, of the feel- ing of human weakness, as a time of the first glori- fying of the divine power and covenant faithfulness. —The names of the Sethites (see above). — Enoch the mediator of the faith of a new hfe in the world beyond (lleb. xi. .5, 6), on the ground of the experi- ence of the divine complacency (justification in its first form), through faith, tliat is, in tlie unfolding of his communion with God, and in the bearing of his prophetic testimony against ungodliness (Jude). — Enoch's walk with God and his blessing. — The long life of Enoch and the long life of Methuselah. — Enoch the wonderful height in the experience of the blessing, in the race of the blessing. — Enoch a turning-point in the primeval history, as Elijah in the history of Israel, and as the ascension to heaven of Christ in the history of the human race generally. — The history of Enoch tlie first germ of the doc- trine of a heavenly inheritance. — Enoch as a type of Christ. — The Cainitic Lamech and the Sethitic Lamech. — Lamech's word of confidence in respect to Noah, 1. a delusion, and yet, 2. no ilelusion. — The lijie of the Sethites and the line of the Cainites: 1. Worldliness ; spirituaUty ; 2. pride and confi- dence ; sorrow and patience ; .S. an end, with terror ; a newer, fairer beginning of life. — Noah as a type of Christ.— Adam the ancestor of two lines : a pious and a godless. — Noali the ancestor of three lines : a line of faith and worship, a line of human culture, and a line of sensual barbarity. Starke : It is this genealogical record that has been preserved by God's wonderful care, and is to be found, 1 Chron. i.. Matt, i., Luke iii. — Cramer : There has always been a church of God, and will re- main even to the last day (Matt. xvi. 18). The evan- gelical religion is the oldest aud the truest of all. — Ver. 3. All men are by nature children of wrath, and stained with the hereditary sin (Eph. ii. 3). — Long life is also from God ; well for him who seeks to ajiply it to his honor. — Osiandkr ; We have lived long enough when we know how to learn Christ. — Ver. 0. It is an old covenant : thou, 0 man, must die (Sirach xiv. 18). — Cainan. He had (like Enoch) seen all the patriarchs. — The example of Enocli is a glorious proof that the marriage state can aud ought to be holily maintained. — Whether now childien and babes enjoy any such intimate intercourse with God, there are still degrees herein, so that husbands and fathers in Christ have theTcby a much closi^r com- munion with God. Jewish, as well as some old patristic and papistical interpreters say, that he (Encjcli) was caiiied into the earthly paradise, where he will remain lo the end cf the world, when he will come back and bi' slain by Antichrist, and there- upon rise again and be taken up into heaven. We may readily see, however, what a mere fable this is. Rather has he been taken up into this heavenly para- dise (Luke xxiii. 43). — Aim of Enoch's translation: 1. Thereby was the doctrine that the good man was rewarded in a future lil'e established as against the prevalent security of that day; 2. thereby, in the seventh from Adam, was there given a pattern which even to the time of the seventh trumpet should serve a« an example to believers whom the day of Christ might find alive; 3. thereby Enoch was set before ■H an a type of (yhrist in his ascension. (Then fol- lows a compariBon of the translation of Enoch with the ascension of Christ.) — Methuselah. No one of the patriarchs reached a thousand years, for thai number is a type of the perfection to which no man in this life can attain. — He died in the year 1658, and, therefore, in the year in which the flood brok* in upon the world. — Noah (Luke iii. 36 ; 1 Pet. iii 20 ; Heb. xi. 7). Noah is a glorious type of Christ; 1. In respect to his name : Noah signifies rest and peace, or consolation and comforting ; so is Christ, too, our Prince of peace, who makes for us peace and tran(iuillity (Is. ix. 6 ; Rom. v. 1 ; Jer. vi. 16). 2. According to his threefold oflBee : Noah was a prophet (2 Pet. ii. 6), and announced many years beforehand the destruction of the first world and it? sons, which was to befall them (Matt. xxiv. 25) Noah was a priest, for he oft'ered sacrifice ; ChiisI has offered himself (Heb. vii. 27). Noah prayed foi the wicked world (Ezek. xiv. 14) ; so also is Christ our advocate (Kom. viii. 34 ; 1 John ii. 1 ; Heb. v. 7). Noah blessed Shem and Japheth ; so also Christ (Mark x. 16). Noah was a king, the head of liij family and of the new world, the builder of an ark at God's command ; Christ was king and head of hia threefold kingdom, the builder of the church (Ps. ii. 6). — The sons of Noah. They are not born in th( order in which they here stand, but Japheth was the first-born (ch. x. 21), Shem the middle son (ch. xi. 10), and Ham the youngest (ch. ix. 24), SciiuiiDER : Genealogies may be called the threads on which history, ehroBology, and everything else in the first book of Moses moves. The Adamitic gen- ealogical table, ch. v., throws a bridge between thf fall and the flood. In the plan of Genesis, the eyf of Moses is firmly directed to Israel. The object of this constantly keeping the eye upon Israel, has for its ground the placmg, in the most visible manner, befoie the eyes of the latest descendants, Jehovah's covenant faithfulness in the outer as well as inner preservation and assistance of the woman's seed. On this account the genealogies of the tlld Testa- ment, and of Genesis especially, Ibrm a part not to be overlooked in the great history of the divine as- sumptions of humanity before the incarnation of God in Christ. — Vers. 1 and 2. According to Luke iii. 38, man stands in a genealogical relation to God; his descent loses itself in the divine hand of the Creator (Acts xvii. 28). — Vers. 3-5. The significance of the time depends upon the significance of the person who is born, lives, and dies in it. The mean- ing of the time is nothing else tli.-in that there ap- pears in it the birth and life of the human ]ierson- aUty. To the mere dead number the coming man first gives life and content, and so too he first makes history. — Abel is murdered, Cain is cursed ; and now Seth enters, a first birth, as it were, into history. — Val. Herbekger : Adam and Eve may have wept long for the death of the pious Abel, and the wick- edness of that wretched son Cain ; but now God makes them to rejoice again in a pious child whom he presents to their eyes. Such vicissitudes of joy and sorrow befall all pious people. Be not, there- for?, proud when it goes with thee according to thy heart's wish ; be not cast down though it may lain and snow crosses. God will again rtjoiee thee with a cheerful sunshine in thy long, wearisome domestic trouble. — Whether the rest of the patriarchs who followed were all first-bom sons, is made doubtfu) by the case of Seth. — "From Adam onward to tin patriarch Jacob, hath the Holy Spirit signifiei' to u» in what year each named ancestor, who propagated Ihiit line out uf which Christ was lo spriny, begal CHAP. V. 1-az. 2T» Ihat son who in turn w:i8 to become a specially-named ancestor in the course of descent." Roos. — Seth's genealogical register is the line of " the sons of God," that is, of the true cliurch. " With reverence and iwe do I draw nigh to thee, 0 holy people who 4well under his shadow and before his presence, 0 o must watch. — Vera. 6-20. Arabian stories concerning Seth and Jared, p. 111. Jared: an enigmatical name, out of which, liowever, as out of most of the Sethic names, there evidently enough breathes a tone of sorrow and of pain. Sharp con- trast with the namings of the Cainites, which express might and pride. — Vers. 21-23 Wliilst the Enoch of ch. iv. 17 bears upon himself the Cainitic conse- cration, and gives to the earthly his consecration (say rather receives it from the earthly), the Enoch of our chapter shows the consecration of (5od (Sirach xliv. 15 ; IJeb. xi. 5). The subjective side of patri- archalism is its faith, the objective the divine ac- ceptance.— Luther : From this we take it that there was In Enoch a peculiar consolation of the Holy Spirit and an excellent and noble courage, so that with the highest confidence and boldness he bore himself against the church of Satan and the Cainites, in the presence of the other patriarchs. For to walk reverentially with God means not to roam in a de,s- ert, or to hide oneself in a corner, but to come forth according to his calling, and to bear himself bravely against the unrighteousness of Satan and the world. (In this, however, the question still remains, whether we are to think of Enoch as having the contempla- tive Johannean, or the zealous Fetrine form ; we may rather suppose the first than the second.) — • Roos : We never find this mode of speech, to walk with God, after the giving of the law, but rather the terms perfect, upright. In the New Testament pious men are called holy (saints), and beloved of God. In this way there shines clearly before the eyes the difference of the divine economies, namely : before the law, and under the law, and under the grace of the Xew Testament. In re.spect to the language, to walk with God, it expresses the patriarchal piety in a very becoming and lovely manner. There were, at that day, no literally expressed prescriptions as to what ought to be done or left undone. God himself stood in place of all such prescriptions. — Hengsten- BKRG : The main thing was that each should become % partaker of the life of God. When this took place, fren had he eternal Ufe, and the assurance of it in his conisviousness. In all the Holy Scripture this term (translation) is used only of three persons : of Enoch b thu old world, of Ehjah ip the old covenant, and of Christ in the new. The first is a " type of th« second, anil both are Old Testament figures " of tha last. — Hehder: The seventh from Adatn cannot bt without God in a world which scorns him; God foi^ got him not, but made him immortal and an evei^ lasting moimment of this divine truth. — Henosten- BERii : Everything arbitrary must be far removed from a religion whose God is the unchangeable Jeho- vah ; what God does in the case of one is, at tha same time, a prediction of what he will do to all who I occupy with him a like stand-point. — Baumgarten : When we confine our looks to the bare catalogue, we find, indeed, life followed close by death, but this opens up to us a series in which we see no close. But that this series has an actual conclusion, namely, the victory of Ufe over death, is for the first time assured to us through the translation of Enoch. — LcTHER : So shines out, in the midst of this nar ration of the dead, like a fair and lovely star, the ple,ising light of immortality. The old doctors of the church say: Abel confessed another life after death, for his blood cries out and is heard ; Cain acknowledged another life before death, for he waa afraid to die, and his soul foreboded that something more awaited him than this world's unhappiness; Enoch confesses another life without death, for, out of this world's misery, and without the pain of dying, he goes straight to everlasting life. In the Koran and among the Mohammedans Enoch bears the name of Edris. So also the heathen leg-nds mention him under the names of Aimak, t'aunak, Nannak (for the further treatment of these stories, p. 119). Methuselah means either man of the arrow- shooting, because, by standing on his defence and using his skill in weapons, in these last times of the first world, he was able to resist the robberlike, murder- ous Cainrtes ; or his name means man of the shout or germ, that is, of a great posterity ; one rich in child- ren and in children's children. — Val. Herbekger : God can prolong our life, as in the case of Hezekiah. While .Methuselah lived the great distress came not upon the world, for he could pray from the heart and keep back the wrath of God ; but as soon aa Methuselah's white snow dissolves, and his gray hair descends into the grave, then grows the weather foul, the rain comes down, out swells the flood, and all the world must drown. — At the speech of Lamech, ch. iv. 1, it was the wife whose mother-feelings sang joyfully together ; in the passage before us (of the Sethic Lamech) we perceive the loud pulse of a father's heart. — The advimcing corruption of the time, and of his ootemporaries, give no doubtful col- oring to his soul's longing ; on this dark background first falls that hard fate of eating bread in the sweat of the brow (ch. iii. 17). — In such a consohation of a pious son did the old pious fathers find their rest. — Roos : From such a man must the patriarchs have been greatly comforted, and gained new courage. (Similar examples in the t>ld Testament, Moses, Samuel, Elias ; in the Xew Testament time, .John the Baptist, the Apostles ; in modern times, Huss, Lu- ther, and others.) It all presupposes Christ the middle point. — Theodoret names him (Noah) the other or second .\dam. — Dreciisler : Here, in the mention of Noah, there is in extensinn to tlie whole chapter in contrast to the previous concise declara- tions.— (Comparison of the three sons of Adam and the three sons of Noah.) Shem the first-born, the most like to his father, who carries farther on the golden thread; he is the representative of the divine principle in humanity, p. 125 The opposit* 278 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. fiews of Luther and CaWn respecting the declara- tion that Xoah was five hundred years old. Lu- ther: He lived so long unmarried, because, in that corrupt time, it was better to have no children than evil, degenerate ones ; but then he may have become married from the admonition of the patriarchs, or the command of an angel. Calvin : It is not said that he had hitherto been uimiarried, nor in what year he began to be a father, but, on the occasion of noting the point of time when the future flood is announced to him, Moses adds that at this time he had already become the father of three sons [this explanation, however, is not in harmony with the allegations of a middle time which he cites as analo- gous to those in our chapter]. — Herder: Remark- able history of humanity ; the form it ever presents. These, imder the curse are singing their song of jubilee; those others, under the blessing are full of Bighs. These are building, singing, inventing ; those live, bring up children, and walk with God. The number of the one class is ever growing more numerous, the gathering of the other grows ever less and less. It ends with one race, with one man, and the seven souls that are with him. So will it also be, says Christ, at the end of the days. Be not dis- heartened, little flock. — Luther: This chapter pre- sents to us a form and image of the whole world. As, therefore, there may be seen in our chapter a fair form and image of the early world, so also is it God's overwhelming wrath, and a most fearful ruin, that we behold in the fact that the whole race of these ten patriarchs perished, with the exception of only eight tliat survived. — The same : We ought not to think tliat these are common names of mean and common men, for, in fact, they are great heroes. — The same: Our world of t(>-day, the third, and Btill a world of mercy, how full of blasphemy and cruelty ! — It must be punished with a flood of fire ; for so prophesy the colors in the rainbow (then fol- lows an interpretation of the three chief colors). Gerlacii : God himself stands at the head of the genealogical table, not merely as creator, as he is of all other beings, but as the father of men, as appears Luke iii. 38. Not without purpose is there mentioned the divine origin of the human race at the very apex of this series. It contains the patri- archs that remained true to the covenant of God, and who, on that very accoimt, are called the Sons of God (ch. vi. 2). — Ver. 5. " \^^lo was like his image " This expression contains no allusion to the fall, but there is rather indicated a contirmance of the divine image according to the original position of man. As Adam was created in the divine image, so could he also beget a son who should be like to his own iniMge. That the predominance of sin is irdicrited along with it, is taken for granted through the whole history (therefore is it here also indicatcil, although the author rightly saw that here, in the representation of the higher Sethic line, and in ac- cordance with its connections, there should be a •pecial emphasis given to the continuance of a side of light in humanity). — Enoch : Most worthy of not* as a very ancient witnessing to the earliest huaao race of a ble.'^sed eternal life. Lisco : Enoch, that is, devoted. He is the sev enth from Adam, wherein there may be some indi- cation that after the six long world-times of sin and death, there should be introduced, in the seventh period of the world, througli one, that is, Christ, « divine life, with freedom from death [" Calculus ot the Biblical Chronology," p. 23]. Calwer Handbcch : Set/i. Eve looks upon him as a present fiom God ; but thinks no more, as in the case of Cain, that she actually has the Lord. Still does her faith behold a new beginning for the promise, of the seed of the woman, bearing in itself tlie pledge of its sure ongoing, whilst she behevingly receives this "oiher seed" from the hand of Goi [Indication that in ihe birth of Cain she had ascribed to herself too great a share.] — Methuselah, the eighth from Adam, lives nearly one hundred years cotempo- raneously with Adam, whilst Noah lives (ightv-lbur years with Enoch, the grandson of Adam, and, in the other direction, was one hundred and twenty-eight years cotemporaneous with Terah the father of Abra- ham.— Abel died early a violent death ; Adam was the first who died a natural death ( ? ) ; fifty-seven years after him was Enosh translated. A thi-eelbld way. [Enoch. Under the name of Idris (learned man) he is said to have been the inventor of letters and writing, of arithmetic, and astronomy.] — Bcnsen, on the word of Lamech, v. 29 : This indicates very hard times and great disturbing events of nature, in the last period of the old world. Men labor hard, but nothing thrives. They toil in vain ; the ciop is little, or it is wholly lost. Now there is a breathing agiiin (according to the root-meaning of tia/iam (cnj) and the Arabic usage) after the fruitless la- bor. [Here, in the first place, it is overlooked that the object of Lamech's lamentation has an ethical background (a commencing corruption), and in the second place, that the destined limitation of that old period through a sudden and destroying flood ex- cludes earlier catastrophes.] — From the name of the Cainite Mahujael, ch. iv. 18: " Detruit tie IJiru," and with reference to a Lydian and Indian tradition, Von Rougemont concludes that : sa generation a ete e7i majeure partie enlevee par urte effroi/able seehercsse^ which lasted at least eighteen years. Ilixtoire de la Terre, p. 98. [In reference, however, to this meaning of the name Mahujael, it is to be re- marked that it would be contrary to the .Tnalogy of the Cainitic names]. — Taude: What Enoch's life and ili'stiny proclaims to us: 1. That a godly life in faith plea.scs God; 2. that God in his grace rewards it with the gift of everlasting life. — The name of Noah : 1. A significant index to the state of soul of the Sethites and of all chiliiren of God; 2. a figure of Christ. — HoFMANN (p. 40): Fathers ever hope foi deliverance in their sons. [|Then follows a rel'ereuo* to Setb, Enosh, Enoch, Noah.] CHAP. VI. 1-8. 274 FOURTH SECTION, J%e Univertal Corruption in consequence of the mingling of the two lines. — The anomimn {or enormity) of ains before the food. — Predominant u7ibeHef — Tetanic pride. — After the flood prevailing superstition. Chapter VI, 1-8. 1 And it came to pass when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and 2 daughters were born unto them, Tliat the sons of God .^aw the daughters of men ["looked upon them] that thej were fair, and thej took them wives of all which they chosa 3 [after their sensual choice]. And the Lord said, my spirit^ shall not always strive* with man, 4 for that he^ also is fiesh; yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years. Ther6 were giants* in the earth in those days ; and also after that, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men, and they bare children to them; the same became mighty 5 men, which were of old, men of renown. And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was 6 only evil continually. And it repented^ the Lord that he had made man on the earth, V and it grieved" him at his heart. And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I havfi created from the face of the earth; both man and beast, and the creeping thing, and 8 the fowls of tlie air; for it repenteth me that I have made them. And Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. [1 Ver. 3.— "jIT^ sb. This word has given rise to a great variety of interpretations. The most unsatisfactory, m well as the farthest from the Het^rew usage, is that of Gesenius, who renders it, non humiliiibitur, my spirit shall not hi humbled, or become vile, in man, regarding it as cognate with the Arabic ,.»l0 ( .t«;^)> There is not a trace of such a sense anywhere else in the Hebrew Scriptures. It is directly opposed to the strong sense of power, superiorittf, as it appears in the frequeni "^iTS , lord, viastsr, "(iTO , judicial conjiict, and the name of Deity, ^3"IX , Dovii7ius. Compare also l^ltl , Job xis. 29, judicium. The other form I'^T , if it is not rather an abbreviated Hiphil of '|n, hae always thi« ruling judici.nl eeose, and corresponds to the other Arabic verb ,,»iO (,.vJ^^). The Arabic verb ,,««t^ may hav« come from this by acquiring a modified passive sense. It may be said, too, that the view of Gesenius is out of harmorxy with the whole spirit of the Scriptures. There is no such thought in ttn- Bible as God's spirit being humble l by dwelliiw; or striving with men. It* philosophy is all the other way : God's " strength is made i erfect in our weakness." The LXX. have rendered it, ov /atj Karajaeii^, shall not remain ; the Vulgate the same, non permanebit ; the Syriac in like manner, • %/->V / |J , shall not dwell. The LXX. and the Syriac were probably in£uenced by some eirly Jewish Targum. since Onkelos gives it Bnbstantially the same sense, D'^pH'^ K3, though he paraphrases the passage. The interpretation of "pT^ has been much influenced by the interprtters' view of ^n*"i following, as denoting the natural life, the spirit or eoul which God had given men (see Ps. civ. 29, 30 ; Eccles. xii. 7), and they have accordingly given "T^ any general sense that, whilst harmonizing with such view, would not be opposed to the radical idea of ruling judicially. Hence we need not regard these old interpreters as having read "IT' or ■|lb'', as some have supposed. Another view which la found in some of the Jewish commentators would refer "^n""! to the spirit, mind, or disposition of God generally, repre- sented as occupied with the care of man, and, as il were, wearied with it. So Rashi : my spirit within me shall not be disturbed on account of man. Another very strange one mentioned by Aben Ezra connects ■|TT' with the rare noun ^^^^ , meaning a sheath (1 Chron. v-gj. 27), as though the body were the sheath of the spirit — shall not always be I'n- sheathed, or inshealh itself—froux the root '^12 ; and they refer to the Aramaic of Dan vii. 15, " my spirit was grieved, n3T3 "lilS, within my body "—literally, within the sheath. But this interpretation, besides being etymologically false, Is too far-fetched and inconsistent with the simplicity of the early language. The Arabic translation (Arabs Erpeuii) tenders it p vAJf) to be wholly occupied with^ according to the view of Kashi above. — T. L.) [" Ver. 3.— •^n^in . Of this there have been nearly as many interpretations as of "1T^. It may mean the spirit of God generally, as the mind of God ; it may mean the Holy Spii-it as a power or influence, or, in the New Testament sense, as a person. It has been intei-preted as the spirit or life of man, which God calls ^n"n (my spirit), because given by him (a-; in Ps. civ. and Eccles. sii., before referred to). This latter view may have two modifications : 1. aa the Iif« generally, or ni~l taken for tUE2 or i^vxi?; or, 2. in the higher sense of wfeujao, according to the trichotomy — the highei or rational power in man, and more nearly allied to the divine — the reason as distinguished froi i the sevse, and from th< mers inductive intellect judging by sense, and for the sense. The decision between these depends on the context, on thi forc-J of nbirb, and the true meaning of "^'sT^ Sin ":ii:;2 ; also, on the question whether, taken as a whole, it is th6 anguageof ajurf^men/ or of a jjred(c//(m on which the judgment isgi-ounded. On this see the Exegetical and Notes. — T L,] [' Ver. 3.-02 C3 . All the old authorities, versions, commentaries, etc., take this, as it is rendered in E.V., as equivalent to Oa "^l^;5t.2, in (hat also, or because also. Thus the LXX., Bta to ; Vulg., quia ; Syriac, 9 *^>.„Julo ; Onkelos, ^ 3^n3 ^ /onath.bb53 "jia. The As\hic of the Polyglotts, .^wXi^J % ^ '"^^^ - Arabs Erpenii, Jk.:^! ^^yjO- So also th* Z-iO GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. tudem Tergions until very lately. The excellent Arabic version made by our American mi^otirWts, and lately printed, has followed tlie most modern commentaries and lexicographers, (rashly, we think,) and render«'d it &jl,JO*J 11 ^^ *J6, '* because of his declination, or straying, he is flesh." The objection made by Gesenius and Roscmniiller tothu abbreviation 113 for nttJN , that it belongs to the later Hebrew, has little weight. There are examples in the oldest books, and t^:- conformity of the writing to the pronunciation is rather a mark of earlier orthography, though it may oe after- wards imiuited, for brevity, in the later Rabbinical writings. There can hardly be a doubt that C;u.*- or CilTZ, basshaggam, would give about the actual pronunciation (especially if rapid) of Di. nlTNS if written m full— 6aas7i«rpam hatshargam — in wliieh the semi-vowel sound of "1 would become very feeble and disappear, as is the case with ! in othi-f eombinations, so that shargam would become shaggam; the duplication by the dagesh compensating for the lost". And this would answer the question why it is not more frequent in the early books. It is not the settled use of 13 for ^li;j< (which is a mere orthographical abbreviation of n^X becoming constant in later and Rabbinical writing), but only a following the pronunciation in a peculiarly harsh combination that seldom occurs. The patach in place of the Begol CCT) is explained by tLe Jewish grammarians, who, as their rich phont-tic system clearly shows, understood these matters as well as the modern philologists. The last syllable is lengthened by the tone, and the compensating dagesh requires the sharpening of the preceding one. An objection to the view of Gesenius and others is, that such a use of the infinitive of 33C (if it can be regarded as an infinitive) is imesarapled in the Hebrew. Besides, this verb or noun, as employed elsewhere, is always used of the more venial errors, or trespasses, and is, therefore, unsuited to the greatness and malignity of the sins here denotmced. It may be said, moreover, that X*n , with the plural third person pronoun immediately preceding, is an nngrammatical anomaly. — T. L.] [* Ver. 4. — D^bS-. ^ephilim. The derivation of this word from 5E3, to fall, cannot be sustained, either in the sense of fallen (from heaven), or in that of invaders (eiriiri'iTTocTe?, those who fall on—irruentes). It is evii'.ently the ancient name they took to themselves, and that would not be, in the beginning, a name either of degeneracy or reproach. Itfl connection with nDE, X5Sj is much more clear and consistent. Compare the Niphal, Ps. cxxxis. 14, n3E3, and n^sbsS (contracted cbs:); also Exod. xxxiii. 16, CSn bSTS r|13S1 ■':s !|3"'bB51, " and I and thy people shall be distinguished above all people." "When it became a proper name, C^xbs: or C^bsS (JViphlim) would easily be changed to D^5E3 (Nephilun), the shewa becoming movable in the frequent use. Thus viewed, we may regard the expression at the end of the verse, ClSJn ^IIJDX » as the intended exegesis of the word itself — z^7Zj , distinguished men; D^X-E3, wonderful men — men of name — vim of renown. Thnt the same name should have been given afterwards to gigantic robbers, as in Numb. siii. 33, is very natural, whether regarded as applied from a tradition of these wonderful men of old or from inherent fitness, "p "^nnx DV , and also afterwards— clenrly intimating that some of these Jfephilim, or wondrous men of violence, had existed before this event, or frum of old (a tim<-- comparatively ancient, going b;ick to the days of old Cain), and that after these mesalliances, whatever they may be, there was an increase of such persons. — T. L ) [* Ver. 6. — Cnl'i*. T.xy , ive&vfiriBjj; Vulg., Puenituit eum. The Syriac and Arabic make it the repentance of grief • the Samaritan version strangely renders it nESTX, iraius fuit, he was ^«rcelt/ enraged, making it the repentance of anger. Both the Targums say : '^'^ -H'' , and Jehovah repented, but qualify it by Pl'113'^^S following— that is, in hit word, or by his word. "What they meant by this is not very clear, but it is one of the methods" they take of avoiding tht Beeming anthropopathisms of the Old Testament, of which the Jewish translators, paraphrasts, and commentators, seem to have been more afraid than the Christian. Farther, see Excgctical and Notes. — T. L.] [• Ver. 6.— I3b bs 2S5n'" . The LXX. give no translation of this, or they have softened it into SitTO^e?). The Targums also leave it out, and put in its place a mere paraphrastic repetition of what follows. Among the Jewish cont- menlators Aben Ezra worthily calls attention to its contrast with the language Gen. 1. 31. It is the opposite, he say;, of (zod's rejoicing in his works', now that evil has so grossly come in and marred it all. See Exegetical and Notes. — T. L 1 PRELraiNARY aUESTION, EXEGETICAL AND THEOLOGICAL, RESPECTING THE SONS OF GOD.* The question, what kind of beings are we to understand '.jy the Sons of God, has been answered In different ways from the earliest times, and has lately, again, given occasion to lively tlieological dis- cu3sion.s. We give h?re, in the first place, the state- ment of Kurtz, who has engaged in the question with peculiar earnestness (History of the Old Cov- enant, i. p. 30, ?,(l ed., 18fi4, and in a long Appen- dix to vol. i., under the title: Die Kliender SUhnt: Ootlet mil den Tochtern der ilenschm, Ueilin, IS!)?). " In respect to the Bne Elohim, we find three principal views : 1. they are Jitii mnr/na- Uim puellan plebeian rapicntes ; 2. they are angels ; S. tliey are the pious, that is, the Sethites, in con- trast with whom the " daughters of men " denote Caiintish women. The first view is found in the Samaritan, .lonathan (Targum), Onkclos (Targuin), Symmachus, Aben Ezra, Kaslii, Varenius, &e., and * Thin Diuousnon has been somewhat abridged by the rranslator. may now be regarded as exploded. The second view is most strongly represented in the old synagogue and church. It would seem to have its ground in the Septuagint. At least the manuscripts vary be- tween I'l'oi Tof. Sifov and S77eAui Tnv Stfou. Very decidedly, however, it is presented (and mythically improved upon) in two old Apocryjihal books, name- ly, the Book of Enoch, and the so-called Minor Cienesis, of which Dillman in Ewald's Year liooko has given a German translation derived from the Elliiopic. It i.s, moreover, recognized in the ?4iis- tle of Jude (vers. 6 and "i ?) and in the Second Epistle of Peter (eh. ii. 4, 5 ?;. It was also presented by Philo, .losiphiis, and most of the Rubbiiiieal writers (Ei.senmenokk's " .Tudaism Revealed," i. p. 380), as well as by the oldest church fathers : .Iu3 tin, Clemens Alex., Tertullian, Cyprian, Anilirose and Lactantius. Since then it fell gradually into disfavor; Chrysostom, .Augustine, and Thuodoret contended zeahiu.>^ly against it ; I'hilastrius de- nounceil it as downright heresy, and our old church theologians tiirneil from it almost witli abliorreuce. i t found also in the synagogue veheijient opposem CH^. VI. 1-8. '^1 Rabbi Simeon Ben Jochai pronounced the ban against all who adhered to it. In more modern times it has been seized upon by all exegetes who regard the early history of Genesis as mythical, notwithstanding "which a decided uumber of com- mentators who are believers in revelation have not allowed themselves to be detetred from deciding in its favor, — for example, KiippEN (" The Bible a Work of Divine Wisdom," i. p. 104), Fr. von Meyer (Bldlttrfiir holiere Wahrheit, xi. p. 61 ff.), Twesten ("Dogmatics," ii. 1, p. 332), Nitzsch ("System," p. 234 f.) Dreschler (Einheit der Genesis, p. 91), HoFMANN ("Prophecy and Fulfilment," i. p. 8.5, and " Scripture Proof," i. p. 374flf.), Batimgarten ("Com- mentary on the Pentateuch," ad k. /.), Delitzsch (Commenl. ad h. I.), Stier ("Epistle of Jude," p. 42 ff.), DiETLEiN (" Comment, on the Second Epistle of Peter," p. 149 ff.), Luther (" Comment, on the Epis- tles of Peter and Jude," pp. 204, 341). The third view is found in Ohrysostom, Cyril Alex., Theodoret, (on the special ground that Seth, on account of his piety, acquired the name dtos, and that, therefore, his descendants were named viol rov ^eoO). It was held by almost all the later church theologians. In mod- ern times it has been defended with special zeal by Hengstenberg ("Contributions," ii. p. 328 ft'.), Ha- VEH.NiK ("Introduction," i. 2, p. 26o), Dettinger ("Remarks on the Section, Gen. iv. 1-ch. vi. 8," in the Tiibmgen Journal of Theology, 1836, No. 1), Keil ("Luther. Periodical," 1851, ii. p. 239), and many others. The preceding statement has been made complete by KoRTz in his Book ("The Marriages of the Sons of God,") BerUn, 1857, p. 12; as Ukewise by Keil (p. SO) by the citation of the treatise of Hengsten- berg (" The Sons of God and the Daughters of Men,") in the Evangelical Church Gazette, 1858, No. 29, and No. 35-37 ; in the exposition of Philippi (" Church Doctrme of the Faith,") iii. p. 176 ii', and the con- troversial writings of Kurtz that have appeared against the treatises of Keil and Hengstenberg (" The Marriiiges of the Sons of God with the Daugh- ters of Men)," Berhn 1857, and "The Sons of God," in Gen. vi. 1-4, and the " Sinning Angels," in 2 Pet. ii. 4, 5, and Jude, vers. 6, 7. Mitau, 1858. Engel- hardt also takes the side of Kurtz (" Lutheran Period- ical," 1856, p. 4ii4). DeUtzsch appears as the latest defender of the angel hypothesis of any considerable note (" Comment." 3d Ed., 1860, p. 230 ff.). Its latest opponent of note since Keerl (" Questions on the Apocrypha," p. 206), is Keil (" Comment," 1861, p. 80 ft'.) It is shown by Keil (p. 80) that the relation of ovir passage to the Sethites had its defenders, both among Jews and Christians, before the time of Chry- Bostom ; since Joseplms knew of this interpretation, and the critical Juhus Africanus maintained it in the first half of the third century. So also did Ephraim the Syrian, to which add, among the Apocryphal writings, the Clementine Recognitions, and the ori- ental Book of Adam. We take first into view the section as it lies be- fore us, with its connection and the analogies of the Old Testament, then the relations to our passage of the New Testament, farther on, the exegetical tradi- tions, and finally, the religious-philosopliical, dog- matic, and practical significance of the question. The Place itself in question ; its Connection, and the Analogies of the Old Testament. The Sons of God. Bne Elohiin. According to the augel hypo- thesis, angels alone are here to be understood, not- withstanding that there is no mention of angels im- mediately before this, to stand as its antecedent, bu< only of the pious race of Sethites. Chap. 5 gives ui an account of pious ^nen, of chosen men, of a won* derfully glorified man of God ; but of angels, on tb< contrary, there is not a word, even to tliis place, ex- cept the mysterious language respecting the cheru- bim, in which we cannot at all recognize any personal angel-l'orms. The single apparent ground for a sup- position, at first view wild and abrupt, is found in tha fact, that in the later books of the Old Testament, not the pious are called DTi'ixn ''33, but the an- gels. It is, however, simply incorrect to say that anywhere in the historical scriptures the angels are called sons of God without anything farther ; only io a few poetical places, and in one nominally prophetic (Job i. 2 ; xxxviii. 7 ; Ps. xxix. 1 ; Ixxxix. 7 : Dan. iii. 25) are they so called ; and then, too, beside the poetical language, there comes into view the eluci- dating context. In Job i. they form the council of God represented as administering government (there- fore not bne Elohim, as nomen naturw in distinction from ilaleak, as nomen officii), and in fact in contrast to Satan. In the same way in chap. ii. In chap, xxxviii. 7, they hail the laying the foundation of the earth and the creation of man. Ps. xxix. 1, they are called upon to glorify the Lord in tlie thunder-storm, and in the restoration of his people. Ps. Ixxxlx. 7, are they thus denoted by way of contrasting their dependent state with the glory of the Lord. Dan. iii. 25 hardly belongs here, but is, perhaps, to be in- terpreted according to chap. vii. 13. In respect to this, Hengstenberg has already shown that tlie name bne Elohim belongs to the poetic diction. Whilst, therefore, in the pure historical pieces the angels are never styled sons of God, there does ap- pear the indication of a filial relation, or of a sonship, in respect to the people of Israel, to the Old Testa- ment kings, to the pious or dependent wards of God, and that, too, in various ways, even in the legal sphere. DeUtzsch remarks, that the idea of a filial relation in the Old Testament had ah'eady begun to win for itself a universal ethical significance beyond the limitation to Israel (Ex. iv. 22 ; Dent. xiv. 1) — as though this filial relation of the children of Israel, under the law, were a real step in progress in respect to Abraham and the Sethites. But the case is ex- actly the other way. In the Epistle to the Galatians, the patriarchal standpoint of belief in promise is a higher one than that of the Mosaic legality (Gal. iii. 16). It is to be specially remarked in regard to Kurtz, that he knew not how to distinguish the diff'er- ent economies of the Old Testament. When, for ex- ample, the Apostle Paul tells us, that the law was given through the ministry of angels, he concludes that the angel of the Lord that appeared to Abi-aham must have been a creaturely angel (History of the Old Testament, p. 152). And yet Paul brings for- ward this character of the angelic mediation for the express purpose of showing that the revelation of the promise was a more essential, and, also, a higher form than that of the law-giving ; it could not, there- fore, have been in this sense (of Kurtz) that the law- giving is referred to the mediation of angels. The explanation consists m this, that the promise vae a revelation for Abraham, and, generally, for the elect patriarchs, whilst the law-gi^■ing, on the other hand, was for a whole people mingled and coarse, or at all events, greatly needing an edticating culture. But as the patriarchal economy, in respect to its rehtioiv 282 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MuSES ehip to the form of the Gospel, had a superiority to the form of the law-giving, and in so far appears Ulie to the New Testament, so again had the economy of the Sethites a superiority to the Abraliamic. The epecitic distinction is the separation between the line of the pious, and the godless, curse-loaded line of Cain. Therefore it is that that peculiar designation of Enoch's piety: "he walked with God," never oc- curs again in the later law-tunes of the Old Testa- ment. In a word, the Sethic economy is a ana^ Keya- lifyoi' in the Old Testament, which has been funda- mentally mistaken by the contenders for the angel hypothesis. It has a prefiguration of the New Tes- tament state, and acknowledges, therefore, the viol deov, or sons of God, as is done in the New Testament in our Lord's sermon on the mount. If the objection is made, that the redemption is not yet perfectly in- troduced, it is to be remarked, that the faith in re- demption, in the thne after Christ, is not to be meas- ured, in its degrees, by the chronological advance; as is shown in the examples of Enoch and Abraham. Luther, moreover, knew better how to estimate the worth of this singularity in the economy of the long living so greatly exalted througli the blessing of Seth, and who reflected in their life the end of time : " They are the greatest heroes that, next to Christ and John the Baptist, ever appeared in this world, and at the last day we shall behold their majesty." Since, there- fore, even the law-period, notwithstanding Israel's servant-relation, did not exclude the idea of Israel's Bonship generally, or of the beheving especially, (as the places Deut. xxxii. 5 ; Hos. ii. 1 (therefore not poetical) and Ps. Ixxiii. 15 show to us, how much more clearly must this idea have appeared, in its typical significance and beauty, among the pious de- acendants of Seth. In that case it has been said, they ought to have been called bne Jehovah (instead of bne Elohim) ; but this is not to keep clearly in view, that the Sethites represented the universal re- lation of humanity to God, and that tliey, like Mel- chizedek at a later time, disappeared from the stage. That the angels, however, in a physical oense, as opposed to an ethical sense, could be called sons of God. — that is, could be referred to some generation of a physical kind, is a view that has been rightly de- nounced by Keil (p. 11). And in this way, for the unprejudiced, the matter might seem tolerably well disposeil of But further on it occurs as a thing to be considered, that the sons of God woo the daughters of men. How, it is asked, when it is said in its gen- eral sense (ver. 2) that men multiplied themselves, can we limit the expression daughters of men, ver. 2, to the daughter's of the Cairrites ? We cannot here rest upon the usual mode of stating this. There is no reason why the sons of God should have forrnd a tempting beauty only among the daughters of the C'aiirites. The daughter's of men may, in the fir'st place, be women in general. In that case, however, the first contrast would coirsist in regarding the ethi- cally d'-fined sons of God as opposed to rhe physic- ally di'firred daughters of merr, — among whom the Cirinitic women might be pr'imarily understood, espe- tially since the Sethite wonrerr too belong to the children of (iod. Their hist Irarr.sgr'ession, however, worrld cori8i>t Lq this, that in the choice of wives they let th<:rnaelvett be deter'rnirred by the mere charm oi' sensual beauty. Krorn this follows the eecornl trans- gression, that they took them wives of all wlrora they chose, that is, of all that pleased them. Orr the word 33TS, therefore, rests the emphasis of the exjiression (out of all). Instead of lookirrg at the spiritrrtd kiris- manship, they had an eye only to the pleasure of sense. That was the first thing. Then there il nothing said here of any mor-al satisfaction in beauty This appears from the fact that they took ihens wives of all that pleased them, of all that tlrev de- sired. Instead of holding pur'e the Sethic line, they took wives indiscriminately (^S'?), and that was tha second and decisive transgression. Bj this was the dam torn down which stood between the Cainites and the Sethites, — that is, the dam wlrich kept b.ack th« universal corruption, and which hitlrerto had pro tected the race of the blessing. Therefore is it, ver. 3, that the corruption which now comes is charged upon men, and not at all upon the angels. If we look for a nroment at the angel hypothesis, it is not easy to see how such amorrrs with individual women could have had so decided an effect upon the destiny of the whole race, at a time, too, when nrore than now, men formed the deciding factor ; and this may we say, without taking into view the fret, that in the historical style angels are never called bne Elohim, that angels do not seek nor are sought in marriage (Matt. xxii. 30), and that the expression: "take themselves wives," denotes marriage-ties, not by way of unnatural amours, or romantic loves, as Kurtz pictures it in his first treatise (p. 99). But indeed, out of those demoniacal, fleshly amours, it is said, must have proceeded the C'S? and n^T3S, and thus they would bring the whole matter to a decision. In the first place, however, must we remember, that the sentence of God respecting the desperate condition of the race (ver. 3) precedes this mention of the N©. plrilim, and it is clear that the D"'bB3 must already de- note a special form of the evil, which, with its fleshly lust, stands at the same time in a position of recipro- city. According to almost ail inter'j)retatiorrs, and according to Numb. xiii. 33, " when the giant Ana- kim are reckoned among them," the Nephilim were gigantic, — or', more accurately, the distinguished, the prominent or over'powering. According to such it is from bsj , a near form to sbs ; other derivations see below. In their bodily appearance the Nephilim were not exactly what are called giants in the mythi- cal sense, but prominent and powerful forms of men. In strength, in courage, or pride, they were Gibhorim, that is, mighty men, heroes ; in deeds, they were men of renown ; but their deeds were especially deeds of vioknce Oon (w. 11, 13), unrighteousness, and op- pression. The meaning is, that tire fleshly nature of pr'ide and cruelty ever associates itself with the fleshly disorder of lust. Lamech the Cainite and his sorrg were now the genera! type of the human race. But as the tendency to violence came in cotempo- laireously with the lust, and not as a gern'ration for the fir'st time descending from it, so were the Nephi- lim cotemporarreous with these fleshly mesirlliances, having been, irr fiet, from the days o( Cain hitlrerto •'men of renown." The Hebrew is ITI , not ITI'I ; there were Nephilim, it is said, cnn D-Q'^a, in tlrcrse same days, not thire became or came to be, aa Krroliel trarrslates it. Add to this the oH'spring of the soirs of God and thi' daughters of irren, that is, of the grossly sensual marriages of the piou.s, and their rrrirrgling with the (Jairritic race. Thus flow together two origins of the Gibborim. In respect to the first were they nrcn of renown, or men of old, cb'iya — that is, the Cainites. Thus, too. In the easiest way does our scctiorr corrnect itself with both the preced- ing chapters, lu the fourth chapter there is described CHAP. VI. 1-8. 283 the line of the Cainites as still divided from the line of Seth ; in the fifth chapter we have tlie line of the Sethites in its devotedness and elevation ; then, final- ly, in the section before us, the mingliu;; of both lines, and the universality and flagitiousness of corruption, as, according to the programme of the Cainitic La- mech, it cuhninates in the two fundamental features of carnality and cruelty. Whoever reads Genesis, to the passage before us, without any prejudice derived from opinions alien to it, would never thinli of under- standing by the bne Elohim anything else than the pious Sethites, and by their connection with the daugliters of men anything else than a corruption of marriage and a mingling with the Cainites. Tliis would especially appear fi'om the fact, that in this section the sharp contrast between the two lines, which is so prominent in the previous chapter, wholly disappears. If we read further we find, too, that not the Cainites alone perished in the flood, but both lines together, with the exception of Noah and his house. Further on, Ishmael, who is a "wild man," and whose "haud is against every man," appears as the offspring of Abraham and " the maid," a copy, as it were, giving us a clear idea of the Gibborim, and of the way in which they originated, although the con- nection of the patriarch was from a purer motive, and more excusable. Hence the traditional and legal abhorrence of untheocratic marriages in the theo- cratic race; as we find it in Gen. xxiv. 3; xxvi. 34, 85 ; xxvii in ; xxxiv. 9 ; Deut. vii. 3 ; Josh, xxiii. 12 ; Judg. ili. 6 ; 1 Kings xi. 1 ; Ezra ix. 2 ; Nehem. X. 30. The faUing away of the Israelites in the des- ert came not from any amour between angels and the daughters of men, but from an unlawful intercourse between the Israehtes and the women of Midian {Numb. XXV.). So the apostasies of Israel in the time of the Judges were derived from the mingling of tile Israelites with the daughters of the Canaan- ites (Judg. iii. 6). The fall of Solomon, and the fall- ing away of the people that followed it, came from Solomon's connection with foreign wives (1 Kings xi. 1 ). So the ten tribes sunk into the worship of Baal in consequence of the connection of Ahab with the Sdonian Jezebel, whose horrible significance goes on even to the Apocalypse (1 Kings xvi. 31 ; Rev. ii. 20) ; and so, too, Ezra and Nehemiah, after the great visitation, know no other way to secure their people against a new degeneracy, than by contending earn- estly against foieifrn marriages. Thus again and again cio the theocratic mesalliances of one section reflect themselves in the Israelitish history, without the angels playing any part therein. For the first time, in the apocryphal Tobit (Tob. vi. 15), does there meet us a demoniac interest in human females, and tills is characteristic for the origin of the angel- hypoihesis. Here, too, it must be rem,arked, that marriage with the heathen was nut absolutely forbid- den to the Israehtes. When the principle was se- cured, that the believing party might make holy the unbeUeving(l Cor. vii.), such marriages appear some- times even in a favorable light. It was only union with the Canaauites that was absolutely forbidden, since they, as well as the Cainites, were sunk in in- curable corruption; and Hengstenberg has rightly supposed that our history here was given for the pur- pose of warning the Israelites against such marriages, i TTie relatione of the New Testament to the mstage before us. There is the passage of the Epistle of Jude, ver. 6, which, in fact, we regard as the original in its relation to the kindred pass.ige, 2 Peter ii. 4. He'e, too. Kurtz reasons from tlie mode of speaking, but not happily: "Both epistlei designate the actors who are punished as simpl) &-yyf\oi. ^Vheu we interrogate the biblical style of speech it shows us at once that this word is nevei thus nakedly used of spirits if i-pxV '"^'^ have fallen. These are ever called SoiVortr, and theii head Sii£u\os or narafat." We will give presentlj the simple solution of this objected difficulty Wherever there is mention of the actual existenci of Satan's kingdom it is naturally and generally of Satan, of the demons, etc., although variations occur, as Eph. vi. 12^ et al. Heie, however, when tha original fall itself of the demons is mentioned, they must be denoted according to their original state as angels. Otherwise it would mean that the devil had sinned, and thereby became a devil. In that case our catechisms would have to be corrected where they speak of fallen ajigels. When it is said, how- ever, that there is here no special mention of Satan, or that the sins of the angels cannot be particularly described, or that the fall of Satan is nowhere desig- nated as a leaving his habitation, all such assertions we must hold as having no significance at all. Tile Epistle of Jude is a prophetical word of warn- ing against the beginning of antinomianism. Here the Israelites who fell in the wilderness are the first example. In respect to these it is confessed that they did not fall in the wilderness merely on account of sins of sensuality. Then are there named tha angels who kept not their dominion {o.pxv) but for- sook their own proper habitation — that is, their sphere of life. The contrast iu the guilt of these angels is made clear by that which precedes. The Jews in the wilderness kept not their salvation, but gave themselves up to unbelief and fell. The angela kept not their dominion, but lost their station and fell. To this corresponds the third example : Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities are pre- sented in a similar manner with these (thutois), that is, the angels and the Israelites, as an example of such as are exposed to the judgment of the eternal fire, and this on the special ground of their excessive sensuality, and their degenerate going after strange flesh. The words ouotuc Tpon-or ro^'noi^ stand in re- laticm to irpd^tivTai Seiyua, and the parenthetical fKJTopv€viTa(Ta has its special interpretation as refer- ring to the Sodomites. The Israehtes in the wilder- ness furnish an example of a lost condition, as yaJj TrttTTeutrai/re^, the angels as ,u7j r^)^)^)(Tav^fSy &c., Sodom and Gomorrah as eKTropvdiTaaai, &c. The forms of antinomianism are different, the judgment upon it is throughout the same. The distinction, however, in antinomianism is this, that the Israelites sinned through unbehef in the word of revelation ; the angels sinned against the divine ordinance, assigning their position, and in striving, beyond their spliere, after a limitless dominion ; the Sodom- ites sinned against the natural law of the sexual relations, estabhshed as a moral foundation of life itself The antinomists, against whom Jude con- tended, resemble the before-named in this, that like the Sodomites they pollute the flesh ; like the fallen angels they contemn authority ; like the unbeUeving Israelites they speak evil of 5(J|ay, glories (rendered dignities — visible proofs cf the revelation of God in Israel). So, too, iu the second chapter of the second Epistle of Peter, the ground-idea is the inex- orability of the divine judgment against an obdurata auomism, without giving the special form of that ano- mism. Of the angels it is merely said that they sinned. Goil .-spared thein not although they were auaeU 284 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. And 80 he spared not the whole old world (Gen. vi.), on whom there is here no other charge imputed than aafSaa (impiety). So, too, Sodom and Gomor- rah are here denoted as having incurred judgnjent solely under the same point of view. Clearly, how- ever, has the second Epistle of Peter distinguished. In addition, the judgment of the fallen angels from the judgment upon the old world (Gen. tI.). The judgment agamst the angels, the judgment against file old world, and the judgment upon Sodom, are three judgment periods. And these places, it is pre- tended, exactly conlirm the angel-hypothesis ! Com- pare also Fronmiiller on the respective places, in the Bible-work. 3. The exegetical tradition. The first interpreta- tion, in which the bne Elohim were sons of the magnates, or great ones, who wooed the daughters of the low-born, Keil denotes as the interpretation of orthodox Judaism. More correctly, however, may it be denoted as the interpretation of tlie Hebraistic or Palestinian Judaism, in its dry story- telling tendency as represented in the Talmud. The Becond interpretation Keil righdy describes as that of the ethnizing, cabbalistical Judaism; however zealous Kurtz may be on its behalf (Part i. p. 8). It is not without significance that the first trace of this interpretation appears in single codices of the Septuagint. It is sufficiently acknowledged that the Alexandrian Jews took pains in every way to throw a bridge between the Old Testament and the Greek tradition. Here now appears a fair probable occasion to introduce into the biblical text an analogous story of Sons of God and of divine beget- tings. Thereupon present themselves two apocry- pliid books as the first defenders of the angel-hypo- thesis : the Book of Enoch and the Lesser Genesi-:. Without doubt Philo tbund it already in existence, and it suited entirely well with his system ; whilst it is acknowledged, too, by the more hebraislic Jo- eeplms. That Christian theologians of the Alexan- drian school, like Clemens Alexandrinus, uncritical fathers like TertuUian, Cyprian, Ambrose, should find the angel-hypothesis suited to their peculiar notions, is nothing to be wondered at. The fact that from the font th even to the eighteenth century, with some isolated exceptions, the taste of the church discovered in the angel-hypothesis a suspicious theo- sophic savor, cannot be set aside. 4. The relip6iriiua. TrreuuttTos, ruling over the flesh, there is a most appropriate significance in "n^ , as denoting the judicial power of the conscience, or of the reason as the imperative, the commanding faculty. On these deeper aspects of humanity, consult that most profound psychologist, John Bunyan, in his Holy War, or his History of tlie Town of Mansoul, its revolt from King Shaddai, its surrender to Dia- bolus, and its recovery by Prince Imnianuel. Bun- yan was Bible-taught in these matters, and that is the reason why his knowledge of man goes so far beyond that of Locke, or Kant, or Cousin. The whole aspect of the passage gives the im- pression of something like an apprehension that a great change was coming over the race — something so awful and so irreparable, if not speedily remedied, that it would be better that it should be blotted out of earthly existence, all but a remnant in whom the spiritual, or the divine in man, might yet be pre- served. Thus regarded, too, as a prediction, it is the ground of the judgment rather than a sentence of judgment itself. It is in mercy to prevent a greater catastrophe ; like the language used In re- ference to the tree of life (see page 241, and note). Men, left to themselves, might have realized upon earth tlie irrecoverable state of lost spirits, or that combination of the brutal with an utterly degraded reason that makes the demon. In this view, too, the divine sorrow appears heightened in such a way that we can better understand what is meant by God's " grieving," and being " pamed in heart." A generation of men is to be removed to prevent the utter deliumanizing of the race. It was this neces- sity that made the intensity of the sorrow. Delitzsch has a similar view, but it is strange that he did not see how it is in conflict with his angel-hypothesis. According to that, the deangel- izing, if we may use the term, and the consequent dehumanizing, was confined to these higher beings and some of the daughters of men. And yet they are not mentioned as having any part in the catas- trophe, or in the intmediate evil that occasioned it. Men alone are involved in it, and they because of an excessive sensuality that had made it inevitable. This, however, was purely human ; it was man that was in danger of becoming wholly flesh, and it was man lor wl)om Goil grieved with a divine sorrow. It was man who was in danger of descending into a lower grade of being, even as the ante-Adamic angels who kept not their first estate. The antedi- luvians were drowned lor the salvation of a race, but for some of them, at least, 1 Pet. iii. 19, 20, gives us the glimpse of a hope that their condition wa'' not wholly Irrecoverable. — T. L.] 2. Ver. 4. There were giants The n^bsr , from b"E: , used only in the pluial, .Numb. xiii. 33. All the old intrrpretaiions take the word as denoting giants, 7i7ai'Tn. If we put out of view the mon- strous popular representations, there are simply meant by it stalely and powerful men. In this ■eniie Tuch explains the word as mentioned before, namely, t/ie dixlinf/uis/ted. Keil understands by the word, invaders, according to A(|uila {eiriwln- ro^-TJi), ,Kyminai-hus (/3ioioi), Luther (tyrants). De- Br7>ft''h, nevprtboloww, totiether with ilolniinin, pre- fers to explain it as the fallen, namely, from heaven, because begotten by heavenly beings. Here from to fall, would he make to fall from, and from thii again, to full from heaven ; then this is maik to mean begotten ofhenve.nln beingx 1 The sense, caden- tex, deftctores, apostatw (see Geseuius), would b« more near the truth. "There «'«•<■ giants " (siTl'*, not, there became giants, which wonUI have re- quired flTl'l for its expression (see Keil). These giants, or powerful men, are alreaily in near eotem- poraneity with the transgression of these mesalliancea (in those very same days), and this warrants the con- clusion of Luther, that these powerful men were doers of violent deeds. — And also after that [Lange renders: and especially after that]. — Keil shows that Kurtz makes trial of three mutually inconsistent explanations of this verse, all of which, too, ofl'end against the law of language (p. 89, note). We take C5 as denoting a climax to the fact already stated. "There were giants in those days, and moreover,^^ etc. Here it comes nearly to the same thing, whether we render ^fs ^""'nnx postea- quam (2 Sam. xxiv. 10) or postea quum ; the fact remains established that the Nephilim were already before the mesalliances. — Came in unto: an euphe- mistic phrase. — Mighty men [Lange renders it he- roes]. — A designation, not merely of oifspring from the mismarriages, but referring also to the Nephilim who are earlier introduced, as it ap[)ears from the ap- pended clause. The author reports things from his own standpoint, and so the expression: "tliey irere of old, men of renown," affirms their previous exist- ence down to that time. Of these men of old, men of renown, Cain was the first. But now there are added to the Cainites the Cainitic degenerate ofif- spring of these sensual mesalliances. It was true then, as it has been in all other periods of the world's history, the men of violent deeds were the men of renown, very much the same whether called famous or infamous. Knobel will have it that there are described here postdiluvian races of giants. 3. Vers. 5-8. And God sawr [Lange correct- 'ly: And Jehovah saw]. — This increase and uni- versal predonjinance of evil through the mismarriages gives occasion now for a more decided sentence of Jehovah upon the incurably lost race. The wicked- ness of man in deeds had not only become great, but the thinkinfls of the purposes (the phantasies or imaged deeds) of his heart, were wholly evil all the day. Judging from the singular •^33 , we hold here, as intended, a concentration of the sentence against man. For this reason is it singular. [Note on the Doctrine of Total Dkpraviti. Gen. vi. 5. — Every imagination of the thoughts of hig heart, lab nactl-a ns;; b3. The Scriptures, it ia said, were not given to teach us mental philosophy, nor do they atfcct a philosophical language, but here is certainly a psychological scala going down as deep- ly into the human soul as was ever done by any scholastic treatise. Here are the three stages of the great original evil : the fashioned pmrpose, the thmight out of which it is born, the feeling, or deep mother }ieart, the state of soul, lying below all, and givino moral character to all. Cir, to reverse the ortler of the statement, there is, 1 the tuhu vabuhu, the formless abyss of evil, 2. the thought (the fii'm-j, sec Ueb. iv. I'i), by wliieli this rises into generic form, 8. the imaged or .v/KcJ/iV purpose (fr3i/i»iiu>), llirougli which, again, this thoujjht makes itself mmifest ii CHAP. VI. 1-8. 281 the objective sphere of the active life. In other words, as the thought is the /onn of the /tt'/t.-i^, so is the shaped ■pnvpoie^ or what is here called the imagin- ation, the form of the evil thouglU. Our Saviour gives the same gradations, Matt. xv. 19 : " Oui of the heart proceed evil thoughts " (5iaAo7i(r^ol iroyTj/jii!, evil thinkings, reasonings, subjective, not yet shaped into outward intent), and then follows the awful brood of the later born, (povot^ ^otxf'at, /cAoiral, &\a'rfpT}uiai, •'murders, adulteries, thefts, blasphemies." They are all in the thought ; they are all in the mother- fleart, that deep seat of moral character that lies be- low the formative consciousness — that is, the con- scious thought and still more conscious purpose. Take the worst one apparently of these hideous births ; a man may not have formed the purpose of murder, fear may have kept him from this extreme stage ; he may never have entertained the thought consciou.«ly, the habitual educating power of law, or other inHuences of a social or of a gracious kind, may have prevented eveu this objective form of evil from rising in his soul ; but it may lie in his heart nevertheless, and even be active there, for this dark place is not a mere blank capacity, or receptacle, but has its processes, its choosings, its willings, and even its unconscious reasonings. Our Saviour de- clares neither more nor less than this when he makes it the procreative source of evil thoughts {bia\oyiirnoi), and so does the Apostle, 1 John iii. 15 : "Whoso- ever hateth his brother is a murderer." This idea of the unconscious heart, as underlying all moral character, is deeply grounded in the Hebrew lan- guage. Hence the peculiar expression lb bs nil" . to ascend, come up, in the heart, or above the heart. See Jer. iii. 16 ; 2 Sam. xi. 20, with other places. One of the most striking is in Ezek. xi. 6 : " Thus shall ye say to the house of Israel, osH^i nbsa rrriST^ ■'IN , the upgoings of your spirit, I know every one of them," — implying how deeply unknown they might be in their source, even to those who were the subjects of them. Cl'n bs SH pn : Only evil, nothing but evil, all tlie dag — every day, and every moment of every day. If this is not total d/ipravity, how can language express it? There is an intense aversion to the phrase in some minds. It is shared by many who would admit that human depravity is taught in the Bible, and that it is great. This term, however, of our older and more exact theologians, shocks them. The feeling comes, in some measure, from a misap- prehension of its true meaning. It is a term of ex- tensity, rather than of intensi'y. It is opposed to partial, to the idea that man is sinfnl in one moment, and innocent, or sinless, in another, or sinful in some acts and pure in others. It affirms that he is all wrong, in all things, and all tlie time. It does not mean that man is as bad as the devils, or that every man is as bad as every other, or that any man is as bad as he possibly may be, or may become. That is, there are degrees of intensity, lint no limit to the iiniveraaliiy orfxfcfKof the evil in tlie soul. So say I he Scriptures, and so says the awakened conscience. There seems to be an allusion to the psychologi- cal division of Gen. vi. 5, in Heb. iv. 12. The extent and depili of human sinfulness are kept from the ob- jective consciousness by the ignorance or d< niul of the threefold distinction here conveyed — the pur- poses, the thoughts, and the heart. According to the Apostle, it is the office of " the Uving word (A \6yos ^ttiv Kcu iy^pyriSyViuid an/l inworkiiigX sharp- er than a two-edged sword, and piercing even to tht dividing (the division line) of soul and spirit " (nvdifia and if'i'xi;) to make these distinctions, and bring them home to the human conscience. Hence it is called KpiTiKfis (y^VfjLT}ae(vtf Kal ivvoiuiv Kaf-Sias — ** a critical discerner (and cxposer) of the purposes and tht think- iugs <_)( tha heart.^^ In this language ftf^vnTjnt^ corre- sponds locally to "i3|^ , and en-oiai to n"3irriB . The terms are no mere redundant tautology, any more than those used above for soul and spirit. The bare dichotomic view fails to explain the language of the Scripture, whether as given in its Greek or Hebrew terms. The Greek words, however-, are less precise than the Hebrew, since both ei/roM and ci'^^/jri^Tit may be used for the purpose or the thought. — T. L.} And it repented the Lord. — Most truly, as Keil rightly remarks, is this sentence so pronounced on man alone, directly against the angel-interpr-eta- tion. On that hypothesis the angels must have been the original authors of the corruption ; and so in con- sistency with Gen. iii., where the serpent is first sen- tenced, ought the first doom here to have been pro- nounced upon the sinning angels. — It repented Jehovah, — A pecuUarly strong anthropopathic ex- pression, which, however, presents the truth that God, in consistency with his immutability, assumes a changed position in respect to changed man (Ps. xviii. 27), and that, as against the impenitent man who identifies himself with the sin, he must assume the appearance of hating the sinner in the sin, even as he hates the sin in the sinner. But that Jehovah, notwithstanding, did not begin to hate man, is shown in the touching anthropomorplusm that follows, " atid it grieved him in his heart." The first kind of language is explained in the flood, the second in the revelation of Peter, 1 Pet. iii. 19, 20, and ch. iv. 6. Against the corruption of man, though ex- tending even to the depths of his heart, there is placed in contrast God's deep " grieving in his heart." But as the repentance of God does not take away his unchangeableness and his counsel, but rightly estabhshes them, so neither does God's grieving detract from his immutabiUty in blessed- ness, but shows, rather, God's deep feeUng of the distance between the blessedness to « hich man was appointed and his painful perdition. Delitzscli does indeed maintain it, as most real or actual truth, that (iod feels repentance, and he does not equate this position with the doctrine of God's unchangeable- ness, unless it be with the mere remark that the pain and purpose of the divine wrath are only moments in an everlastmg plan of redemption, which cannot become outward in its efficacy without a movement in the Godhead. And yet movement is not change. — I will destroy man. — To man in the wider sense pertains the human sphere of life ; therefore it is said that the beasts too shall be destroyed. Of any cor- ruption that had entered into the animal there is no mention (see ver. 12). The perishing of the beasts, tliei efore, can only have meaning as a sharing in the atonement for himian sins (Jer. xii. 4 ; xiv. 5 ; Hos. iv. 3; Joeli. 18; Zeph. i, 3. Knobel). It is rather as a consequence of the dependence of the animal world upon man that it is joined with him in joy and sorrow. We are not to think of it as something per sonified together with man, but as the .syiuliohc im personal extension of his organism. — But Noab found grace.—" In these words there breaks forth from the dark cloud of wrath the mercy which givei security for the -"reseniation and restoration of hn manity." Keit 88S GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSEB. [Note on the Ditihk Repenting, Gen. vi. 6. — We do not gain much by attempts to exiilain iihilo- Bophically such states or movements of the divine mind. They are strictly i^jirira — ineffable. So the Scripture itself represents them : " For my thoughts are not your thoughts, saith the Lord; as the heav- ens are high above the earth, so high are my ways above your ways, and my thoughts above your thoughts," — that is, my thinking, my mode of think- ing, above your thinking. And then these same Scriptures, so far transcending all philosophy in the abstract declaration of the inefl'able difference, fur- nish us helps by means of finite conceptions, human ^^presentations, onthropopathisms, as we learnedly call them, condescensions, " accommodations." Let us not vainly attempt to get above ihem, as though they were made for lower minds, whilst we, from Bome higher position, as it were, can look over them, or see through them, and are thus enabled to dis- pense with their aid. If they are accommodations, let us be accommodated by them ; since here all hu- man minds are very much on a par. Our right feel- ing is much more concerned in this than our right understanding. We cannot rise to God, and we should reverently adore the effort, if we may so call it, which he makes to come down to us, to enter into the sphere of the finite, to think our thinking, and thus to converse with us in our own language. Without this there can be no intercourse between the infinite and the finite mind. God's putting hiui- Belf in the place of man is the idea and the key of all revelation. In this sense, even nature itself has an anthropopathic language. We nmst put our feet upon the lower rounds of this ladder thus let down to us, — in other words, we mtist use these accommo- dations, use them reverently, honestly, thankfully, or have in the mind a total blank in respect to all those conceptions of God that most concern us as moral beings. Talk as we will of impassibility, we tmiil think of God as having vridT), affections, some- thing connecting him with the human, and, therefore, human in some aspect or measure of agreement. We must either have in our thoughts a blank intel- lectuality making only an intellectual difference be- tween good and evil (if that can be called any differ- ence at all), or we are compelled to bring in some- thing emotional, and that, too, with a' measure of intensity corresponding to other differences by which the divine exceeds the himian. Without this, the highest form of scientific or pliilosnphic theism has no more of religion than the blankest atheism. We could as well worship a system of mathematics as Buch a theistic indifference. The emotional in view of the true and the right, the evil and the false, is a higher thing than the intellectual perception of them, even could we suppo.«e such separable cognition. We do not rightly see the true, or truly see the right, unless we l"ve it ; we do not truly see the evil or the false, unle.ss we have the opposite affection. It belongs to the very essence or being of the ideas. 6uch emotional is the highest thing in man, and is it rational to suppo.-^e that all this is a blank in the higher being of (iodV Reason may sometinjes go Bafcly in allirniing what it cannot di'fine, and recon- cile with other and lower affirmations. Thus here, an intellectual and a moral necessity may compel us to say that the idea of the emotional in the divine has a veritable existence, though the conception utterly fails to reach it ; just as reason truly affirms the infi- nite in mathomatict, and with as clear a certainty as that of any finite ratio, though sense and imagina- tion are both transcended by it. It may know thai a thing is, tliat it must be, though not how it is. So here, a moral necessity compels us to hold that there is such a region of the divine emotional, most in- tensely real, — more real if we may make degrees, than knowledge or intellectuality — the very ground, in fact, of the divine personal being. If we would carefully examine, too, our own feel- ings, we would find that it is not alone a supposed repugnance to reason that is the ground of the difS- culty. We do not raise the objection of anthropo- pathism when love is ascribed to God, and yet it is as strictly anthropopathic as the divine indignation, or the divine sorrow. An unemotional love is utterlj inconceivable. It is inseparable, too, from the othci elements. Love for the good has no meaning except as involving displeasure at the evil; and sorrow, to speak humanly, is but the blending of the two emo- tions in view of the loss or marring of the lovely, and the predominance of the unloved. And in this wa have the thought so fearful, whilst so attractive and sublime : the intensity of the one must be the meas- ure of the intensity of the other. Depart in the least from the idea of indifferentism, and we have no limit but infinity. God either cares nothing about what we call good and evil — or, as the heaven of heavens is high above the earth, so far do his love for the good, and his hatred of evil, exceed, in tlieir inten- sity, any corresponding human affection. The great business, therefore, of the interpreter of Scripture is to determine philologically the nature of the emotion expressed by these words, and then the theologian is to take them in their highest inten- sity, and in such a way as shall not be in contradic- tion with other divine attributes, whether given to us by clear reason, or revealed to us in the Scrip- tures. Thus it will be found that this word, cnjj rendered in Niphal to repent, has a dual relation, the first and primary to the feeling, the second to the purpose. The first connects itself with what may be called the onomatepic significance, to »ig\ to draw the breath ; hence ingeimdt, doluit, as Gesenius gives it. Hence poenitnit emv, it repented him, in the sense of sorrow. The anthrupopathism thus ex- pressed is the more touching form, and the whole context shows that it is the one predommantly in- tended here. It is no change of purpose, no confes- sion of mistake, but a most affecting representation of the divine pity and tenderaess. The language following shows this : " and he was grieved at the heart," when he saw how this fair world, which he had once pronounced " good, exceeding good," had become marred and full of evil. In the course of its applications the word naturally gets also the other or more secondary, yet quite common sense of change of purpose. It is thus used, 1 Sam. xv. 29 : " God will not lie, neither does he repent ; he is not man that he should repent " — hterally, " man to repent," — that is, he does not repent like man with change of plan or purpose. The other, and more primary idea, comes also in this very passage relating to Saul, as appears ver. 3.5 ; unless, contrary to all rules of criticism, we would bring the writer in immediate and palpable contradiction with himself. See also I's. ex. 4. The repenting of sorrow is the authiopo- pathism that is always to be supposed when the lan- guage is applied directly to Deity ; as Ps. cvi. 46, I'non 313 t:n5''^, "and he repented according Ut the greatnesa of his mercy;" Ps. xc. 18, "Return CHAP. VI. 1-8. 288 Jehovah — how long ! — and let it repent thee concem- \ng thy servants." As an instance of the way in which words branch out into various meanings, till they sometimes get al- most a reverse sense, it may be noted how this word, in this very conjugation, gets the meaning of reveng- ing, or rather of aveni/inij. It comes from tlie prima- ry idea of bycathing^ finding reUef from the letting out of pent-up indignation. When thus applied to Deity the anthropopathism is terrific, and yet the context always shows that no other term could so express the vehemency of the indignation ; as in Is. i. 24 •'-iS'3 cn:x, well rendered, to the letter, "I will ease me of mine adversaries ; " yet even here there is something touching in the anthropopathism, trom the greatness of the long-suffering that appears in the verses preceding. Compare Ezek. v. 13; .xxxi. 16; xxxii. .SI. .More nearly allied, however, both to the primary, and to the sense we have traced in Gen. vi. is the Piel idea of consolation. It is the siimpaihiz- ing sorrow, as in Gen. 1. 21, where Joseph comforts his brethren by paUiating their guilt. Its primary sense, as well as its tenderness, appears in what is immediately added, D2b bs -aT^l cnis cns'l , "and he soothed them, and spake to their heart." Compare Is. xl 1, " Comfort ye, cnmfort ye my peo- ple," and especially Ps. xxiii. 4, where it expresses the soothing care of the shepherd for the wearied, panting sheep. It is this sense of sympathizing sor- row that makes the exquisite beauty of its tender- ness.— T. L.] DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL. 1. The character of the Alexandrian Judaism, as inclined to the Gnostic and the apocryphal, needs to be recognized in order that we may estimate its in- fluence upon the old and traditional exegesis of this passage, and on the passage itself as given in the codices of the Septuagint. 2. There is a difference between the biblical and apocryphal measure of the doctrine respecting the demons, analogous to the difference between faith and superstition, or the ditiei-ence between the census commimh of a sound theology and the hankering laste of a mere theosophy. S. The Scripture distinguishes between corrupt- ipg mixed-marriages of the pious and the godless, which, according to their point of departure (that is, sensual satisfaction), draw down the nobler part into commuiuty with the base, and unlike marriages among those of ditTeient religious communions, which may draw up those of lower standing to the staitd-point of the more elevated. Ic is because there lies originally at the ground of the latter a moral motive. To the first class belong, next to our his- tory, the marriage of Esau, the .Uidianitie connec- tions (Xumb. XXV., yet oidy in conditional measure, since, in this case, there is mention only of licentious amours), the marriages of the Israelites with the Ca- naanitish women (Judg. Hi.), the Delilah of Samson, the foreign wives of Solomon, Jezebel in Israel, Athaliah in Judah (both baring a fearful efficacy for the corruption of the people), the danghlers of San- ballat (Neh. xiii. 2S), who gave occasion for the false woi-ship on Gerizim. To these, if we regard the essence of the matter, we may add the case of Hero- dias in the New Testament, and connect with them •nalogous examples in the history of the church and •f the world, even to our own day. To the otner in class belong such cases as that of Thamar, the mar- riage or the marriages of Moses, the ease of Rahab, the marriages of the sous of Xaoun (see Book of Ruth), the cases mentioned by Paul, 1 Cor. vii. 13, the case of Eimice, 2 Tim. i. 5, and many examples from old church history, where Christian princesses have been the means of converting heathen husb^inds and, through them, of the conversion of whole n* tions. From this contrast it appears that a mer« zeal in the abstract against mixed marriages is not grounded on the Bible, but that it depends on this whether the motive for the contraction of marriage is the instruction of the one who occupies the lower position, or a religious apostasy of the higher. And so, too, the political and civic conception of mesalliances is to be determined by fundamental positions of a moral and religious kind. In the imiversal treatment of tills question, there comes also into consideration the moral predominance and the social priority of the man, as well as the great religious influence of the wife, especially of the zealous, or of the bigoted wife. 4. Between the moral and ennobling satisfac- tion in female beauty, as, for example, in the love of Jacob and Rachel, and the satisfaction of sensual desire, there is a specific difference. Beyond a doubt, a satisfaction of the latter kind is meant in our text, as plainly appears from the expression: "they took them wives of all (that is, without ex- ception) that pleased them." Such a wide choice ia unknown to the moral love. The language appears, too, to hint at a Cainite polygamy. The expression ni^ta, as used of the daughters of men, is to be thus determined. 5. The Bible conception of whoredom, as it becomes a symbolical designation of a falling away from God into idolatry, determines itself — not solely by the outward mark, that Is, as lacking the ritual of marriage — tfut also by the inward evidence as to whether the spirit-life sinks into sensnaliiy through the sensual connection. And such a sexual life ia here evidently intended As the true marriage be- comes a symbol of the connection between .lehovah and his people, because in its looking to the eternal it eohires with it in the generic bridal idea, so does the impure sexual coimection become a symbol of apostasy, because it has in common with it the characteristic feature of unspirituality anii carnality. It lies, therefore, in the very nature of the thing, that the first kind of sexual intercourse conducts to lawful marriage (the marriage-law), and conforms to the true and faithful in the chasiity ol the spirit, whilst the latter hates chastity ami loves change. 6. Lust and cruelty are psychologically twin- forms, like despotism and mesalliance, or the harem life in all its forms. Jezebel, Athaliah, Heroiiias, are world-historical types. Women like these have shown themselves to be murtleiesses of the prophets. So, too, the authoress of Nero's persecutions had to be his wife Poppaea, a bigoted Jewish proselyte (see Lehman: "Stu'lies in the History of Apostolio Times." Greifswald, 185ti). In this tendency of lust can we explain the common disobedience of degenerate sons towards their pious [larenis, the disowning of modest Sethite mai.iens in favor of Camite beauties, the existence of polygamy and licentious disorder, and, ev^■rywhere, what is called " the emancipation of the flesh." Therefore is it that this nee is a prefiguring example of the antino- mi.sts of "the la.st time" (Matt. xxiv. ; Epistle of lude; 2 Peter ii.) From the violence of action. 290 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. moreover, can we explain tlie oppression of tlie weak and miserable, and the spreading of infinite Borrow. 7. A physiologist might find it Terv conceivable, that the ottspring of such unbridled lust, as exhibited in the intercourse of the hitherto unimpaired Sethites with the Cainite women, might be a race in wliom bodily strengtli would present itself in an unusual degree, in connection with spiritual savageness. This, however, is doubted by Kurtz (Part 1, p. 82). 8. The first mention of the divine judicial office of the Spirit of God, ver. 3. 9. The first mention of worldly favor in instruct- ive and warning significance, ver. 4. 10. In respect to God's repentance, see above (comp. Numb, xxiii. 19; 1 Sam. xv. 29). A well- known school does not hesitate to bring into the idea of the divine being the conception of muta- biUty, even in its relation to other questions (for example, the doctritie of Coinniunicatio idiomatum). We should, however, always distinguish between symbolic and dogmatic anthropopathism. Besides, we must not confound the judgment of God, ver. 5, with the judgment of God, ch. viii. 21. 11. Noah found grace. As innocent children died in the flood, and as, moreover, there may have been always individuals less guilty who nevertheless fell under the jmlgment, so does the yrace in the exception of the pious Noah become still more con- spicuous. But in Noah, moreover, the liernel, or root-stem of humanity, still remaining comparatively sound, was the subject of the divine mercy. The "iPI , the gracious, fair, and saving condescension, appears here for the first time in full distinctness. This showing grace to Noah in this world casts a ray of light upon the destiny of the iimocent infant- world that sunk with the guilty, and of the race generally, as judged in the other world (see 1 Pet. iii. 19; ch. iv. 6). HOMTLETICAI, AND PEACTICAL. The fall and perdition of the first human race in its detail: 1. Ungodly lust; 2. wanton deeds of violence; 3. the lawless commingling of the pious with the godless; 4. disdain of all warnings from the Holy Spirit, and impenitent obduracy in their sensual course. — How the w;irniiigs of God die away unheard in a sinking race. — The higher the stand- point the deeper the fall. — The sanctifying of the true feeling ol beauty in contrast with the wanton di-sposition. — The sanctifying of the true hero-power in contrast with the wanton love of violence. — The dei'p connection between carnality and cruelty. — The sanctifying of marriage. The corrupting effects of unchasiity. The contagious power of evil, especially of lust and injustice. — God's beholding it at all times. — How the divine repenting reflects itself in the heart of the pious Noali. — The godly mourning of the pious over the corruption of these times; its high signilic.'ince: 1. as an animating sign of the divine compassion ; 2. as a terrifying sign of the divine judgnient. — How man draws with him, in his doom, the surrounding nature — even in liis cor- ruption— The sufferings of children on account of their parents. — The sutVcrings of the animal world on account of man — Noah the chosen of God; 1. As the prophet of the divine spirit and of its judg- ment upon the earth ; 2. as the priest of his house ud of a new humaoitjr ; 3. as a kingly hero in his steadfastness against a whole race. — The grace o? God, how it excepted one man, Noah, out of the common judgment. — Grace for the one, in its effect grace for the many, that is, for the whole conjing human race. — The second ancestor a child of grace iu the most special sense. — The grace in its first manifestation, ho^v all-powerful, and how wondrously saring. — Noah found grace ; therefore he muse have sought it, as it sought and found him. — "7n hi* eyes ; " consciousness of the grace of the all-knowing God as ever beholding hJTn ; this through his com- munion with God. Stakke: Ver. 2. Luther: It is a ^reat mercy when the Holy Spirit through its word punishe.% and strives with, men ; on the contrary, the highest disfav or and punishment when it is withdrawn and leaves the world unpunished. — Ver. 3 : After the time God gave also to the Amorites four hundred years (ch. xv. 16), to the Jews also, after the death of Christ, forty years, to Nebuchadnezzar one year (Dan. iv. 29 j, and to Ninevah forty days, for repent- ance.— Ver. 4 : Th(^ security and carnality of men i» a sign of God's judgments drawing nigh (Matt. xxiv. 33-38). — Evil examples (Book of Wisdom iv. 12; Siriich xiii. 1). Reckless and anhke maniagea draw after them only clear perdition, — The contempt of the divine word is the most grievous sin, for from it all others have their origin. How great the patience and long-suffering of God ! The oppression of the poor and wretched is a great sin, and chaws God's judgment after it. — Ver. 7: Though the httle ones are comprehended in the c:danuty, we nuist not, on that account, charge God with unrighteous- ness (he might have foreseen that they would tread in the footsteps of their parents, or he may have taken them without prejudice to their soul's blessed- ness).— Ver. 8. LuTHKR : This way of sjieaking ex- eludes merit and extols faith. — SciiRfDER: The fall first begins its course in the sphere of Adiim .md Eve's single personality, then, by and with Cain it enters into the family life, thence showing itself in the members of a whole Une, it now reaches its last stage of antediluvian development; it advances to the fall of a world. — Vers. 1, 2. Herder: The more intimate they are, the nearer they live together, the more do they infect each other with their breath, and defile each other with their disease ; each be- comes to the other the instrument of a more multi- plied and subtle evil. All great kingdoms, states, and cities are still mournful evidences of this fact. — Calvin : By such a title of honor (sons of Gud) Moses upbraids them with their unlhankl'uluess. in that, forsaking their heavenly lather, they become outcasts, as it were, and expose themselves to ruin — Luther : The Hood comes not on this acooiujt merely, that the race of tain was corrupt and evil, but because the race of the righteous, who had be- lieved God, had fallen into idolatry. So God does not hasten the last day because heathen, Jews, and Turks are godless, but because, by means if the Pope, and the fanatics, the church itself has become full of errors. — From all, that is, whom they loved, took they to themselves wives. That would be the love of diversity. Or, before all, namely, that to them the female race (the sex without discrinjination) had become everything. The worth or i',nw:uthi- ne.ss of the person came not into ccmsideralioa I'robably it w;is incest ; it was certaiidy polygamy LiiTMKu: They ilisilaincd the .simplicity, seriousness, and modest dcpoitment of their young womea, which had atti acted the holy patriarchs, not amor- CHAi'. VL y— VIIL 19. 291 onsly, but chastely, and suffered themsclveg to be pleased with the fondlings, tlie adorning, and the wantoning that proceeded from the lattiT (tliat I3, the Oainite) race. — -Ver. 3. Calvin : Moses repre- Bents God himself as speaking ; thereby K-ould it be- come more certain that that punishment was as righteous as It was tearful. — Lctiiee!: (The judging (or striving) of the spirit relates to a public office in the church, or the preaching of the truth, perhaps to a cenaure pit)nouiiced by Methuselah or Lajnech). They are the words of an anxious heart; according to the language of Scripture, God is troubled, that is, the heart of the holy people which is lull of love to every man. Such sorrow is properly the sorrow of the Holy Spirit (Eph. iv. 3(1). — The samk ; When the spiri*; of docirine is gone there departs also the spirit of prayer. — Calvin : As long as God holds back punishment he contends, to a certain extent, with men, especially if he would draw them to re- pentance by threatenmgs, or with light chastenings by way of example. Now he declares, as though in weariness, that he desires no longi'r to contend. — • Berlenbnrger Bible: Where the Spirit of God is, there it condemns sin. His presence and his disci- pline are inseparable (Book of Wisdom xii.) — The same : Let no one believe that he can do without such a chastening of the Almighty. We see it in little children. — Calvi.n : This contempt of God gave birth to pride, and, pride full blown, they be- gan to break every yoke. They glorified themselves in their deeds of shame, and became robbers of renown, so called. — The same: That was the first nobility in the world ; so that no one might please himself with a longer or more renowned series of iucestors. — The same: There is nothing iu itself to be condemned in the desire of celebrity, it is useful that rank should have place in the world ; yet, as inordinate ambition ever deserves blame, so, when there is added to it the tyrannical cruelty of the more powerful, in their scorn of the weak, it becomes an intolerable evil. — Vers. 5-7. Koos : Be- fore, the Hood of sins ; after it, the sin-flood. With- out a doubt has God impressed this feeling upon his saints, though no one in a human way is capable of it, according to its true divine nature. Wrath is proper for a king and a magistrate, but pain (for sin) is peculiar to the Creatoi-, who has love for hii creatute, and before whose eyes that creature stand*' as one utterly corrupt, unthankful, and apostate.— The same: A destruction of man and beast must be their end. But, whether this destruction is t4 be through water or through fire, God has not yel in these words revealed. Gerlach : The Sethites are here presented as ■ warning to the IsraeUtes. God allows no one of his greater judgments to take place without giving a respite for repentance after its announcement Luther's inteipretation 'takes the repentance and the grieving as the same with that which preeedel in the genuine children of God. (Examples which Luther presents. Abraham's prayer for Sodom; Samuel's sorrow for Saul; Christ's weeping ovel Jerusalem.) Lisco : Flesh ; that is, a people wholly sunk in sin. Despise not thy day of grace. Calvee {Manual) : When members of the trua church become degenerate, the judgments of God are not distant. — The NephiUm : Despising God above ; exercising violence and oppression towards their brethren below. Now are these names un- known, hke the names of many others who have sought for empty fame. In the heathen world there are such people as heroes, men honored as demi- gods ; and triily there he in these and other early indications of Moses, the fountains of many of the heathen legends concerning the gods. (The demi- gods of the heathen are, in fact, the heroes of humanity, such as Hercules, for example; but they htive, doubtless, an origitial national origin tor the most part which doi-s not go back beyond the flood.) — Noah, the one righteous man in an entire corrupt world. — The eyes of the Lord are upon those »ho fear him. — Talbe (p. 4S): The judgment of God upon the first world a warning example for our time : 1. In respect to the first world being ripe lor judgment ; 2. in respect to the manner in which God executed this sentence. — Miotiow : This is the very climax of corruption, when men will not suffer themselves to be reproved by the spirit of God. The repenting of God (see Numb, xxiii. 19). It denotes God's dealing with men, which, though at all times just, must correspond to the behavior of men THIRD PART. tB* GENESIS OF THE WORLD'S JUDGMENT AND OF THE WORLD'S RENEWING BY MEANS OF THE FLOOD. THE FLOOD AND THE DROWNED RACE. THE ARK AND THE SAYED HUMANITY. (THE ARK AS A TYPE OF THE PIOUS FAMILY, OF THE PIOUS STATt; AND OF THE CHURCH). (Chap. VL 9-Chap. VIU, 19.) FIRST SECTION. The Calling of Koah. Ttie Ark. Chapter VI. 9-Chapter VII. 9. 9 These are the generations [tholedoth] of Noah ; Noah was a just' man and perfect in 10 his generations [in liis times], and Noah walked with God. And Noah begat tiiree srna 29'J « J on the side, but irom the top surface downwards tlirougli the different stories] ; and the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof; with lower, second and third stories shalt thou make it. 17 And behold I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesli, wherever is the breath of life under heaven; and everything that is in the earth shaL" 18 die [expire-yield the breath] : But with thee will I establish my covenant; and thou shalt 19 come into the ark, thou and thy sons, and tliy wife, and thy sons' wives with thee. And of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark, to keep 20 them alive with thee ; they shall be male and female. Of fowls after their kind, and ot cattle after their kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind, two of every 21 sort shall come unto thee, to keep them alive. And take thou unto thee of all food that is eaten, and thou shalt gather it to thee [for a store], and it shall be for food for thee 22 and for them. Thus did Noah according to all that God commanded him. Ch. VII. 1 And the Lord said unto Noah, come thou and all thy house into the ark ; for 2 thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation. Of every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female, and of beasts that are not clean 3 by two, the male and his female. Of fowls also of the air by sevens, the male and the 4 female ; to keep seed alive upon the earth. For yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon tlie earth forty days and forty nights ; and every living substance that I have 5 made will I destroy from the face of the earth. And Noah did according lo all that 6 the Lord commanded him. And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of 7 waters was upon the earth. And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and lii.s sons' wives with him, into the ark, because of the waters of the flood [from before, or from 8 the face of the waters]. Of clean beasts, and of beasts that are not clean, and of fowls, and 9 of every thing that creepeth upon tlie earth. There went in two and two [by pairs] unto Noah into ihe ark, the male and the female, as God [Elohim] had commanded Noah. (' VeF. 9. — p^^S, primary sense, jiddity, truthfulness. D^lSt^, primary sense, soundness^ integrity. That the terms are comparative is shown by the qualifying word that follows, l^PTni"13 , in his generations. Tho language gives no countenance to the opinion of Knobel, that Noah is represented as a man of spotless innocence, and that the author of this account knew nothing of any fall. So the Jewish interpreters take it, some of whom, as Itashiand Maimonides both tell us, go so far as to say that he would not have been so called in comparison with Abrah-am. 7^2nrn CTliXn rfi<: ■ee remarks on this phrase as used in the account of Enoch. — T. L.] ■ ' ■ ■: ' [' Ver. 11. — rnirn" , primary sense, depression, sinking down. Hence, corruption, destruction. — T. L.l [* Ver. 12.- X^*1 . "And God saw the earth "— ^oofced at the earth, and lo. Some would render: "saw that the earth was ; " but the other mode is the more literal, as well as the more expressive. It may be called anthrnpopathic, w expressing something like surpi-ise, but it is all the more striking on that very account. "Had corrupted its way." ■^3^:1 rx r"n'I,'n. This maybe taken physically as well as moniUy. *5^". its way, its mode of life. Men were becoming monsters, sinking down into brutality — becoming dehumanized through lust and cruelty. "C'S ?^ , aU JUjh, Br, Murphy well remarks, that "this should teach us to beware of applying an inflexible litenilitT to such tenu* as aU when thus "used ; since the mention of the whole race '• does not preclude the exception of Noah ana his family." Com* 9untary on Oen. p. 210. — T. L.] [« Ver. l.'i.— 1C3 hz yp. *' The end of all flesh is come up, •'SSb , before me (to my face).*' Or it may be rendered in tho present, comes up before me, giving it more tho sense of a prediction (or an event seen to be inevitable unless pre* Tented soon) than of a threatened judgment. The language is remarkably graphic ; as though the events of ^ime, as it moves on, or the roll untolds itself, come up before the immovable, unchanging God, and the lax^t periods of a long series were drawing nigh in their development. In this view, bs of ver. 13 would be taken in its universjiiity. Through human wickedness and comiption there will be an end of man crus (g(n) pr). It may denote any resinous wood which is at the same time light •ndhrm.— T.L.J , , , . i,_ [« Ver. 17.— bsaan ; used only of the Great Deluge, except Ps. xxix. 10, where it comes in as a hyperbole in the description of a great storm and inundation. LaULje, Geseuius, and others, derive it from SS^ , to which they give the Bense /luzit, though it occurs only in some noun derivatives, the Hiphil sense being remotely secondary. The sense ol flowing, however, in b3^ , if it has it at all, is quite different from the conception we have of the deluge. It is the flowing of streams, rivers, rivulets, as seen in the derivative bz^ , Jlumen, rivus. Aben Ezra gives us the views of the older Jewish grammarians. One class of these make il fiom t-:, comparing it with Is. xxiv. 4, }*~S. Xisuthrus, the last of the ten primitive kings, lieleld ill a dream the appearance of Cronos (in (IreeV the same as Bel or Baal), who announced to him, that on the 15th day of the month Diisio, men would be destroyed by a flood. It was commanded him to write down all the sciences and inventions of man- kind, and to conceal the writings in Syparis, the city ol the Sun ; thereupon he was to build a ship, and to embark on the same with all his companions, kin- dred, and nearest friends; he was to put in it pro- visions and drink, and to take with him the animals, the birds, as well as the quadrupeds. If any one should ask him whereto he was bound, he was to answer: To the gods; to implore good for men. Eo obeyed, and made an ark five stadia in length, and two in breadth, put together what was command- ed, and embarked with wife, children, and kindri'd. As the flood subsided, Xisuthrus let fly a bird, which, when it neither found nourishment nor place to light, returned back into the ark. After some days he let fly another bird ; this came back with slime upon its fool. The third bird sent forth never re- turned. Then Xisuthrus perceived that land was becoming visible, and after that he had broken an opening in the ship, he sees it driven upon a mount- ain, whence he descends with wife, daughter, and pilot, and when he had saluted the earth, /milt an altar, and offered sacrijice to the gods, he disappeared. Those who were left in the ship, when they saw that Xisuthrus did not return, went forth to seek him, and called him by name. Xisuthrus was seen no more, but a voice sounded from the air, bidding them to fear god, and telling them that on account of hia piety he had been taken away to dwell with the gods ; and that the same honor was given to his wife, daughter, and pilot. (This disappearance has rela- tion to his deification, or probably to his translation among the st;irs, where the forms of the waterman, the young woman, and the carrier (the wagoner) still present themselves to us). They were comtnainled to return back to Babylon, where it wa.s appointed to them to take the writings from Syparis, and impart the knowledge they contained to men. The country where they found themselves was Armenia. In re- spect to the ship, which had landed in Armenia. Berosus adds that there was still a portion of it ou the mountains of Kordyiier (or the Kurdistan mount* ains) in Armenia, from which some persons cut off CHAP. VI. 9— vn. 9. pieces, took them to their houses, and useJ them as amulets (according to LUcken). Amid all the simi- larity which this story presents to the Bible history, there is no mistaking the mythological coloring ; for example, in the huge size of the ark. Just iis little do we fail to hear the echo of the history of Enoch. 3. The Fad of llie Flood— The narr.itive of the flood, like the history of Paradise, has in a special measure the character of all the Bible histories — that 18, it is at the same time fact and symbol ; and it is the symbohcal significance of this history that has formed the significant expression of the fact. In re- gard to the fact itself, the view is rendered in a high degree difficult by reason of the mingling with it of the following representations, resting solely on the literal interpretation : 1. the supposition that the history narrates not merely the extermination of tlie first human race, and, therefore, the overflowing of the earth according to the geographical extension of that race, but an absolute uni* ersal submersion of the whole earth itself; 2. the idea that the terres- trial relations were the same at that time that they are now, that the mountain elevations were com- pleted, and that the mountain Ararat was just as high as at the present time ; 3. that the branching of the animal species had become as great at that day as it is now : add to these a 4th, the ignoring of every symbolical imprint in the representation. As to what concerns the first two points, it is argued by Ebrard, for example (" Belief in the Holy Scriptures," p. 73), that .\rarat was 16,000 feet high. The waters stand fifteen cubits above Ararat; consequently must the whole earth have been covered, though it may still remain a question whether single peaks, lilie the Dhawalagiri, might not have projected above the water-surface (in a literal construction of the text, however, such a doubt caimot remain), since a bank- ing limitation of so high a flood would be inconceiv- able. This conclusion depends upon a supposition wholly uncertain, namely, that the peak of Ararat was in that day 16,000 feet high. In regard to the first point, the remark of Niigelsbach (Art. " Xoah," Hkrzog's Real-Enci/clopedie) coincides wholly with the view X)f Delitzsch, namely, that the theologic:il interest does not demand the universality of the flood in itself, but only the universality of the judgment that was executed by it. In respect to the second point, it is to be remarked, that the mountain forma- tions of the earth had been, indeed, begun in the creative period, but were not yet fully completed. The history of the deluge is, without doubt, the his- tory of a catastrophe in which the terrain of the earth experienced important modifications through the co- operation of fire. The deep sinking of the land in the neighborhood of the Armenian paradisaical re- gion, which is denoted by the Caspian Sea, might alone have brought on a deluge catastrophe analogous to that which must have had a connection with the ruin of the legendary island of Atlantis. In respect to the third representation, the Darwin theory of the pro- gressive origin of races, though in itself untenable, does nevertheless contain an indication of the truth that the countless unfolding of organic memberships in the animal life goes back to great individual anti- types, as science theoretically sets forth. For each species, perhaps, there may have been a ground type iu the ark, out of which all varieties of the same have proceeded. In respect to the fourth false repre- sentation, which confounds the style of the Holy History with the notarial expression of a worldly pragmatism, we refer to the Introduction. On the side of the mythologizing of the lelugl history there are similar untenable representation! that call for remark. 1. The apprehension in respec< to the pos.sibility of building the ark. It is histori cally established that, at all times, a necessity fun damentally perceived, has, under the guidance of Ood, brought to discovery the helps required for th« accomplishment. Necessity learns to pray, learns to build. •!. The difficulty of assembling such a multi- tude of beasts in the ark. In reply to this, allusion has been made to the instinct of animals, which, in ■ presentiment of natural catastrophe, seek an asylum, sometimes, almost in violation of their natural hab- its. Birds, in a storm, fly to the ships ; wolves coma into the villages, etc. 3. The difficulty of the animal provisioning. Answer: This would be of least weight in respect to animals like those of the marmot and badger species, whose winter torpor in the easiest manner keeps them through the wintry storm-period. But the deluge, in like manner, supposes, in the main, a slumbering, dead-like transition from the old existence into the new. Darkness, the roaring and rocking of the waters in so peculiar a manner, must bring on a benumbing torpor, and, in the case of many animals, a winter sleep, whereby the feed- ing would be rendered unnecessary. The ground ideas of the deluge history are as high above tha popular representations on the right, as they are be- yond the scholastic thinking on the left. They may be regarded as something like the following: 1. At the moment when the first human race, through the commingling of an angel-like elevation of the Sethic line with the demonic corruption of the Cainitic, is ripe for judgment, there is a corresponding catas- trophe, having its ground in the earth's develop- ment, forming an echo to the creation catastrophes, and, at the same time, imposed by God as a judgment doom upon that human corruption. 2. The pro- phetic spirit of a pious patriarch, in whom there is concentrated the heart of the old world's piety, takes into its belief not only the revelation of the impend- ing judgment, but also the deliverance which out of that juilgment is to go forth for this world itself as represented in his person, and in his family, whUst it denotes thereby the progress of faith in revelation, from the assurance of salviition in the other world (which Enoch already hud), to the confidence of sal- vation in this. 3. The inspiring of necessity teaches him, under the divine guidance, to build an ark, which, in its commencement, is to be a preaching of repentance to the cotemporuries of the builder, but which, in its completion, is distinguished neither by oar nor lielm, but oidy by its gre;it spaciousness and water-tight construction. 4. In this use of the ark, as a common asylum, the instincts of the beasts act in harmony with the prophetic presentiment of chosen men, whilst the rest follows through God's care and a peculiar success. 5. The history of the flood is av £iro£ Ae-yrinci/oc in the world's history, analogous to the creation of Adam, the birth and history of Christ, and the future history of the world's end. Even BuNSE-s (ii. p. 63) affirms, in general, the historical- ness of the biblical tradition. Therefore is this unparalleled fact in the highest degree symbolic or ideal, whilst it is, at the same time, a tvpical prophecy. 1. It is a prophecy of the deliverance of Israel as the people of God in tha passage through the Red Sea ; 2. a prophecy of th* deliverance of the Christian church from the corrup- tion of the world, through the washi ag of baptism (1 Pet. iii. 21); 3. a prophecy jf the deliverance of 796 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. the congregation of Christ, at the world's end, out of the tire-flood of the world i judgment. The ark is especially reflected in tlia ark of Moses, in the ark of the covenant which w 's carried througii the Jordan, in the houseliold of tlie cburcli, and in She congregation of faith at the end of tlie world. Kno- bel thinks that in llie narration before us there is to be recognized an Eltihistic foundation w'hich the Jehovlst must have elaborated, not without a con- tradiction of its fundamental ground. Thus the de- BCription of the cornipiion, in ch. vi. 11, 12, he says, doe-T not agree with the Jehovist, who repre- sents the wiokedness in human life as having com- menced at a much earlier day. As though the origin of evil and an incurable corruption were not two distinct grades ! So, according to the Jehovist, it is (as Knobel would have it) that the human life-period after the flood sinks down to one bimdred and twenty years — an idea that rests upon a felse interpreta- tion. Moreover, it would seem not to agree with the ground-scripture, that of many kinds of beasts Noah took more than a pair (ch. vii. 2, 3, 8). Knobel supposes, therefore, that the special enlargement was a contradiction to tlie more general appoint- ment. In regard to the fact itself, says Knobel : Unanswerable are the questions, how Noah came to expect the great flood, and was led to the building of the ark. So also would it be incapable of an answer, how at any time one could attain to a pro- phetic prevision. The question he regards as still more difficult to answer: "How he was enabled to produce such a structure," — that is, such a great quadrangular box. Further : " How he got the beasts in his power?" Experience shows, that in extraordinary cata.«trophes of nature, the wildest animals take refuge with men. Lastly : " How could they all, together with the necessary provisioning for a whole year, Hnd room in tlie ark 'i " This point carries us back to a primitive time, when, as yet, the species were comparatively less divided, and to a stormy death of nature, which intensified to its most extreme degree the phenomenon of the winter's sleep; to say nothing of the point, that to the sym- bolical expression there is needed only the general fact of the savuig of the animal world, along with man, by means of the ark. When Ebrard admits that possibly tile highest mountain-peaks may have projected above the surface of the waters of the del- uge, it would allow the consequence of an Alpine fauna existing outside of the ark. The point mainly in view is the destruction of the human race, and the saving of the Noachian family, in the deluge. Not- withstanding his objections, Knobel supposes an actual ground of fact in the narration, even as an alter-piece lo the great earth revolutions of the crea- tive period (p. 78). This la.st point of view carrier us beyond the supposition ol' mere partial historical inundations. A concussion of the earth permits the conclusion that a. displacement occurred in its conti- nental lelations, whence there might have arisen a deluge of a very wide character, without our having to a.s.'jume a corresponding inundation of the whole earth's surface. Stormy deludes do not oliey the law of standing waters. Such a deluge might have passed over the whole inhabited part of the earth, without making alike height of water as standing over the whole sphere. " The ground."," remarks Delitzsch, " on w liiih Ihe Thora (ilie rentaicnch) dwells so emiihatically upon the Heioil, consist in their signiflcancy for the hiHtory of God's kingdom in general, and the history of the Old Testament theocracy in particular. Th« flood is an act of deepest significance, whether re garded as one of judgment or of salvation. It is a common judgment, making an incision in history so deep and so wide, of sudi force and imiversality that nothing can be compared with it but the final judgment at the extreme limit of this « orld's history. But the act of judgment is, at the same time, an act of salvation. The sin-deluge is, at tlie same time, a grace-deluge,* and so far a type of holy baptism (1 Pet. iii. 21), and of life rising out of death; therefore it is, that old ecclesiastical art was so fond of distinguishing chapels of burial by a representa- tion of it. The destruction has in view the preserva tion, the drowning has in view the purification, the death of the human race has in view the new birth ; the old corrupted earth is buried in the flood of water, that out of this grave there may emerge a new world. In this way Ararat points to Sinai. The covenant of Elohim, which God then made with the saved holy seed, and with the universal nature, points to the covenant of Jehovah." 4. The Geological Effects of the Dehtge. — In earlier times, the traces of earth revolutions that took place in the creative days (for example, the mountain formations, the shells on the highest hills, and similar phenomena) were brought forth as proofs of the flood. Such a mode of reasoning must now be laid aside by those who would reconcile revela- tion with science. Neither can the assumption be proved, that it rained for the first time in the flood, and that, with the change in the atmosphere, human life suddenly sunk in its duration, nor the supposi- tion that at that time a sudden tran^fornlation took place in the animal world, or that new animals were originated. The following suppo^ition.s, however, may be regarded as more or less safely entertained: 1. As the great flood denoted an epoch in the life of humanity, so also must it have done in the life of the earth; and through this epoch the giant-like in the human imtural powers seems to have been moder- ated, whilst, on the contrary, the development in the earth's life becomes more conformable to law. 2. The historical indications and signs of great changes in the earth's surface, such as volcanic mountain forma- tions, surface transformations (Caspian Sea, and island Atlantis, for exanijile), may be coiinecied, in some special mea.sure, with the catastrophe of the flood. 3. The flood in itself may, perhaps, have been par tial (see F. Pf'AKF, " The Creative History," p. 646), but the earth-crisis, on which it was conditioned, must have been universal. With the opening of the fountains of the deep stands the opening of the windows of heaven in polar contrast. An exlraor- tlinary rain-storm and full of water over the Noachian earth-circle, was probably conditioned by an extra- ordinary evaporation in other regions of the globe. This must have been followed by an extraordinary congelation on the same side. Does the " ice-period," the ]ieriod of the wandering boulders, stand in any relation to this? As an earth-crisis, the flood wa» prolKibly uni versa.'. EXEGETICAL AND CRITICA.i.. 1. Nanh and hin Ifouxe, in contrast with the Con teiiiporaries of Noah (eh. vi. 9-11). The history thai {• I^uniio tolls usCsce p. 293). that Siittrljluf 'iid not onffln- ftlly mciiii in (ionnan a sin-dt'tu{ft', but tlicrc- iti no other rea* deiini,' that will preserve liis iiitLiided contrast. — T. Ii. ! 3HAP. VI. 9— VII. ». 291 follows 18 distiuguighed by the name Tholedoth, or Generations of Noah. For Noah is not ouly the lust of the Sethic patriarchs, as the end of the antedilu- vian period ; lie is, moreover, the first of the new, through the patriarchal line that goes on in 81iem, and, in this representation, is he also a type of the future Christ, the finisher of the old, the author of the new, worhi. In a typical sense, Noah is the second ancestor of the Liumau race, as Christ, the Man from Heaven, is such in a real sense (1 Cor. xv.). As a continuer of tlie old time, >'oah is virtually a repetition of Adam ; as a beginne of the new time, he is a type of Christ. He was a righteous man. According to Knubel, the autlinr (of this account of the flood) knew nothing of any fall of Adam. One might deduce a hke conclusion from Luke in his ac- count of Zachaiias and Elisabeth (ch. i. 6). But evidently the righteousness here meant is that which represents him as justified in view of the judgment of the flood, by reason of liis faith (Heb. xi. 1). Therefore was the explanation added : he was D^'?n . guiltless, perfect, blameless among his cotempora- ries who perished in the judgment. The ground of this was: he walked with God as Enoch did. That he begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, is here again related, as in ch. v. 32, because in them the continuance of a new race is secured ; with Noah, therefore, must his family also be saved. But, more- over, to Noah, and his house, there is formed a con- trast in the race of his time, and in the old form of the earth that had been corrupted by it. — Ver. 5. To represent the wickedness of man, our text goes fur- ther, and expresses the incurable perdition of the old earth itself, as having been produced by it. It was utterly corrupt, in that it was filled with wickedness, acts of violence, and pride. But it was corrupt be- fore the eye of God in its most manifest form, so that its judgment was imperatively demanded. — And God looked upon the earth, and lo. — De- litzsch correctly points out the contrast of these words to ch. i. 31. "Everything stood in sharpest contradiction with that good state which God the creator had established." God's looking (or seeing) denotes a final sentence. The earth was incurably corrupt because all flesh had corrupted its way, that is, its normal way of life, upon the corrupted earth. Herein lies the indication, that as men grew wild and savage, the animal world also threatened to become wild. If, however, we suppose, with Delitzsch, an universal corruption of the animal world, whence could Noah have taken the good specimens for his ark V Moreover, it caimot be concluded, fiom ch. ix. 4, that men, in their greediness for flesh, cut out pieces from the yet living animal. According to Knobel, the text denotes the beasts, inasmuch as thev originally lived upon vegetables, but now had partly degenerated into flesh-eaters. This, however, would be all the same as introducing a representa- tion into the text, just as DeUtzsch maintains, that the eating of flesh had not yet been permitted. Keil understands the words in question as referring gen- erally to men only. Thereby, however, there is loosened that organic connection of man, beast, and earth, on which the text lays stress. More correct is the emphasis he lays on the words " all flesh : " humanity had become flesh (ver. 3). 2. The Announcement of the Judgmeni^ and the Directinn for the Building of the Ark (vers. 13-22). — And God said to Noah. — The revelation of the divine disjileusurc with the human race, which ap- pears first, ver. 3, as a conditional and veiled threat- ening of Judgment with the granting of a space foi repentance, ami which, in its second utterance, has already become a resolution to destroy the buniao race (ver. 7), becomes here an absolute announce- ment of approaching doom. There had, perhaps, been previous revelations, in the form of a pT-eachiug of repentance, made by other patriarchs (such aa Methuselah and Lameeh), as they, one after the other, left the world. These had been gradually ex- tended in time; but now are they all concentrated in the one revelation made to Noah. With this there was, at the same time, connected the promise that Noah and his family should be saved. As God's acts of deliverance are cumiected in time with his acts of judgment (since his judgments are evei xcparalious of the godly from the ungodly, and, in this sense, xatvatimis and deliverances), so also are the reivlatinnx of judgment at the same time revela- tions of deliverance, and the faith of the elect which corresponds to them is, at the same time, both a faith in judgment and a faith in salvation. — The end of all flesh. — An expression which strongly conveys the idea, that the positive judgment of God is indi- cated through a judgment immanent in the corruption of men. The self-abandonment in this corru|)tion, the clearly visible end of the same, is so fearfully de- picted, that the positive end winch God is about to impose takes the appearance, not of a judgment merely, but of redress. StUl is the first concejition the predominant one, as appears from the expiession which tells us that God saw the end, the extreme end of the world's corruption (Keil). — Is filled 'with violence through them (Lange renders more coi- rectly, from their faces, or, before them. Vulg., a facie eorum). As it is said, in immediate coimeo- tion, ^^ before the face of God" we hold it unsatisfac- tory here to render CHESS'S from them, or through them. The flood of wickedness that comes up before God's face goes out from their face ; that is, it is a wickedness openly perpetrated; the moral judgment, the conscience, goes utterly out in the direct behold- ing and approbation of evil. — I will destroy them ■with the earth. — Destruction as set against cor- ruption (1 Cor. V. 5). The earth as such can, indeed, suffer no penal destruction, .^s one with man, the destruction becomes to it a total destruction, which comes upon men along with tlieir earth. And so in the renewal of humanity must the earth also receive a renovation of its form. — Make thee an ark. — An indication of the mode bf salvation, in which he himself must co-operate. Baumgarten: " He must be not only the preserved, but also the preserver." fl3tn , according to Delitzsch, probably (if the word is Shemitic), from a;in = 3^S, to be hollow.* Chal- [♦ Tlie etjonology of Delitzscli cannot be sustained, u no such formation can be grammatically made from ^'X . The reasons Eodiger gives for its Egyptian origin are in- conclusive, and if something like it existed in the old Egyp- tian, that would not prove that it had not come into il from the still older language of Shem and Noah. Fuerst regards it as Shemitic, from ilZTTi , to which he gives the sense t»- cavare, hence hoUoiuness and capacity — cognate to the Latin tuha, laberna. Kimchi makes it fi-om ZT\ , hut this is not it all easy. The word is doubtless the one used ft the time, — a peculiar archaic term for a very unusual i.'iing. liks b^3*'3 , the term for the flood itself, ^though afterward* transferred to any smaller vessel. It is not likely that it would I'e ever lost, or another used for it by way of trans- lation, in any subsequent version of the tradition. It might be conjectured to be cognate to the Syriac wSa-^ . redui* davit, supernatavit (Heb. "plJ), or the Arabic I o j^ 298 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. daic, sr'-"ri, Sept. ki^ojtos, Vulg. area (other meanings see in DelitzsehV Keil and Rodiger con- jecture tiiat the word i» of Egyptian origiu. So Knobel : "In Kgyptian, boat is called tept.^'' It is likewise used of the small ark in which Moses was PHved (but wliich In the Septuagint is rendered SiSts or ^i&7}. — Of gopher-wood [Lange, resinous wood]. Hieronynius: Uffna biiuminata% " Troba- bly, cy press- wood." Keil (^S>, cognate to "^ES and KvnaDiaao^). — Rooms shalt thou make [Laiige, cells]. — Properly in cells, as cells (Uterally, nests — lit'le cabins), or cell-containing. — With pitch. — Sept. arf(pa\Tf}s^ Vulg. bifutnen. — And this is which (what) thou shalt make it, — " The most probable supposition is, that the ark was built, not in the forui of a ship, but after the manner of a box, without keel, with a flat deck, more like a four-sided moving house than a ship, since it was destined not for sail- ing, but only for floating upon the water. Thus regarded, the measures 300 cubits long, 50 cubits broad, and 30 cubits high, give a ground-surface of 15,000 cubits square, and a cubical content of 450,0uu cubits solid, taking the usual measure of the cubit (Deut. iii. 11), as the length from the elbow to the end of the middle finger, or about 18 inch- es." Keil. Knobel remarks: "The building sur- passes in magnitude tlie greatest ships-ot-the-line. Its arrangement, however, according to experiments made in Holland, would be found in harmony with its design." In the year 1609, at Hoom, in Holland, the Xetherlandish Mennonite, P. Jansen, produced the model of a vessel afier the pattern of the ark, only in smaller proportions, whereby he proved, that although it was not appropriate for a ship-model, it was well adapted for floating, and would carry a cargo greater by one third than any other form of like cubical content.* See Delitzsch, p. 250. — elatus fuit supra aquam^ were it not that the changf of ^ for B is so very rare a thing in Hebrew, although they are letters of the same organ. It may be difficult to trace it to anj' Hebrew root afterwards in common vize ; but that the word is Shemitic is reDdered alm'J^t coi-tain from its being sc constant in all the branches of that family. Thus the Chaldaic XP^S'T (the Targum word for nUP), the Arabic 5«jL3*, -Ethiopic i'l'T, and even the Maltese Ubui. Thu SjToac Version, instead of the old Shemitic root, uses f Z&^uc* or ) ^" P r . which is simply the Greek ct^uTOf Get^enius regards the word ae Shemitic, though he exprc-pes some doubt aliout it. — T. L.l * [The ditliculty which some have in respect to the mag- nitude of the ark, and the gieatn'-ss of the work, arises from overlooking the extreme simplicity of its structure, the length ct time allowed, the physical con.'^titution of the fabricators, and the facilities ior obtaining the materials, which, it is easy to suppose, may lave existed in abundance in their near vicinity. Four men of iiriniitive gigantic strength, to whom the architects of Stonehenge, the ^ai^e^e of Oyfb'jH an walU (stiuctures found in Greece and in other parts (jf Kurope, which, to our modem eyes, seem almost Buperhuman), the lifters and di-awers i>f the immense stones of the pyramids, and the diggers of the deep granite ravoms of Upi>er I^gj'pt, were junior and inhMior,— four such men (to saynotiiing now of any other probable heli)with iron tools, himjile perhaps, yet well adapted to cutting, t^littiug, and he\\ing (see Gen. iv. 22>, and surrounded by Kirests of the gf'pher-pine, firm and aurable. yet light and easy for working— could ccitainly have built such an ark in much le»?^ time tlian is allowed for it In the Scripture It is noth- ing tin.Tedible, nothing even strange, that they should have Jnid Huch a llooring. .'(00 cubits l^ng (4'>0 feet), and 50 wide, and that they should have raided upon it walls and a roof 30 cubito hi(!h, — thai they should have strengthened the whole with wef Ulysses* Schcdia, Odys. v. 24»-261>, A window shalt thou make in the ark. — "'.ris not in the roof (Kosenmviller and others), but a lighfc opening (C*ins, dual, a double light)* see ch. viii 6. Baumgarten supposes that it must be regarded as a light-opening of a cubit's breadih, extending above the whole upper length of the ark ; Kuubel and Keil, on the contrary, suppose that the wimiuw was hxed on the side, to the extent of a cubit, under the ridge of the roof. Then, indeed, according to Tuch, would only one cabin have received light, per- haps that of Noah ; at ail events, only the liighest story would have had a dim twilight. We suppose, therefore, with Baumgarten, that it must be regarded as a light-opening in the deck, which was continued through the ditierent stories. Against the rain and the water dashing, must this opening have been closed in some way by means of some transparent substance ; for which purpose a treUis, or lattice- work, would not have been sufficient. The expres- sion *' to a cubit," denotes also precaution. In this view of the case, moreover, it is not easy to take ■ins collectively, as is done by Gesenius and the Syriac, and to fancy a number of light apertures, although it might be that one light-opening in the deck could be divided into a number of light-open- ings for the interior.* — The door of the ark.— making it like a large dry-dock rather than a ship— and then have rendered it water-tight by a copious use of the rosin and bitumen that abounded in that region. What is there incredible in it, or even strange, we say ! Add to this the considerations mentioned by Lange, the feeling of necessity, the conviction of a divine impulse, together with the in- creased vigor that ever comes from the consciout-ness of a great wt rk, and the difficulties which at first appear so start- ling are immediately diminished, if they do not wl)oUy dis- appear. There is more force in the objection arising from the stowage of the ark, if we take the common estimate of the animals. But here, again, everything depends upon the theoiy with which we start. Throughout the account the several alls, as already remarked in the text-notes, become universal or specific, widen orcontrnci, according to our pre- judgment of the universality or partiality of the flood itself. See remarks on this in the Excursus, p. 318. Had the narrator been more guiuded and specific in hia language, it would have justly impaired his credit. It would have been an affectation of knowledge he could not have possessed. In giving hi^ divine convictions, as derived from visions, or in any other manner, he presents them aecor-^ing to his coneeptions a* dependent on his knowledge of things around him. Greater Ciire in his language would have looked like distrust in himself— like an anticipation cf axvil, and an attempt to get credit for accuracy. And this is the peculiar character of the narrative. Precise is it even to minuteness in things that fall directly within tht; observa- tions of sense; here the narrator gives us numbers, dates, and even cubits of measui ement ; whilst he is general, even to the appearance of hyperbole, in what was beyond such range. It is the chara* teristic of a truthful style,— that is, truthful to the conception and the emotion.— T. L.] * [In interpreting the expression, "to a cubit shalt thou finish it above, nbyTablO nrk^n n:2X bsl, much de- pends on getting the right sense of the preposition, or ad- verb, nbi'iabTj . The Hebrew language, so tense in other parts of speech, rejoices in double, triple, and even quad- ruple forms of its particles. Thus, by vpon, 7^13 '^^'^''e, nb"T2 with local n , upward, JlbT'Cb to upward, or loabnvef nhV'ch'Ci/rmn ahme to above. Thus, in Gen. vii. 20, 1^33 C^l^n the waters prevailed nby^bia from higher to hiyk- er, from the top of the mountain to the summit of the flood, or in the other diroetion, as in Josh. iii. 13, 16. There isaa exactness here which is not to be disregarded : fnnn ihoeav* of the ark up lownrd the lidgo of iU>i mof, thou shiilt.A>".'>'A it to a cubit ; that is, leaWng a cubit itnfiuish'd, open, or un- closed. There is also an emphasis in the Piel verb nS*-n , especially if we regard its objective pronoun as leferring to the ark ilself, or the roof of the ark. Thou shalt make it comjilr.te, all except a cubit space which was to be left. It is not easy to untferstand liow Ihis vacant cubit could \ye is CHAP. VI, 9 — VII. ». 29? Here car only be meant an entrance wbit*h was after- wards clused, and ouly opened a,i;ain at the end of the flooa. And since there were three stories of the ark. the word is to be understood, perhaps, of ihree entrances capable of being closed, and to which there would have been constructed a way of access from the outside on the outside. " Is it held that so eolossal a structure as the ark would have been im- praciicable in this very early time; the objection may be met with the answer, tl-at some of tlie most gigantic .structures belong to m imnieiuorial anti- quity." Baum^i^artea (compare also Keil, p. 98 ; Bklitzsch, p. lioii).— And behold I, even I, am bringing. — Noah must make the ark, for He, Jeho- the side, or at the eave. In the other way we get the idea which would seem to be s^iven by Aben Ezra, that "the roof of the ark was triangular, cbll'^a m^a'IS , (that is, in its section) with a sharp top, in IliJxSl , and so also its comers or angles, T^rizr^SjrTD , so that it could not turn up- side down ("^BriPn sib), whilst its door was on one side." That is, the roof was not flat, but made by two planes, more or less inclined. " To a cubit shalt thou fanish it." That is, it was to be left open (or unfinished) on the ridge, to the breadth of a cubit extending the whole length. This waa the in^ (Zoliar), a word whose strong primary sense is iig/tt, splendor, the light of heaven^ or of the meridian sun; like the similar Arabic words, f\j^ , or ?.L^? • So it was emphatically to the ark. Their light was fiom above. This "ins showed the open sky, or heaven, through its whole length, like a meridian line, and this suggests, and is suggested by, that other use of the word in the dual, C'^n^ , for noon, or the midday light (see Gen. xliii. 16, 25 ; Ps. xxxvii. 6 ; Cant, i. 7, etc.)* li^^e another Arabic word, '^ still more closely resembling it. Its dual form in Hebrew denotes exact division, or the noon splendor when it divides the day (menrfiVs, ^ecn/jn^pivo?), or the lime the Greeks called crraSepov ^/xap, when the day apptiars st.ition- ary, or evenly balanced. It may be also said that ibe Hebrew dual denote- not only what includes two things, but likewise what is exactly fce/ioeen two things. As for e.^ample, w^S C^iHn I S:im. xvii. 4, 23, an epithet applied to Goliath. It is the dual of "3 , as though we should say, a man of betweens. The LXX. have well rendt-red it 6 ainjp 6 ^eaaioy, and the Vulgate, most absiu'dly, vir spurius. It denot<-s one who comes out, as a champion, in the middle space between two armies, like Homer's eiri jrToAe'p.oto yei^vpjj, the bridge, or ridge, of the battle. The Hebrew and the Syriac ascribe number to these prepositions, and to this mode of conceiv- ing is also due the double use of "p-, as in Gen. i, 4, '*6«- ivaeen the light and between the darknes-;." The ^nSE , thus regarded, was a dividing, meridional line to the ark itself. It very probably served, also, as a means of kuowing the astronoraiciil meridian, when the solar light fell perpendicular, showing tlie noon, or the shadows falling in the line of the ark's longitude,holped to ascertain the course. The same information might have been ob- tained from observing the line of stars that appeared through it at night. In this way it may have imperfectly answered Borae of the purposes of a dial, or chronometer, and of a eomp;i^. Such a view will not appear extravagant, when we bear in mind that the observation of the stars for lime purposes, annual and diurnal, was peculiar to the earliest periods, ami that the very names now Lriven to the constella- tions are lost in the most remote antiquity. The necessity of some such guide for the year and its seasons, made these early men more familiar with the actual aspect ot the heav- ens than many in modem times who learn astronomy solely from books. The "inS was evidently something different from the '"iSn, also rendered window. Gen. viii. 6. We need give ourselves no difficulty about the covering of the ■*n3 , when it rained. Noah, doubtless, found some method for that purpose, whenever it was needed. The Vuliiate rendering of Gen. vi. Ifi, comes the nearest to the vi(?ws stated, although it does not exactly express them : Fenos- tram in area fades, et in cubito consummabis summitalem tiu-u— T. L.1 /^ vah, is about to bring a flood upon the earih, but at the same time to make a covenant of sahatiou with Noah. bl35 from b:^ or biZ, to undulate, t4 swell — an antique word, used expressly for the waters of Noah (Is. liv. y), and which, out of Gene, sis, occurs only iu Ps. xxix. 10." Keil. Therefore Keil and Delitzseh take for its explanation the words that follow : " waters upon the oaith," regarding H as in apposition. Knobel, again, explains it ag meaning the flood of water, whilst Michaclis and others have changed D'^a into c^^a (from the sea) without any ground, although in this conformation of all collections of water to make the flood, the co-operation of the sea comes into account. The di- vine destination of the flood : to dedi-oi/ every living thiiig under the heaven. In a more particular sense: whatever if upon the earth. The sea-animals cannot be destroyed by water. In respect to them, more- over, the symbolical relation in which the beast? stand to men, does not come specially into considei ation. — But with thee -will I establish my cov enant. — r''i3, Sept. Smdijicr;, Vulg. fadus, in tht New Testament, testamentum (Rom. ix. 4). The re- ligious covenant-idea here presents itself for the flrst in literal expression ; although the estabUshment of God's covenant with Noah presupposes a previous covenant relation with Adam (Gen. ii. 13; iii. 13; Sirach xvii. 10). In the repeated establishment of the covenant with Noah (ch. vi. 18; viii. 21 ; ix. 9 ; vers. 11, 16; Sirach xliv. 11), with Abraham, ch. XV. 18; xvii. 9-14; xxii. 15; Ps. cv. S-10 ; Sirach xhv. 24 ; Acts iii. 23 ; vii. 8), with Isaac (ch. xxiv. 25), with Jacob (ch. xxviii. 13, 14), with Israel (Ex. xix. 6; xsiv. 7; xxxiv. 10; Ileut. v. 3), there are unfolded the different covenants, or covenant foiins, which bring into revelation the ground-idea of the covenant between God and humardty in .\dam, whilst they arc, at the same time, anticipatory repre- sentations of that true covenant-making which is reaUzed in the new covenant of God with believing humanity through Christ (Jer. xxxi. 32, 33 ; Zach. ix. 11 ; Matt. xxvi. 28 ; 2 C.r. iii. 6 ; Heb. vi. 17, 18), and which finds in the perfected kingdom of God its last and conclusive development (Ucv. xxi). The covenant of Goil with Noah, and that with Abra- ham, form a parallel ; the first is the covenant of I compassion and forbearance made with tlie new hu- i inanity and earth in general ; the last is the covenant of grace and salvation made with Abraham and his l>'iieving seed, as a more definite covenant-making on the ground of the Noachian covenant. The pa- triarchal covenant which, iu its specialty, embraced Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Ex. iii. 6) as the cove- nant of promise, takes the form of a law-covenant for Israel ; this latter is the old typical covenant in the form of an anticipatory representation of the new covenant, and which, therefore, as the older and more imperfect, must give place to the new ; where- as the covenant with Noah and that with Abraham, as beginnings of the covenant of faith, become one, finally, with the new covenant of Christ, which, in its stricter sense, embraces the children of faith as partakers of salvation, but, in its wider sense, the children of men as called to salvation. But the cov- enant of Christ carries on the foundation covenant made with Adam to its perfect realization in the eter- nal covenant-life of the new world (Rev. xxi). The revelation and recognition of the divine covenant rests on the revelation and recognition of the fad that God, as the absolute personality, placs himself 300 GENESIS. OK THE FIRST BOOK OB MOSES. in a personal, ethicMlIy free, covenant-relation of love and tiiiib to man as personal, and to the human race. That the covenant of (jod has its root in the personal relation is evident from the fact that in its diflerent forms such covenant ever goes out from a pei-son, as from Noah, Abraham, etc. Therefore it is, that ever within the universal covenant relations, as they widi-'n from the centre out, there are tlie making of special covenants, such as that with Moses, with Phineas (Numb. xxv. 13), with David. It is a con- Bequenee of the etldcal signiticance of God's cove- nant as forming the personal foundation of the cH-sen kingdom, that the a^saults of the kingdom of darkness are in like manmr comprehended as covenants or conspiracies against God (the troop of Korah, Ps. ii. ; Ixxxiii. 6; Luke xxiii. 12; Acts iv. 27). The word !^''"^3 from r^S, to cut, divide, is derived from the sacritices of animals that are cut in twain in the formation of a covenant ; and in this is tlie peculiar explanatiou of the word, Gen. sv. 10, 17. — And thou shalt come into the ark. — God makes his covenant personally with Noah, but there is included also his house, which lie represents as paterfamilias, and with it the new humaiuty medi- ately, as also, in a remoter sense, the animal world that is to be preserved. " The narrator supposes that the beasts of themselves (as is held by Jarelii and Aben Ezra), or at the instigation of God (ac- cording to Kimchi, Piscat.), would come into the ark." Knobel. Rather was it through an instinctive presentiment of catastrophe, which was, at the same time, God's ordering and an impulse of nature. The collection of the provisioning is distinguished from the gathering of the beasts, so that the ark repre- sents a perfect economy of the Noachian household. Noah's obedience in faith makes the conclusion of the section (see Ileb. xi. 17). 3. 77ie approach of tfie Flood, and iJie Divine Direction to JS'oak for cntcrifui into the Ark (ch. vii. 1-9). And the Lord said unto Noah. — Here Elohim appeals as the covenant-God; therefore is he named Jehovah. — Come thou into the ark. — The signal of the approaching judgment. Enter, my people, into thy chamber (Is. xxvi. 20) for thee have I seen righteous / Jn the divine forum of the judg- ment of the deluge, Noah is justified before God by means of the righteousness of faith through the word of the promise ; therefore is he saved, together with his whole family, because his faith is imputed for their pood. — Before me (Heb. before my face) denotes the divine sentence of justification.. — In his generation, denotes the 0|iposite sentence of God against that generation. — Of every clean beast — by sevens. — This appointment is a special carrying out of the more universal one, ch. vi. 20 ; it is, theie- fore, wholly in correspondence with the advancing prophecy, and not in contradiction of it, as Knobel thinks. Of the unclean beasts it says, " by two, a male and a female ; " according to the analogy of this expression, the number seven (as used of the clean beasts) would denote also the numbei' of indi- viduals (Calvin, Delitzsch, Keil, and others), not seven pair (Vulgate, Aben Ezra, Jlichaelis, De Wctle, Knobel). The prescription, therelore, is three pair and one over. This one was probably de.'^tined for % thank-ofrcring. " The distinction between clean and unclean beasts is not fir.st nuidc by Moses, but only becomes (ixod in the law as correpponding to it, though existing long before. Its beginnings reach back to the primitive time, and ground themselves OD an immediate conscious feeling of the human s])i- rit not yet clouded by any un.iatural and ungodly cul. ture, under the influence of which feeling ii sees in many beasts pictures of sin and corruption which fill it with aversion and abhorrence." Ke I. But such a distinction, so grounded, might make an analogous division a permanent law tor Christendom. The contrast of clean and unclean cannot, surely, have here the Levitical sigiuficauee. More to the purpose would be the contrast of beasts tame and wild,^-of beasts that are utterly excluded from the society of men, and roam about independent oT them, altliougb this contrast is limited by the physiological concep- tion of cleanness and uucleanness (see 13f.litzs(H, p. 25(5). The interchange of the divine names Jehovah and F'ohira in our section makes trouble, as might well inferred, for the documentary hypothesis (sea Ke. p. 94, and the opposing view of Delitzsch, p. 256). — For yet seven days. — After seven days must the flood break out; there is appointed, there- fore, a week for the njarehing into the ark. — Kain upon the earth forty days and forty nights. — This is more widely expresseil, ver. 11, where the phenomenon of the deluge is referred back to its original cause, the breaking up of the fountains of the deep. — And Noah was six himdred years old. — According to ch. v. 32, he was live hundred years old at the beginning of his married hfe. The 120 years, theretbre, of cii. vi. 3, go back beyond this, — And Noah went into the ark That the members of Ins household went in with him, denotes their connection with him in obedience, and in their fitness to be saved; with which the behavior of Lot's sons in-law, and of Ids wile, forms a contrast. That the beasts follow him into the ark, shows a wonderful docility proceedmg from their instinctive presentiment of the catastrophe. [Note on the Bible Idea of Covenant. — It is a most important remark of Dr. Lange (p. 299), that "The revelation and recognition of the Dirine Covenant rests on the revelation and recognition of" the fact that God, as the absolute personnliti/, places himself in a personal, ethically free, covenant- relation of love and truth to man as j)crsonal, and to the human race." It is strange, indeed, that our philosophy should have so overlooked the glory of this covenant-idea, whilst our more ordinary worldly literature has so often treated it as a narrow dogma- tic of an almost obsolete theology. God raised man above the animal by endowing him «ith moral, ra- tion.al, and religious facidties. This lifts him above the plane of nature, and prepares him lor a still higher relation. His Creatcjr makes a covenant with him as being, though finite, a supernatural person- aUty. He is placed upon higher ground than that of natural law, or natural right, as deduced from man's relation to the universe, or what might be called the uinvcrsal nature of things. He is lak' n out of this, and raised to a higher s]iiritual glory. No longer an animal, however richly endowed, yet l.jound in the chain of cause and eflect, but under the free law of the promise, — living not by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth from the Lord. Child of dust as he is fihysically, God makes a covenant with him, and thus gives liini more tlian a natura. right, — a legal or forensic tight — making him a son, an heir of glory and immortality. Man has an un- derstanding with his M.'tker ; he is elevated to a platform on wliieh the finite and infinite pt r>onality, the finite and infinite intelligence, converse together, and become parlies in the same voluntarv, spiritua transaction. True it is, that in the Bible even naiu CHAP. VI. 9— VII. 9. 301 ral law is sometimca calleil a covenant, aa in Jcr. xxxiii. 20, 25, but in such eases ihe language i« evi- dently figurative, and derived, by way of analoj;y, from "the higher idea. With man it is a real cove- nant, a convening, or coming together, of tlie Divine and human mind. The transaction belongs to a higher world. It brings in a higher class of ideas. In nature, and natural relations, there are forces, gravities, attractions, affinities, or, as we approach Its department of life and sentiency (tUo. gli still na- ture), there are appetites, instincts, susi -ptiljilities, having some appearance of freedom, yet itill Ijound fast under the fatality of cause and ettt-ct ; in the covenant, on the other hand, there are parties, prom- ises, agreements, oaths, conditions, imperatives, ful- filments, forfeitures, penalties, rewards. In the ten- dencv of our modern ethics to become converted into a system of physics — making all duty to consist in the study and observance of natural law — we lose sight of this higher glory of positive law, covenant, or promise ; we fad to see how it is tlie very dignity of the human soul, that, unlilce the animal, it can, through faith, be in this forensic or covenant rela- tion to the universal Lawgiver. The opposite of this is the tendency, now so common, to place the relations between God and man on the general basis of " the nature of things," and to determine the hu- man place tlierein as made out by science or philo- sophy, in distinction from, if not in opposition to, that expresn revelation winch is itself a carrying out of the covenant-idea. When carefully examined, the former process will be found to be a tracing of man's obligation to the universe, rather than to (!od the free, personal, sovereign lawgiver of the universe. The word covenant is not in the first three chap- ters of Genesis, but the spirit of the word is there, and the term itself is expressly predicated of the transactions there recorded when referred to in other parts of the Old Testament ; see Hos. vi. 7. Imme- diately after the inspiraiion that made the human creation, we find this language of con-venmg, of nm- tual intelligence, showing that God is now speaking to a supernatural being, and in a style different from that which had been used in the commands to na- ture The expression Ti^^a nx Tiapn Gen. vi. 18, " I will establish MT covenant, 7(nX laith thee" (literally, I will make it stand), evidently implies something preceding that had been impaired — the raising up of something that had fallen down. It was the cbi" n^^a of Is. xxiv. 5, or coiienant of eternitij, originally made with man as an immortal being, and itself an e^adence of his designed immor- tality ; or, as it may be rendered, world-covenant, intended to last through the world or Eeon of human- ity ; or it may have that still higher sense of the covenant made " before the foundations of the world " with him who was to be the second Adam, and whose delight, during the aeons of creation (see Prov. viii. 31), was " with the sons of men " who were to crown it all. The remarks of that profound critic and philosopher, Maimonides, on this expiession, are very noteworthy. He regards r^na as, from its very form, in the construct state (Vike n'^'J^X"]), and where there is no other expressed, the word with which it Ig in regimen is clsis or 2''B.^" , being thus equiva- lent to CTlbi' r"'n3 , the covenant of eternities, "because, before we were, he commanded that it ghould stand, Oipru;, and be forever with the •igbteeua." The word r'^^a has been derived from the sens* of cutting in X"i:, as Lange explains it, but there i< another verb of cutting (m:) usually join.d with it making the common phrase exactly like the Uomerij opKta Tiatiitv, derived, doubtless, from the same ides of dividing the victim by whose death the covenani was made. It is better, therefore, to derive it, ai Maimonides seems to do, from the creative sense of X12. It is making anew thing in the moral and spiritual world, as the physical creations were in the world of matter ; and so, says this Jewish commen- tator, ^rx"" laa 'irna, "my covenant, as it were, my creating." There is no religion without this idea of a person- al covenant with a personal God, and, therefore, all such views as those of Comte, Mill, and Spencer are, for all moral or religious purposes, wlioUy atheisticaL They acknowledge no personality in God ; they can- not u-e the personal pronouns in speaking of him or to him. It may, in truth, be said that all reliyion ia covenant, even when religion appears in its mo.st per- verted form. It has some appearance of being in the very etymology of the Latin word. Cicero makes it from relego — reliyiosi ex relegendo — but a better derivation would seem to be from religo, to bind, bind back, — religio is a positive bond (higher than nature) between straving, fallen man, and hia ILiker. We find traces of this iilea of covenant even m the heathen religions, as in n"i3 h~_- Baal beritli, mentioned Judg. viii. 33, whom the children of Is- rael, in their apostasy, took uistead of their covenant Jehovah. It seems to characterize certain peculiar epithets which the Greeks attached to Ztil?, their supreme God. It was the moile they took to inti- mate more of a personal relation between the deity and the worshipper than was afforded by the general or merely natural view. Or it denoted a greater nearness of the divine in certain pecuiiarly sacred re- lations which men held to eacdi other, as though im- parting to them a more religious sanction. Thiw Zei/i JeVios, who calls specially to account for the violation of hospitality. More closely still suggest- ing the idea of the Hebrew covenant God, or tliat of the Phoenician Baal berith, is the Greek epithet Zfi/t opKios, Zeus, the God of the oath, as the special pim- isher of perjury, or violation of covenant, whether as ag.ainst himself, or as a breach of covenants raeE m.ake with each other, as though there were a special guilt in it, greater than that of any naturd injustice, or ordinary impiety. The very essential idea of the oath itself is that of covenant, and it is, therefore, that part of religion to which our politico-natnralista exhibit the most deadly opposition. The same idea may be traced in other epithets, such as Zf us fToiptios, the God who avenges treachery to friendship, ca though the obligation of fidelity were grounded on a special and mutual relation to something higher and more positive than mere human likings. Similar to this Zetis e'cpetTTios, the protector of the hearth. So also Ze'vs epK-6ios (Jupiter Herceus), the God of the family enclosure, or of the sacred domestic relaticna, as founded on positive institution, transcending any mere natural or individualizing rights that may ba claimed against it. These precious ideas are akin to tliat of covenant as the everlasting groimd of the church. The divine covenant, the DSiJ r''~a. was confirmed with Noah, to be transmitted by hira as the root of all that is most sacred in the rnlatioiu of man to God. or to his fellow-men. — T. I- 1 802 GENESIS, OK THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. DOCTEINAI, AJtD ETHICAL. 1. The flood makes a division between the .idamic antiquitj- aud the primitive time — between the first (throughout symbolical) and the second svmbolical- traditioual primitive religion, as well as between the anomi.'Uic aud the aomistic or superstitious lurms of heathenisin. In Uke mannT is there a division be- tween the old (antediluvian, antiquity and the post- diluvian or the Noachian human race It is a type of the historical incisions, epochs, and periods that follow. 2. The flood was indeed a sin-flood (Siini^lut), or rather, a flood of judgment, and as the first world- historical-judgment, it was a type of all following judgments, a«pecially of the world's last judgment. 3. The flood is a synthesis of judgment and de- liverance, forming a type for every following synlhe- eis of judgment and deliverance, especially for the double effect (of juiigmcnt and deUverance) of the exodus of the oliildreu of Israel from Egypt — for the middle point of the world's history, the cross of Christ, and for the final deUverance brought out by the final judgment at the world's end. To the judg- ment by water corresponds the judgment by tire as the higher potency of judgment; to the baptism by water corresponds the baptism by fire as the second potencv, or the power of baptism for salvation. Thus the judgments are deliverances, inasmuch as they separate the salvable from the lost, or incura- ble; and so the salv,ations arc judgments, inasnmch as they are ever connected with some separation of this kind. 4. The universal tradition, atnong men, of the great flood, and its ethical significance, stands in connection with the universal expectation of human- ity that at the world's end there will be a world- judgment. 5. The flood at the same time fact and symbol. See the previous remarks. No. 3. f Tiie meaning of the name Noah. See the Exegetical annotations. No. I. 7. Tlie announcement of the flood, or the whole- some destruction, as a means of salvation from the incurable corruption. "The end of aU flesh," not so much a judgment of condemnation as a remedy again-t it (see 1 Pet. iii. 19 ; ch. iv. e,). Tlieieby does the expression : " the end of all flesh," denote the fact that the immanent judgment of natural cor- ruption ha." for its consequence the positive judg- ment. "Wherever the carcass, there are the eagles gathered together." 8. The right bi-lief in the judgment is, at the same time, a belief in the diliverance. A presentiment of the flood and a preparation of the ark went together. 9. The ])lan of the ark was imparted to Noah by God. The Spirit of (iod is the author of all ideal or pattern forms of the kingdom of God. So, for ex- ample, the tabeinacle, or ark of the testimony. — The building of the ark was not merely a means ot salvation for Noah and Ids race, but also a .sermon of repentance for his cotemporaries. \<>. The ark was not a .ship (in forin\ but yet it was the piimilivc ship of humaiiity ; Goil'fl teaching men navigation, hi« word of blessing upon il, and a qrmbol of deliverance in all perils of the deep. 11. Noah was not only saved, but also the savior or the mediator of the divine salvation for liis house. He wae a type of Chris', the ab.solnte mediator. 12. Noah was comprehended with his honsehold Id the (lue baptism of the flood. Already in Noah's history there conspicuously appears the theocratij significance of the household (Matt. x.). 13. The religion of revelation is alone the r^ gion of covenoit. It alone has the idea of the vaj-'> nant. On this grand and peculiar feature, compare BtCHSER's " Concordance," art. Bund. But it is a covenant religion because it is the religion of a per- sonal Gcid, and of his relation to personal men (see the Exegetical annotations. No. 2). Here we are reminded of the covenant-theory of Cocteins. The divine covenant la truly a divine instituting, not merely a contract (n^"l3 ir: he gave a coeeimnt); but this instituting is also a covenanting. IIV Mil- erate the personal ethical relation betwten the ptrsorud God atid personal man, when we '■bliteraie the coee- naiit idea. This has special force in respect to the sacraments of the covenant. Through them man re- ceives the promises of God, which he appiopriates along with the obligations of the faith. This applies to the tree of life given to Adam, to the rainbnw of Noah, to the stars of heaven as shown to .\hraham, and to circumcision, to the passover of Mose.«, as well as to the Christian sacraments. When we have out of view the obhgations of the covenant, as, (or ex- ample, that of tiie initiation of children in baptism, we profane the covenant (compare Baumuakten, p. Iii9). 14. The difference between the chan and the un- clean animals (see the Exeget. aimnt.). The con- trast between the cattle and the wild beasts is not the only thing determined, but, at the same time, the eonlra.st between an animally purr, aud an animally impure, physiologically-physical, disposition (>ee Lanoe's Leben Jesu, vol. ii. p. 662). Con ectly does Keil remark (ji. 262), that the reception by pairs of " all flesh " into the ark, may be reduced to a certain relativity. The measure, however, of this relativity cannot be particularly determined : for the suppo- sition of EiiKARn (p. 85), that the beasts of the field that were upon the eartli after the flood did not come out of the ark, but were originated anew by God, has no support in our history. HOMILETICAl AND PRACTICAL. See the Exegetical notes, and the Fumlainental Theological Ideas. The great flood as a miraculous sign of (iod : 1. In nature, as pointing back to the cre- ation, and forward to the end and renovation of the world. 2. In the world of man ; pointing backward to the fall, forward to the last apostasy. 3. In the sphere of thetlivine righteous government ; a copy- ing of the first judgment of death, a pn figuration of the end of the world. 4. In the kingdom of grace; pointing backward to the first deliverance ill the fiisl judgment, forward to the completed salvatijn in the complete and fin il judgment - — The world if that day an oliject of displeasure in the eyes of (r..d. — Noah's righteousness of faith. — Noah, .-tanine alone in the generation of his day. — In the time M greatest corruption, there are the chosen of Goa— Noah comprehended with his house. — A witness ibr the signifieance of the family in the liingdoin of (iod and in the Chuich. — The covenant of (iod with Noah in its significance, and the unfolding of this covenant. — The covenant of God with Noah a cove- nant ot salvation lor himself and his house, and for the fircservalion of the human race, 'flic direction for litiilding llie ark, or the sacred archetypes of the kingdoiri of (iod. — The ark in its figurative .signifi cance: 1. An image of a house consecrated \i, liod. CHAP. VII. 10-24. Mi I. of the Church of Christ, S. of the Christian state. —As the ark Heats on iu the great flood, so does the jhip of ^he Chureli sad on amid tlio storm-judgments of the \»orld's liisti ry. — As tlie arli never goes under, iO never sinlss the Cliureh. — The ark a sermon; 1. In its own linie, 2 for all times, 3. for the last times, and especially, 4. for our times. Ham, too, was in the ark, so also the unclean beasts (in oppo- Bition to the Donatist extravagances). — In the one person, Noah, were both his house and his future race delivered ; therefore is Noah a type of Christ (s. V. 18): "Go thou into the ark," thou and thine bouse, that is, thy sons. Noah as the middle mem- ber of the line between Enoch and Abraham (with reference to Hib. .xi.). — The distinction between the pure and the impure animals, or, that which is proper for an offering to God is also proper for tlie enjoy- ment of men. — How the instinct of safety brings to- gether man and beast into the asylum of deliverance. — Through death to life. — The judgment of God on the iiist world In its still enduring efficacy : 1. as a sign of light for the understanding of the course of the world; 2. as an everlasting sign of warning; S. ai a sign of salvation full of the blrssing of salva- tion. The humanity baptized to humaneness. The heart iu the covenant of Elohim is the covenant of Jehovah. Through faith is humanity saved. Starke, ch. vi. 9 : The ground of Noah's piety was grace on the side of God, ver. 8, but this was obtained, in no way, through his chastity, as the Papists allege, on account of which he remained five hundred years unmarried. Grace went before all his works. On his side, faith in the Messiah was the ground of piety — faith in the God . f tht prumise, and his word of prondse. He proved it iu fort ways: 1. He was possessed by a holy fear, in «hiek he held for true the threatening of (iod in re.^peei to the flood, although the event was yet far ott'; 2. he prepared the ark according to the divine command, although he had to contend with the ridicule of the Cainites on account of tlie judgment being so long delayed ; :i. he preached righteousiie.ss to others (2 Pet. ii. 5^, whilst, 4. he himself walked irreproach- ably.— Noah walks with God. — What God says to Noah has three parts ; the first is the announcement of the flood, the second the command to build the ark, tlie third a promise relating to the preservation of his life. Lisco : Noah's life deliverance includes in it that of the whole human race; to this also does the cov- enant of God with Noah have relation in its widest sense. — Calwer, Handbuch: Noah, with tho.se that belong to him, is to bring from the old into the new world, not merely naked life, but the pure worship of God, to which the offerings pertained. — SiHRiiDKR, v. 13 : God speaks to Noah in his relation to him as creator and preserver. And so his covenant with him has in view the whole human race. The whole of creature-life is embraced in this voyage from tlie old to the new world. Calvin, ch. vii. 6 : Not without cause is the statement of Noah's age repeated ; for among other faults of old age, it renders men sluggish iind obsti- nate ; therefore Xoah's faith comes more clearly into view, in the fact that even at sucn an age it did not fail him. SECOND SECTION". 3%« Flood and the Judgment. Chapter VH. 10-24. 10 And it came to pass after seven days [literally, seven of days] that the waters of tlie flood 11 were upon the earth. In tlie sixth liundredtli year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep 12 broken up,' and the windows '^ of heaven were opened. And the rain' [oca, heavy rain, 13 imiier, cloud-bnrsting] was upon the earth forty days and forty nights. In the selfsame dav' entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife, 14 and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark. They, and every beast' after his kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon 15 the earth after his kind, and every fowl after his kind, every bird of every sort. Anrf they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh wherein is the breath of 16 life. And they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God had com- 17 manied him ; and the Lord shut him in. And the flood was forty days upon the earth , 18 and the waters increased and bare up the ark, and it was lift up above the earth. And the waters prevailed, and were increased greatly upon the earth; and tht forty days denote the full develop- ment of the flood, which lifted up the ark and set it in motion. The advance of the flood is measured by reference to the arli. It is lifted up ; it is driven on. With the waves she sails, and over the high hills. The last is said in a general acceptation, as a meas- urement of the height of the flood by the height of the hills. The estimate that seems to be expressed by saying, " fifteen cubits did the waters prevail over the high hills," would neither give sense if taken lit- erally, since the high hills have very difl'erent heights, nor could it mean that the flood was fifteen cubits above the highest mountain on the earth. But since now Noah could hardly have sailed directly over the highest mountain of the earth, much less have known the fact, we must suppose that this exact estim.rte was imparted to himself, or to some later writer, through direct revelation — an idea wliich is little in harmony with the true character of a divine revela- tion. We must, therefore, suppose that the epic- symbolical view according to which the flood rose high over all the mountains of the earth, becante conuected with the tradition that Noah found out the measure denoted, by some kind of reference to the mountain on which the ark settled. Knobel : " The representation may amount to this : since the ark drew about fifteen cubits water, its first settling on Ararat in the falling of the flood would give that measure. The 160 days, within which the de- struction was accomplished, include the forty days of .storm at the liegiuning. According to eh. viii. ■!, the rain continued all through these 150 days Still must we distinguish iis more moderated continuance from the first Sturm of rain in the fcjrty days.'' In respect to the universality of the flood, see Kcil, whose judgment about it is similar to that of Ebrard,- whereas Delilzseh is unwilling to insist upon it as an article of faith, especially the geographical univci- aality (p. 2G0). Compare the preceding Section. DOCTEINAI, AND ETHICAL. 1. The threatenings of God are as certain as his promises ; for God's word is certain. As sure, how- ever, as is the word of God, so sure is faith in its holy fear, its holy confidence and joy. 2 As God has provided hcl|) and deliverance for men by means of exposed infants, or Bhandoncd oipbans, so also through old men, as in the case of Abraham, Moses, Noah. The like wonders happei in all times. 3. Wiien the necessity is grealt^t, then is th4 help at the nearest, and the highest. When sin (and the flood) become most powerful, then grace, and the miracles of grace, become most mighty foi dehverance. 4. The safe embarkation of a little world in the ark before the breaking out of the flood. A won- derful instinct, a still more wonderful procession, a wonderful peace as the consequence of a wonderfu' terror. 5. The animal-world in the ark, type and symbol of the animal-world in general: the mention oi' man and woman, man and wife, presents prominently the fact that the ark was to become the point of depart- ure for new generations. 6 Jehovah shut him in. — The innermost motive for the salvation of every living thing is God's cove- nant with his own. Christ is here the head and sta' of history. 7. The ark, with its souls, in the waters of the great flood (sintflut), which was at the same time a sin-flood (siindflut), a destroying flood of wrath and judgment ; in like manner Moses in the ark upon the Nile, and Christ on the cross and in the grave. — There are moments in which the kingdom of God seems lost, or in the most fearful peril, and yet is it all the more securely hidden and protected in the truthfidness of God himself, in the everlasting love he has for his people. 8. The terror of judgment in the flood immensely great, and yet not equal to the terror of the last judgment-day (1 Pet. ill. 4). 9. The waters of the flood as a symbol of the judgment of redemption, of the baptism at the world's end, and generally, of the passage of believers with L'hrist through death to life (Ps. Ixix. 77), is to be distinguished from the waters of the sea as the symbol of peoples and nations, their births and rev- olutions, as compared with the kingdom of God (P» xciii ; Dan. vii ; Rev. xiii. 1). It). The most fearful sorrows are measured by comparing them with the height of water in the flood, and the hardest days of sorrow are reckoned as the days of the deluge. 11. The symbolic of the forty days. Four is the number of the world, ten the number of the con' plcted development. It therefore denotes the fulncak of the world-times, and of the world's judgment. 12. God's dominion as great as God himself. HOMELETICAI, AND PRACTICAL. See the preceding — The embarkation into th« ark. — .Jehovah's shutting in. — Tiie measured deepa of terror, the numbered days of trouble. — The ark as the cradle of the new human race rocked by the bil- lows: 1. a frail dicst, an infinitely precious content, 2. fearfully threatened, securely protected ; trem- bling in the deep abyss of waters, lifted high on the wave of consecration. — The help of God in the floods of distress. — The watery grave : I. deep for the liu- mim eye ; not too deep for the eye of God. — The sea, too, sliall give up her dead. — Noah's faith ; its grand- eur: as in contrast, 1. to the universal apostasy, 2. to the impending judgment, 8. to its once great task and labor, 4. to the sport of the woi-ld, 5. to the terrors of the flood, 'J. to the roirors of the «ni CHAP. Vm. 1-19. 301 mal world incloseii with him — the ark a lion's den. — Noah in the floating; ark, and Moses. Both, though seeming lost, preserved for the greatest things. Starke; As God suffered the waters to increase iradually, so Iiad tlie ungodly time for repentance; a thing which may, perliaps, have happened in the case of many, so that tlie soul was saved in the de- struction of the flesh. According to tliis, it would be false what the .lews say of the men who perished in the flood, tliat tliey have neither part in the eter- nal life, nor in the resurrection of the dead, — a con- clusion wliich they draw from an improper interpre- tation of ch. vi. 3. It may be easily believed that the fish in great part died, not because the waters were seething hot, as the Rabbins say, but because, with the fresh water, there mingled itself the salt, which is contrary to the nature of many kinds of fish. Lisco : God .shut Noah in ; so was the pressure into tlie ark prevented as against the godless, whilst Noah was made safe. GsKi^CH : The clean beasts. Before their use as food they were offered in sacrifice, devote'i to God ■ partly because in each enjonuent thanks should b« offered to God, and p^irtly because thereby even the enjoyment itself becomes sanctified. C.\LWER, Bandhuch: The first jud.gment of tli« world through water, the last through fire (2 Pet viii. 6). — So sinks the old world in its grave. Jehc vah, the trusted, shuts him ia So, too, watches ovei us the shepherd of Israel, who slumbers nut nor sleepetli. — Schrodkr : There secst thou that all the words of God have the power of an oath (Val. Her- berger). — A night of death reigns over a world abandoned to its doom. Because the earth was cor- rupt, morally, the Lord destroys it — (that is, gives it up to physical corruption). So Luther. To say the fountains were broken up, and the flood-gates were opened, is a biblical mode of speech whereby is ex- pressed the fact, that the waters were not suffered to flow in their wonted manner (Calvin). — The Lord pi'eserved the ark and Noah therein as a treasur* (Verleb. Bibel). THIKD SECTION. The Ark, and the Saved and Renewed Hvmanity. Chapter Vm. 1-19. 1 And God remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the cattle that was with him in the ark ; and God made a wind to pass over the earth and the waters 2 assuaged.' The fountains also of the deep and the windows of heaven were stop- 3 ped, and the rain from heaven was restrained. And the waters returned' from off the earth continually [to go and return, aiiai "iibn] ; and after the end of the hundred and 4 fifty days the waters were abated. And the ark rested' in the seventh month, on the 5 seventeenth day of the month, upon the 'mountains of Ararat. And the waters de- creased continually imtil the tenth month ; in the tenth month, on the first day of the 6 month, were the tops of the mountains seen. And it came to pass at the end of forty 7 days that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made. And he sent forth a raven which went to and fro' until the waters were dried up from off the earth. 8 Also he sent forth a dove from him to see if the waters were abated from off the face ^ of the ground [lipH, hadbecomelight or shallow, not had disappeared, as Lange says] . But the dove found no rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him into the ark, for the waters were on the face of the whole earth ; then he put forth his hand, and took ber, iO and pulled her in imto him into the ark. And he stayed (-n»:) yet other seven days, 11 and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark. And the dove came in to him in the evening; and lo, in her mouth was an olive-leaf plucked off; so Noah knew that the 12 waters were abated from off the earth. And he stayed [bn«7 Niphal] yet other seveu 13 days' and sent forth the dove; which returned not again to him any more. And it came to pass in the six hundredtli and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from off the earth ; and Noali removed the covering 14 of the ark, and looked, and behold, the face of the ground was dry. And in the second 15 month, on the seven-and-twentieth day of the month was the earth dried. And God 16 [Elohim] spake unto Noah, ."iaying. Go forth of the ark, thou, and thy wife, and tliy 17 sons, and thy sons' wives with thee. Bring forth with thee every living thing that ia with thee, of all flesh, both of fowl and of cattle, and of every creeping thing, that creep- eth ipon the earth; that they may breed abundantly in the earth, and he fruitful and 308 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. 18 multiply upon the earth. And Noah went forth, and his sons, and his wife, and hi> 19 sons' wives with him. Every beast, every creeping thing, and every fowl, and what* soever creepeth upon the earth, after their kinds, went fortli out of the ark. l» Verl— S13J'*. "E.Y. assuaged. It differs from fOn, to ebb or fail (as \ised in ver, 3). TjStt; refert tc thi quieting, or becoming calm, of the waters after the ebullition that followed their eruption from the earth, and the heavj pPlif ingof the w:iter-spoutsCLXX(caTappfltjcTaO from above. Its primary sense appears Esth. ii. 1 ; Tii.lO,nD2ir ^^TSH man the wrath of the king was calmed. So in Hiphil, Numb. xvii. 20, where it denotes the quieting of popular commotioi, I4XX. iKonaae to ii6 i^*^ • The Koranic Arabic hasil constantly |^ '^y^ ' ' ^^ S^^- The Samaritan Version (not the Hebraico- Samaritan) has the strangest of all. It sayk the ark rested on the mountains of Serendib, which is in the island of Ceylon. These various renderings are only im- portant as showing, that anciently the place was regarded as in a measure im^known and indefinite. The old transfatora did not consider themselves as bound by the Hebrew yilS to confine it to the peak which afterwards solely acquired that title. The name might have been transfc rred to Armenia, or to other countiies, just as the story of the flood itseU wa-i transferred, and loMted i 1 different parts of the earth, according to the ancestral traditions of the various migrations. The place wliere the ark i^rounded could not, at the time, have had a name to ?\oah and his j^ons, since, before this, there are nt» geogiaphical distinctions recognized in the Bible except Eden, the names of the Paradise rivers (if they are not Bubsequent). and the land of Nod, or of the wanderer, which is clearly metaphorical. It is to be tioted, that of all proper names in the Bible, there is no one that has lees of the Shemitio form than tliis word l3"1'^X . As It occurs 2 Kings xix. 37 ; Jer. li. 27, it may have been a much later transfer, just as the old Pelasgi carried certain names through Asia Minor, Greece, and even Italy, or as the early sons of Gomer tett traces of their ancestral name thiough Europe. In like man- ner the names of the old ark-mountain, like the story it'^elf, may have been transferred to different countries ; so that, i( we had nothing to guide us but the literal face of the Hebrew account, tlie direction of the ark's moving, and the place where it rested, would be as indeterminable, geographically, as the land of Nod. The Samaritan Serendib would nave as good a claim to be regarded as a right translation of l3^H5< , as the Armenia of the Vulgate, and the ^ardu (or ^arud) of the Targimas and the Syriac. The argument, however, for the region now commonly recognized, has a good support In the concurrence of the Chaldaean and Syrian traditions. — T. L.] (» Ver. 7.— ^ill'' N^S"^ 5<2i;^j. "And it went /jac^: and /ortft." The liXX., Vulgate, and Syriac, render It, " and did not return," as though they had read "2X0 Hj" . There can be, however, no doubt of the Hebrew text, fortified ns it i" by the Tnrtnims, the Samaritan Codex, and the Samaritan Version. The LXX., etc., may have derived the negative p.tr'iphni.'^ti. aly— the goini: bnek and forth being regarded as evidence that it did not re-enter the ark. Bochart, in hii Uierozoikon^ vol. ii. pp. 209. 21 u, makes a labored attempt to reconcile them.— T. L.] [• Ver. 12—" And he waiYed yet seven days." bn'*"! , as here pointed, is the regular JVipfta? of pH'' , whereas bn'"^ ▼er. 10, ha« the foim of the Hiphil of PTl or b'^H , and is bo regarded by the modem commentators and lexlcograehen fenerally. From b'^H , doluit, they get the sense of waiting anxiously, painfully. It seems strange, however, that^rher* the connection ia so precisely similar, the word should be ahsigned to two distinct roots, though they are of forms that sometimes interchange senses. It is safer, therefore, to follow the Jewish authorities, who make them both from bH^ . The fir«t, eays Rashi, is Piel (bs>E''), as though he regarded it as equivalent to bn^^l (contracted into bpl''), and tha second Hithpahel (b-TEH^ ) or briT^ » becoming by assimilation brT^*^ , like XSp f«r ^S^n*^ . Abon Ezra, however, make? the sccnnd a regular Niphal, which is to bo preferred, rfne* there Is a pasf^ive or deponent sense in the idia o( vaaiting, as is seen in the Latin moror, demoror, prvstohr ; Greek, fKSixofiat, wpo^Sexofiai. In regard to the first, it ia easy to see how bn*^ would become bn*^ (yyS-hel = yS-hel), since to the ear there is hardly any perceptible difl"erence in the pronunciation (tfie sounds ia, iya, and ya, being organically the same). So Rabbi Jndah would read b"'b''|i , Isaiafc XT. 2, S ; xvi. 7, for b^b'^" (or y^-lH for yyi-lil'), as stated by Jon;i ben Gannnch in his Hebrew Grammar (lately edited ■ riebrew), p. 28.— T. L.i CHAP. Vni. 1 19. 309 BXEOETICAL AND CBITICAL. 1. Stages of the Flood as taken in tlieir Order. i. To its highest point : 1. Seven days, the going In to the ark ; 2. f'oi-ty days of the flood-storm ; 8. one hundred and ten days, thereupon, of steady rain, and of the steady rismg of the flood — so in general one hundred and fifty days. Threefold grade of advance: 1. The ark is lifted up fiom the ground; 2. the ark's going upon the face of the waters ; 3. its rising fifteen cubits high above the mountains, b. 2o the disappearance of the waters; In the seventh mouth, on the seventeenth day of the month, that is, after five months, or one hundred and fifty days, just as the waters begin to fall, the ark rests on Ararat. On the first day of the tenth month, that is, after two months and about twelve days (Knobel : seventy-two days after the setthng of tiie ark), the mountain-peaks project* above the surface of the water. After forty days Noah opens the win- dow and lets fly tlie raven. Next goes forth the dove. It is not directly said how long after the flight of the raven was the first flight of the dove. The second fliglit of tlie dove, however, was seven other days after the first, and therelbre it is inferred that there were seven days between the fliglit of the raven and that of the dove ; the third flight, again, was seven days after the second. We must either reckon in here an unnamed portion of time, or the time between the flight of the raven and the flight of the first dove must have been longer than seven days. Hereupon follows the la.st section of time, from the first day of tlie first mouth to the seveu-aud- twentieth day of the followmg, or the period of the full drying of the earth. /« the six hundred and first year, etc. Luther, following the Septuagint, and by way of explanation, adds, " of Noah's age." 2. Vers. 1-4. The first Decrease of the flood to the Resting of the Ark upun Ararat. ' And God remembered Noah and every living thing God's remembering must be understood in an em- phatic sense. God has always remembered Noah ; but now he rememljers him in a special sense — that he may accomplish his deliverance. There comes a turn in the Hood, and the ground of it lay in the government of God. To the rule of judgment upon the human world, succeeds the rule of compassion for the deliverance of Noah and humanity, as also of the animal-world. It is his com/>assion, not simply his grace. For God remembered also ihe beasts. Thus did he remember them all, as Elohim, in his most universal relation to the enith. Had there been a longer continuance of the flood, there would not only have been want in the ark, but the ark itself would have been destroyed. A wind must blow to disperse and dry up the'flood, whilst, on the other side, the fountains of the flood were closed. With the shutting of the fountains of the drep, or with the restormg of the continental tranquillitv of the earth, and of the equilibrium of the atmosphere, there ceases also the extraoi dinary rain; and be- tides, the windows of heaven were closed. It is an inexactness of the narration, but whicli gives it an • (The Hebrew SS^: here, in Kiptial, would seem to have s more emphatic sense— bcrame dlstinctl)/ insiUe. It is an- »ther esimplc of the remarkably optic.il style of this whole Rsrrjtive. The Vuljafe beautifully rendere it, nj.parmrunt eacumina 'K^nfium. Tliey mishl have proieelet before, but now, on ;ihis day—perhaps the first clear day that afforded Noah .%n opportunity for taking an ob.serration— they stood fcrth as conspicuouB objects, iu ojien si0fu, — T. L. I unmistakable historic character, that the time of thf flood's advance is given as one hundred and fifty days, and that the pomt of time when the ark settles, and when, therefore, the actual sinking of the waters must have commenced, falls in like manner at th» end of the one hundred and fifty days. For Noah, indeed, the first turning-point in the sinking of the waters, which had commenced already before the running out of the one hundred and fifty days, could not have been a matter of observation. For'hini, the first sure sign of the sinking of tlie waters was the grounding of the ark. — And the waters- returned. — Here is the whole process preliminarily described — how the waters, in their undulations here and there, kept steadily settling more and more. Then follows the indication of the first decrease. — Upon the mountains of Ararat. — '• U'^^X is the name of a territory (2 Kings xix. 37) which is mentioned Jer. li. 27, as a kingdom near to .Minni (Arr.jenia), — probably the middle province of the Armenian terri- tory, which Moses of Chorene calls Arairad, Araratia. The mountains of Ararat are, doubtless, the mount- ain-group which rises from the plain of the .\raxe8 in two high peaks, the Great Ararat, 16,254 feet,, and the Lesser, about 12,000 feet, above the level of the sea. This landing-place of the ark is of the higliest significance for the dev elopment of humanity, as it is to be renewed after the flood. Armenia, the fountain-land of the I'aiadise rivers, a ' cool, airy, well-wati.'red, insular mountain-tract,' as it has been called, lies in the middle of the old coutment. And so, in a special maimer, does the mountain of Ara- rat lie nearly in the middle, not only of the Great African-.Vsiatic desert tract, but also of the inland or .Mediterranean waters, extending from Gibraltar to the sea of Baikal, — at the same time occupying the middle point in the longest line of extension of the Caucasian race, and of the Indo-Germanic lines of language and mythology, whilst it is also the middle point of the greatest reach of laud in the old world as measured from the Cape of Good Hope to Behr- ing's Straits — in fact, the most peculiar point on the globe, from whose heights the hnes and tribes of people, as tliey went forth from the sons of Noah, might spread themseh es to all the regions of the earth (compare Vo.n Raumer, ' Palestine ')." Keil. See also Delitzsch, p. 266. "The Koran has wrongly placed the landing-place of Noah on the hill JuJhi* in the Kurd mountain-tract; the Samaritan version locates it on the moimtaiiis of Ceylon ; the Sybilline books in Phrygia, in the native district of Marsyas. * [There is no evidence of any hill so called among the Kurd muuntiiins, or m any other region. In a note on the Koran, xi. 46, Sale regards it a^ a con-uption for Jordi, or tiiordi, but there is no trace of this in the Arabii;. In the Koran and elsewhere, wherever the Arabian tradition ^^T,i appears, it is constantly writtt-n i^«^)-^) j and is evi- dently a descriptive name from <> j. -^ . piiestanSf bontu fuit. It is. therefore, an tpitbet deuo'ti. g goodyiess, libera alihj, or viercy: |^i^*^( ^N^^ , the hill of Mercy, oi mount Mercy, as we s;iy, the cape of Good Hope. Com- pare the Hebrew appellative, Deut, iii. 25, ^lisn "n , and especially such epiti.ets as we find iu Gen. sxii. 14, '^^"?- *"'}'^"' ^''^ y ^f^T^ Jehovah Jirach, '^oxmt in vfh\c\\ the Lord appears. On Al-jude, see Herbelot, Bib. Orient 37 J. A. He calls it Gi'iuda, and finds a difficulty in locatini it, but conjectm-es it to be near a village called T/uimanin^ frum the eight persons saved in the ark, ok is si'ppo.sed.- 310 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. The Hindoo story of the flood names the Himalaya, the Greek Parnassus, as the landing-place of the de- livered ancestor.'' KnobeL Delitzsch and Keil agree in the supposition of the Armenian liighlauds. 3. Vers. 5-12. Tlie time of the Si(/ni of Ddirer- anee^ and of the increasing Hope^ from the first De- crease until the Disap/iearance of the Flood. The first sign of deliverance was the resting of the arli upon Ararat. Now it continues still until the first day of the tenth month (Tammuz), or from seventy to seventy-three days, when there appears the second eigu: the -peaks of the Armenian higlilands become visible ; at aU events, the ark, on their summit, had \)ecome free from the influence of the water. Noah, however, is not satisfied, until after forty days more, that the flood will not return; and then he opens the window fllbn) of the sky-Ught (^ns). Fresh light and air awaken, or rather gradually reanimate, the torpid animal-world, and Noah's longing desire sends forth the raven through the opened window. (It is to be remarked that the ark had only one male ra- ven, because from the unclean animals there was taken but one pair. From the staying out or return- ing of the raven Noah might, at all events, draw inferences ; but this bird is noted for his appetite, that which makes all life in the ark strive for free- dom. The raven, therefore, may be first ventured on this craving flight, since he can find food from the dead bodies left by the flood upon the moun- tains. " In the ancient world, the raven was regard- ed as a prophetic bird, and was therefore held sacred to Apollo. Something of this appears (1 Kings xvii. 4, 6) in his connection with the prophet Ehas. He was thus esteemed among the Arabians, who as- sumed to understand the voice and flight of the birds. Especially was he regaided as a prophet ol' the weather, as inferred from his flight and cry. Pliny describes him as a wild and forgetful bird,* • [This is rather from Servius, in his Note on Virg. Geor- gic. hb. i. 410, and who incorrectly ascribes it to Pliny. See Bochart, Bieroz. ii. 207. B. The idea, however, may have come from the tradition of the raven's not relumins to the ark, as the story is told in other accounts than that of the Hebrew. There was another wide-spread ancient be- lief respecting him, which is givi-n by Pliny, x. 12, by Aristotle, Hist. Nat. is. 31, and mentioned by the Rab- bins, as well as the Christian Fathers, that this liird is cruel to its young, and early ejects them from the nest before they are prrpaiod to gather food for themselves. Whether true or false, it seems lo have furnished the gnmi d for one of the most touching illustrations of the divine care for the helpless to be found in the Scriptures. See Ps. cxlvii. 9. " who giveth to the young ravens when they cry," JoD xxxviii. 41, " who providetb for the raven his fond, when his young ones cry unto God, they wander for lack of meat." The Arabians had the same tradition, and employ it in a similar illustration of the divine compa^8io^, givmg it in almost the very words of the Hebrew. Thus in averse to be found in Hariri, Seance xiii. p. 151 (Be Sacy ed.). a_Cu_f ^L^it ^i; IS " O Tbou that providost for the young raven in his nest." On whii'h the Scholiant makvg a very aiiitrular commfiit: •• When thf youn^ ravt-u," he says, " or the iiaabu, hrvnks the f'Kk', it comes uut white, wliieli so friiihteus the pa.r.inis tbttt tlioy tly f;ii away ; for the raven is the most limi'l ami cautious of birds, wheu this takes place Ah:»h sends to it the tiiih that fall into the iiost. And bo it lives for forty days, until it.s foatherr* are gi-own, and it Ijeoiiraes blark, when the pareiitn acain return to it," etc The truth or (aiw.'hood of sui-h a belief, or of the laet uf abanAi/ from b'^n,* to be in trouble, to wait painfuUy and longingly." Delitzsch. "The olive-tree has green leaves all the year through, and appears to endure the water, since Theopurastus, Hist Plant. 48, and Pliny, liiM. Nat. 13, 50, give tion the poet there attempts to give of tho animal signs ol the weather in general. It iiii^ht be a question worth studying : how far the whole scienci? of biid-divination, so prevalent in the an- cient world, may have had iis origin, like tliat of other [lerverled beliefs, in the use N'oah made of the raven and the dove in detei mining idiviuiyig, we might say) the natu- ral signs of salety for himself and the ark, and so ihe gracious signs of the divine mercy and i)ronuse. So preva- lent was tho belief and the practice, that oituvaq (.bird) in Greek becomes a name for omen, or fortune, good or bad. So the Latin aui^jiiciuin {av^sp^cn^v\)—^^\iv words uimpice^ auspicious, though tho latter is generally taken in a lavor- able sense. The Hebrew words ')313'', part. "iSI-ia, (de- noting divination by clouds,) as used Lev. xix. 2(>, Deut, xviii. 10, et ah, show tho prevalencu of a precisely t^imilai superstition, and furnish some proof of such an onj;iii, in the perversion of what weie originally holy and believing acts. Just so they perverted the luenioi^ of the laazen serpent. Tbere may, however, have been anothei", or a I nucurrent, ground of these bird-divining practices ol the Oreeks and Romans, in a jirimitivo notion that the inhab* itanis of tho ail' (tho birds of heaven, as Scripture callg tliem) were nearei- to the divine, or that from theix- sujier- eaithly position thej; may have had a 8iipe''huLmaii Mght and knowledge of things on tho earth. Comp. Jc»' ■vx\'ui, 7, "a path which no lowl Unoweth, which the eagi^'s ty* hath not seen." Also ver. 21, where of the mystercua Wisdom it is s:iid ; *' it is hid from the eyes of all liviig, ai d coi ccaled from the birds of the lu'avi;ns "— a poetical mode of »ayiug, it is l}o\ond^all hiunaii divining, or human investigatitin. — T. L.] ♦[See remarks on this derivation iu the textual not** No. t,, pagcoOS— .T. 1*1 CHAP. Vin. 1-19. 311 ui account of olive trees in the Red Sea. It comes early in Armenia (Strabo), ttioiigti not on tlie lieiglits of Ararat, but lower down, below the walnut, mul- I'frry, and apricot tree, in the valleys on the south side (R[TTER, " Geogiaphy," 10. p. 920). The dove must, therelore, have made a wide flight in search of 'be plains, and on this account have just returned at evening time. Tliis olive-leaf, — which was not something picked up on a mountain-peak, where it might have been floated by the water, but (~^-) something torn olf, and, therefore, fresh plucked from the tree, — taught Noah what was the state of things in the earth below. It was the more fitting heie, since the olive-branch was an cmblein of peace (2 Mace. xiv. 4; Dion., Halic, Virg., Liv.), and yet in the text it is not an olive-branch (.Symm , Vulg.), but only an olive-leaf." Kuobel. — -The sign gave intelligence that at least the lower olive-trees, in the lower ground, were above the water; the olive-leaf, moreover, in the mouth of the dove, was a fair sign of promise. — Yet seven other days. — This time the dove returns no more. The attraction of free- dom and the new Ufe outweighs the desire to return ; in which it is presupposed that it is an attraction which the others will lollow. " The dove is found also in the classical myths. According to Plutarch (l)e Solert. Animal, 13), Deucalion had a dove in the ark, which indicated bad weather by its return, and good weather by its onward flight." Knobel. It was, in like manner, a prophetic bird at Dodona, ac- cording to Herodotus and others ; and the ancients were also acquainted with its use as a letter-cariier, according to yElian and Pliny. On the significance of the dove in the New Testament, see the account of the baptism of .lesus. — In the six hundred and first year. — Tins reckoning completes the old life of Noah. His seventh humlred is the beginning of his sabbath-time. — In the first month, in the first day, etc. — This date looks back to the be- ginning of the flood, in the second month of the previous year, on the seventeenth day. Now Xoah removes the covering of the ark, and takes a free look around and upon the new earth. The waters, no longer flowing back, were evaporating from the earth, and the groimd was in the process of becoming dry. Yet still he waited a month and twenty-seven days, that he might not too hastily expose to injury the living seminarium of the ark, the precious seed of the new life that had been entrusted to his care. But he waited only for the clear direction. — And Noah removed the covering of the ark nos'a . Because this word is used elsewhere only of a covering made of leather and skins with which they covered the holy vessels on the niarch (Numb. iv. 8, 12), and of the third and fourth covering of the ark of the testimony (Exod. xxvi. 14, etc.), it does not follow, as Knobel supposes, that the author had in view a similar covering. The deck of an ark on which the rain-storms spent their force, nmst surely have been of as great stability as the ark itself — And God (Elohim) spake to Noah -It is Elohim, because this revelation belongs to the universal rela- tion of God to the earth. "The time of the flood, •ecording to verse 14, amounted to twelve months ind eleven days, that is, three hundred and sixty- five days, or a full solar year ; consequently in the course of one full circuit of the natural cliange or period (n:'l"), does the earth become destroyed and renewed. In the fact that Noah might not leave the »rk from hit own free, arbitrary will, there is ex- pressed his preservation of the seal of the divun counsel, and of the divine work." Baumgarten New blessings upon the creatures, similar to thos« which were pronounced at the creation, are connect' ed with Ills going forth at the divine command; it ia the beginning of a new world. " As in creation the beasts were blessed bel'ore man, so is it here.*" Baumgarten. In the beasts going out of the ark in pairs there is given to us a clear idea of the stabilitj of the new order in nature, and of the security for its continuance. [Note on the Week, and on the Seve.nth Day Observance in the Ark. — '^ And he waited seven days,^^ ver. 10. ^^ And fie waited seven other dat/s.^* Dr. Lange gives little attention to the important question connected with this language, as he passes over, with a very few remarks, the wliole question of the sabbath in Gen. i. There is certainly indicated here a sevenfold division of days, as already recog- nized, whatever may be its reasons. Of the^e, no ona seems more easy and naluial than that which refers it to the traditionary remembrance of the creation, and its seventh day of rest, although some of those who claim to be " the higher school of criticism " reject it. Had such a reference to a sevenfold division been found in some ancient Hindoo or Persian book, and along with it, or in a similar writing closely connected with it, an account of a hexameral creation with its succeeding day of rest, they would doubtless have discovered a connection between the ideas. But here they do not hesitate to violate their own famous canon, tliat " the Bible is to be interpreted like any other ancient writings." Now it may be regarded as well settled that such a division of time existed universally among the Shemitic and other Oriental peoples. (See this clearly sbowu in the article Week, in Smith's " Dictionary of the Bible.") It is a fact^ too, well established, that a similar division existed among the Egyptians, as is particiUarly stated, with the names given to the days of the week, by Dios. Cassius (Hist. Bow. xxxvii. 18). They are the names of the seven celestial bodies, and yet there are no astrononncal phenomena that could of themselves have given rise to it. It is evi- dently an after-thought. The things named must have been known before, and when the original reason of the division was lost, the planetary series was adapted to it, although it had to be taken in an irregular and disproportioned manner. This was to give it mystery and interest, and to accommodate it to the astrological superstition, which early came in, of lucky and unlucky days. The same names came into the Roman (ecclesiastical) and ."^axon calendars. They could not so readily have found place, had there not been some previous ground in the Occi- dental heathen ideas (Roman and Scandinavian), although they do not appear in classical literature. But how shall such a division be explained? The reference to the lunar phases seems plausible, but will not bear close examination. It is true that a lunation (about twenty-nine and one-half days) is approximately divisible into four parts, of nearly seven days each, but the beginnings and endings, especially of the second and fourth quartets, are so obscure, and incapable of easy determination, that it could never have been adjusted with the required practical precision to any settled weekly reckoning of definite days. Besides, in that case, the week would have had its series commence and end with the divisions of the lunation. But we find nowliera any such reckoning. The week has no reference M 312 GENESIS, OR 1 EE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. the muntli. SucU a day, of such a mouth, h in all calenJai's, but first or second week, of such a ijonth, is nowhere found. Again, there were adjustments of the months to the solar year by admitted inequalities and intercalations, but there is no trace anywhere of any sutb atteiupts to regulate the days of the week with reference to the month. A seventh portion of time computed from an ever-shifting beginning would have been of no use, or woiUd only have in- troduced confusion. The week, therefore, must have had, and did have, its reckoning from some point entirely independent of any annual, monthly, or even astronomical calculus. It must, too, have been from some remote period, fixed in itself (or supposed to be so fixed), just as we reckon our weeks from the day of Christ's resurrection, in a series continuing steadily on, though there has been, since then, repeated rectifications of the month (or moons), and even a change of style in respect to the year. The weekly series has been unbroken. The Jewi.^ih reckoning of the seven days, and of the sabbath, we know, was thus independent. In Exod. xvi. 23, we find the particular sabbath there mentioned as coming on the sixteenth day of the second montli (the day after they came to the Wil- derness of Sin), and on the twenty-third following, as reckoned without reference to any monthly or annual beginning. It comes on such a day, but computed by itself, and seems to have been thus known as something dating from some ancient, re- mote period, and kept in remembrance even during the ignorance and debasement of a servile bondage. It must have come by tradition from their patriarch- al ancestors, and was probably the same seventh day which was recognized by the Egvptians (their day of Saturn, Remphan, Hebrew ",S"3 , Arabic .\^jS'i s^6 Amos T. 26, Septuagint version, and Acts vii. 43), although with them the observance may have lost its original idea and reason, and be- come wholly idolatrous or superstitious. Therefore does Moses tell the Jews to remember, and keep it holy, calling back their minds to the primitive groimd of its institution. So Kimchi and Aben Ezra, in their comment on Amos v. 26, say " that ■1'2 (Kii/un) is the same with •'Pl2t', Sliahhut"' (Saturn, or the sabbath-god), for they made to him an image, whilst another interpretation m.akes it to be ■'rise :31S , the star of Saturn, and so is he called isle's, Khivan, in the tongue of the Arabians and the Persians." In the earliest F.gyptian mythology, as in the most ancient Greek derived from it, the dynasty of Saturn (Kp(iyos=xc<'''"s, time), or the old creative, generative power, was before that of Zf us, the light, or the Sun; that is, his day (dies .'^aliirni) was before the dies Soli.s, or, su7t-daf/, the priniiti\e dies Jovis.* So does the darkened mirror of heatlien- ism give to all these early things both a pantheistic and a polytheistic hue. Thellebrew revelation alone preserves them tiuihful, pure, and holy. The silence of the Scriptures in respect to the patiiarchal ob- servance of the sabbath, religiously or otherwise (unle.'s thin that is said of Noah be an exception), fnmi^iliea no answer to the strong inference to be derived from Kxod. xvi. and xx. See remarks on this in Note on the Sabbath, page 197. * tThis ntitr.c was also givnn to Thursday, or ruled by the planet Jugiitor, liut in the mos-t ancient niythulOKy it 'QiUDt have cudio directly after Saturn, an dies tiulia. — T. L.] The more we examine these acts of Noah, thi more it will strike us that they must have beeti of s religious jutture. He did not take such observations, and so send out the birds, as mere arbitrary acts, prompted simply by his curiosity or his impatielce. liod had "shut bun in," and as a man of faith and prayer he li oks for the divine directions in deter- mining the times of waiting. Every opening, there- fore, of the ark, and every sending forth of the birds, may be regarded as having been accompanied or preceded by a divine consultation. He " inquired of the Lord," as the Scripture records other holj men as having done. What more likely, then, than that such inquiry should have its basis in solemn re- ligions exercises, not arbitrarily entered into, but on days held sacred for prayer and rehgious rest. When this was dotie, then the other, or more human means of inquiry that were in accordance with it, would be resorted to. In this point of view, the sending forth of the raven and the dove may be rev- erently regarded as divine ausjiications. (See re- marks in marginal note, p. 310.) They immediately followed such stated religious exercises, and hence his periods of waiting would, in the most natural and appropiiate manner, be regulated by them. On any other view, his proceedings would seem wholly reasonless and arbitrary. The idea gives an interest to the life of this lonely, "righteous man," during his long sojourn in the ark. He did not forget God, nor God's ancient hallowing of a certain day in seven, and, therefore, is there the stronger emphasis in what is said ver. 1, that " the Lord remembered Noah." See Lange's most striking and beautiful remarks on this expression, p. 309. There must be reasons for such a seven-days' waiting, and what more natural and consistent ones could there be than those here staled ? It amounts to nothmg to say that seven is a sacred or mystic number. How came it to be such ? Though after- wards thus used in Scripture, there could have been nothing of this sacredne.ss at that early day, unless it had come trom the still earlier account of the cre- ation. It must have been founded on some great fact ; for, of all the elementary numbers, seven may be said to have the least of any mathematical or merely numerical interest, such as gave rise to pecu • liar specidations in the earliest thinking. "There was a mystery about the number mie, as the foun- t.iin of the infinite numerical series, or as represent- ing a point, the principium of all magnitude. Two had an interest as representing the line, and a.' the root of that most regular of all series, the binary powers. Tliree was the binditig of unity and dual- ity, and represented the triangle, the simplest or most elementary plane figure in space. Fovr (the tetracti/s of Pythagoras) represented the tetraedron, or the most elementary solid. Five was the number of the fingers on the lianil, and thus beciime the origin of the universal decimal notation. Six was tlie double triad, and so on. Hut it is not easy to find any such njalheniatical or nuineiical peculiarity in seren that could have drawn speei:d attention to it. as having, in itself, anything niystic.d or occult It is not a square, nor a power of any kind ; it is not what i< CitUed an oblong niinilier, or one that can be divided into factors. It represents no figure that, like the hexagon or pentagon, can be geometrically prodi ced. Its sacredness, or mystery, therefore, could only lisive arisen from some great historical truth, or institution, supi)osed to have been con^ nectel with it ; and if we " interpret the Hebrew CHAP. VIII. 1-19. 3ia books like other ancient writings,'' this origin could have heen no other than a belief in the grrat events mentioned Gen. i., as laying the foundation for all subsequent veneration of the hebdomadal number and period. — T. L.] DOCTMNAl AND ETHICAL. 1. The great turning. As the first half of the flood pictures especially the judgment of death, so the second half presents the redemption from judg- ment, as it goes forth in its gradual development, with its redemptive and anticipatory signs. 2. God remembered Noah. Everything (every affliction of the pious) endure.s its time ; the good- ness of God endureth forever. God's remembering in a special sense. His righteousness makes a spe- cial knowledge, and a special beholding, inside of his general omniscience and omnipotence ; so his mercy and his compassion make a special remembrance within his consciousness, wherein there are known to him all his works from the beginning. That is, God is a hving, personal God, showing himself to be such in his government, and in his revelation which makes joyful again the believers in his grace, after they had been exposed to temptation. Each deliverance, each help, especially each experience of salvation, rests upon a remembrance of God. God's remembrance of man and man's remembrance of God meet each other, as eye meets eye, in the actual manifestation of sav- ing acts. The compassion of God embraced also the animal-world, but conditions itself through the grace that embraces believing men. 3. As the spirit of God moved over the waters at the beginning of creation, so goes forth here, over the floods of the deluge, the wind that saved, as an emblem of tlie same divine spirit. It was a wind of life — a vernal wind — for the new earth. 4. As the fountains of the deep were broken up before the windows of heaven were opened, so also were they closed before them. In order that the rain might cease at Ararat, it was necessary that be- fore this the evaporation in the opposite regions of the earth should have come to an end. 5. Ararat. The home of Adam, the home of Noah. Our first home the heights of Paradise, our second home the salvation hills of Ararat, our third home Golgotha, our everlasting home the highest heavens. 6. The salvation is unfolded gradually, and an- nounced in a gradual series of saving signs : 1. The resting of the ark ; 2. the appearance of the mount- ain-tops ; 3. the flying forth of the raven ; 4. the olive-leaf of tlie dove ; 5. the dove's not returning. Thus it is that the time of deliverance is a time of patience, and of alternate desire and hope. " Blessed in hope " { Rom. viii.). 7. The raven and the dove. The sympathy and the co-opevation of the beasts in the kingdom of God. The unity of the raven and the dove, and at the same time their contrast, denotes the community of creaturely interests, as well as the contrast between the interests of the creature generally, and the king- dom of God in particular ; for the raven is a figure of the universal Ufe, the dove an emblem of the church. 8. The signs of hope increase from seven to seven Jays — an indication of the idea of the Sabbath and »f Sunday 9. " The fresh leaf from the olive-tree is the first lign of life from the buried ee* Ih. A significant sign : for the oil, as a gentle yet penetrating substance, ii the symbol of the anointing of the Holy Spirit. This is brought by that purest bird of the heavens, which even among the heathen is held sacred (see Herod. 2. 56). The green olive-leaf in the mouth of the dove is a sign that the earth is not merely laid waste (we may rather say purified), but also conse- crated by the waters." Baumgarten. And yet w« must distinguish between the symbolic sigiiificane« of the oil, of the olive-tree, and of the olive-lea£ The oil denotes the spirit, the olive-tree (Zach iv, 11-14; Rev. xi. 8, 4) denotes spiritual men, the holy Israel ; and in correspondence with this the olive- branch denotes the partakers of the spirit (Rom. xi.), the blossoms of the spirit, the signs of love and peace. 10. " If we take the human race and the earth ai a totaUty, the flood is the dividing of the old from the new. The old earth, with the humanity tliat had be- come flesh, the apxaltis koo-mos,* is destroyed, but even this destruction is the preservation of the right- eous man, of Noah, in that he is delivered from the corruptive community of the flesh. On this account is it said, 1 Pet. iii. 20, ' eight souls were saved by water,' and even there (ver. 21), the flood is named a type of baptism. The water of the flood is, there- fore, the baptismal water of the earth, which drowns the old whilst it preserves and quickens the new. This view of the flood, moreover, has passed over into the consciousness of the Church. In the prayer for the consecration of the baptismal water in the Sacranteiitarium Gregorianum it is said: Deus tjui nocentis mundi crimina per aquii& aUuens^ etc." Baumgarten. 11. As baptism makes a distinction between the old and the new man, so did the flood make a distinc- tion between the old and the new humanity, which were, therefore, types on both sides. So did the Red Sea divide the children of Israel from the Egyptians, who were droivued in the same (1 Cor. x. 2). 12. As Xoah went into the ark at the command of God, so also must he, at the same command, go out. That he was in no perturbation, did not wil- fully and hastily go forth from the ark, is a sign that we must not anticipate the hour of God's help, nor tlirow ourselves hastily out of the ark of the church in sectarian impatience, but wait the Lord's time in which to go out of the ark into a new world. 13. The renewal of the blessing of propagation upon the creature is a confirmation of the first bless- ing (Gen. i.), a repeated expression of God's good- ness, and of his complacency in life. Contrast aa against dualism and a sickly asceticism. HOMLLETICAL AND PEACTICAL. See the Doctrinal antl Ethical. The figures of the coming salvation. 1. The resting of the ark, the firmly grounded church ; 2. the emerging of ihe mountain-tops, the mountains of God as the sign of heaven ; 3. the flight of the dove, " the longing of the creature;" 4. the dove with the olive-leaf, tin spirit of life, with the announcement of peace; 5. the remaining out of the dove and the opening of * [This word Koafio^, 85 used by Peter, does not necessa- rily denote the earth as a whole. It means a former statl of things as distin^islied from the present. As employed, it has the same (generality, and ttie same limitation, a4 oiKoujuei^, when used for the inhabited world, real or sup posed.— T. L. 314 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. the ark. the free intercourse between the clmrch and the consecrated world; 6. the going forth from ihe ark, the passing over of the church into the new world. Starke : It is certain that God had not forgotten Noah ; but the Scripture is wont to speak after the manner of men, namely, as man, sometimes, repre- sents to himself God as speaking. According to this, God's remembrance denotes the revelation of his gracious will and pleasure, according to which he re- ve:ils to the wretclied that help which before was hidden (Hieronymus). A life of faith is the most difficult of all, — such a life as Noah and liis sons must have lived, who could only cling to the hope of aid from heaven, since the earth was covered with water, so as to give them no ground of trust. It was, therefore, no vain word when the Holy Spiiit says that " God remembered Noah." For it shows that from the day in which he first went into the ark, God had not spoken to him, nor made to him any revelation. He could see no ray of the divine mercy, but mu^^t sustain himself alone upon the promise he had received, wlnlst, in the meantime, the waters of death are raging all around him, as though God had indeed forgotten him (Luther). The leaf represents the gospel, for oil denotes compassion and peace, of which the gospel teaches. — Bibl. Wirt: "0, my Christian friend, hast thou been a long time confined in a wearisome ark, whether it be of some difficult calling, or some painful state ; ask not counsel ol the charniiT, but wait with patience until God, throuL'h righteous means, shall bring thee help therefrom." Gkrlach: God does, indeed, remember all his works, in all times, and in every way, but the praver "remember me" (Ps. x.xv. 7 ; Luke xxiii. 42) goes forth from the image of God in man ; and by reason of this we have no re-t until we can rejoice in all the attributes of God through an inward, personal com- munion with him. The word here denotes the trials of Noah, when God hid himself, and the enjoyment of his gracious favor, when he again revciils himself. Calwer HandOucli : The olive-leaf has been ever held as a symbol of peace. ScMRiiDKR: God had exercised Noah's faith and patience (Calvin). What is said of the raven, Luther makes to corresjiond, allegorically, with the office of the law. [" In the blackness of the raven is a sign of Borrow, and its voice is unlovely. So, therefore, are all preachers of the law who teach the righteousness of works ; they are ministers of death and sin, as Paul names the ministry of the law (2 Cor. iii. 6; Rom. vii. 10). Nevertheless, Moses was sent out wiih this doctrine even as Noah sent forth tlie raven. And yet such teachers are nothing else than ravens that fly round the a'-k, brlTiging no certain sign that God is reconciled. But wliat Moses says of the dove is a very lovely figure of the gospel."] [excdrsds on the partial extent of tiik Flood, as hkduckd from tiik very face of tiik Hebrew text." — This account of the flood fur- riehes a happy illustration of wliat may be called the Kulijrctivp. truthfulness of the Sciij>ture narra- tives. There is meant by this that the language is • perfect reprcscntati(jn of an actual, conceptual, and •fThe RTCat importance of the question, anil the fact that Dr. Lnncre fails to (nve a decided view, form the pica for the length of t!ii.'* JCx'-nrnUH. I»<'litzsch also seems undecided, though he jircHentrt Home view(« btrongly favorable to the Iheory of limitation.— T. L.l emotional state in the mind of the author By lh< author is meant the one in whose soul s'^ch emo' tions and conceptions were Hr-t present, 'rom what- ever cause, ouiward or inward, they may have been derived. Whether this was ecstatic vision, or a cerved (by some strong influence in opposition to the ordinary human tentlency) from grotesque exasgeration, from mythical indistinctness and confusion, from false em- liellishment, from interpolated deformities, from all that characierizes the story-telling, wonder-making style — and which are the spurious aihlndu, betray- ing, by all these marks of their secomlary character, that they are the far-off, dimly-seen, and monstrous- ly disproportioned impressions of what, to the scrip- • (In retpect to the first kind, the famous canon of the ration.alist, undoubtedly holds true : the Scriptures, in their human l.angu:ige, are to be interpreted as other books. When, however, it is applied to the second, orwhat may be called the theologicil ese^esis, it ignores an'l denies what is most peculiar in the Biijle as a book composed dming two thousand ye.ars, by ditlerent writers, in widely different styles, and embiacinu a vast variety of ideas, yet preserv- ing, from betantiii- to end, a holy aspect, and a relipoua unity, that no other writings jKissess, and which have given it a place in the very core of human history, such a4 no otiier book, no other literature, or literary series, can lay any claim to. Not less absurd would it be than to inter* pret Homers Iliad as an accidental or arbitrary seriea of fragmentary unconnected ballads, after the nrofoundosl criticism, grounded on the truest Homeric feeling, hal derided it to possess an epic unity and an epic harmoaj worthy of the high poetical inspiration from which it flows — f. (..1 316 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOUK OF MObES. tural nairator, iras aa oetual scene full of a. Bonl- awing and fancy-re^tiftii^ing emotion. Tlie Bible ;-tory has nothing of the wonder-mak- in<; about it. It is too full of the overpowering i-cal to allow of sueh a secondary excitement of the mind and the imagination. The emotion is too high to admit of my play of fancy. It is contemplation in its most exalted stats, having no room for anything but the great spectacle before it, and that as seen in its grandest features. Hence so calm and yet so full of animation, ?o severely chaste yet .'lo sublime. It is a telUng from the eye, and it speaks to the soul's eye of the thoughtful reader, giving the impression of an actual spectacle. The style throughout is adapted to produce such impression. It is a truthful eifect, or the narrative is to be regarded as a most skilful fiction, a most ingenious forgery, exhibiting a life-like power of painting and invention utterly in- consistent with any antiquity to which it can be ascribed. The writer or relator is one who stands in med u rebus. The awful spectacle ia present to his absorbed sense or to his vivid memory. He is startled by it to abruptness of description. Though long expected, the catastrophe is sudden in its com- ing. Torrents descend I'rom the heavens like burst- ing clomJs ; chasms are seen in the opening earth, and floods issuing from their subterranean reservoirs. A writer less interested, less awed by the actual scene, would have used comparisons here, or indulg- ed in redundancy of language. The Scripture his- torian gives it aU in one brief verse : " The fountains of the great abyss (the tehom rabba) were broken (!irp3D , were cloven), the windows of heaven were opened." The attempt to reconcile this with any scientific correctness is worse than trifling. To re- solve it into a poetical metaphor, or any rhetorical artifice of language, takes away all its emotional power. He speaks according to his conception as grounded on the state of his knowledge. He evi- dently had the old idea of waters above the tirma- mentum, now descending through the parted barrier How ill-judging the interpretation that, for any fancied reconciliation with present knowledge, would oblite- rate the marks of this precious subjective truthful- ness, so full of evidence for the great antiquity of the accoimt, and the actuality of the scene sls con- ceived and described. One all-absorbing image of power is before him. The deluge from above and the eruptions from the earth, whatever may have been their cause, have an awful rapidity of effect ; and with what graphic touches is this set forth in the vivid Hebrew idioms ! The ark is lifted clear from the c:irth C'l.Jjn br^), and goes forth (-'SP walks forth), ="sn 'jB'bs , on the face of the wa- ters. C'On !i"s;'l, the floods prevail exceedingly, IXt: "IS": , stronger, stronger — higher, higher — bij' T(lbn , ^^ go and increase" constantly waxing, graiiu.il but irresistible, steadily visible in their rise a^ me.isured by the submerged plains, the disappear- ing hills, until to the remotest extent of '.he visible horizon, 3 'HCn bx riTT, "under the vhole liea- Tens," it is water everywhere as far as eye can see, Jce vast ,sky-bounded wa.ste, shoreless and illimitable M il a|)peared lo the absorbed and wondering gaze of the one from whose sense and memory this story has come down to us. This is what he wiw, and this Is all that the interpreter can get from his language. What he may have llmuylu, we know not. He may bare supposed the flood to be universal. Probably he did so ; but then his universality must have beet a very different thing (in conception) from the notion that our modern knowledge would comiect with the term. He knew of no land that was not covered bj water ; he had been told that God meant to destroy the human race, and so far as the extent of the flood was necessary for that purpose, he doubtless suppos- ed the judgment executed.* But we have only to do, as interpreters, with what he actually saw, the laO" guage in wluch he has recorded it, the necessary con. ceiiticms which it suggests, and by which it was itself suggested. We have no right to force upon him, and upon the scene so vividly described, our modern no- tions, or our modern knowledge of tlie earth with its Alps and llimmalayas, its round figvire, its extent and diversities, so much bej'ond any knowledge he could have possessed or any conception he could have formed. It may be said that such idea of terrestrial universality is included in his words, such as "ISC earth, — "under the wAoZc heavens," C^S'm P2 nnr, — " all the high mountains under the whole hea- vens ; " but then the question arises. On what scale of knowledge are they to be interpreted ? If we say the modern, calling it the absolute sense (on the sup- position that such absolute scale has even yet been reached), then we make him a mere mechanical ut- terer of sounds whose intended meaning lay not in his understanding, or a writer of words representing, in their truthfulness, neither the emotions felt, nor the spectacle that lay before his eye. A very slight change in our English translation, and that a very justifiable one, greatly affects this impression of uni- versality. Read land lor eartli wherever the word occurs, as, for example, the ichole land, or the face of the whole land, and the scale, to our imagination, is at once reduced. Thus we actually have, in one place, oh. vii. 23, riBTX instead of ^"iS , and yet nothing is more evident than th:it in the previous chapters the first word is used of the Eden-territory and tiie region adjacent. In like manner is this word niaTX used in the account of the general corruption of the race by the intermarriages of the Sethites and the Cainites, ch. vi. 1 : " When men began to multi- ply upon the face of the adamah," rriTsn "'rs 55 . It is not only without any warrant from Scripture, but in the liice of the fair inferences to Ite drawn from its artless language, that some have regarded the antediluvian human race as spread o\er the wide surface of the earth according to our present know- ledge. Equally, too, against the impres.sion to be fairly derived from the account, is the idea of a vast population as in any way to be compared with that which has since existed and now exists. We know nothing of any physical or moral reasons that may have accelerated or retarded it. The Scripture simply .says, in its introduction t(j the account of the flood, that men began to multiply, ~~b bnn , evidentlj imjjlying that they had not been very numerous before in either line, and that the mixture and the multiplication were, at the same time, cause and effect of the corruption. The fair inference, there- fore, is, that it took jilace, together with the judgment that followeil, whilst they were yet confined to this • [DolitzHph, ttiough undecided in the main, prcj^enti the ttwioli; ease, or the whole ^-ouud of iirsunn nt for and a[rllin^t. wlu'u iio navs, page 2(>2 : ''Thi; Srnnlmc domatids the univcrs-ility of the nt)Oil, only for the earth as iuhiiiilcd, not for the earth as sucit ; and it hixs no interest in the uni- versality of tlie flooil in itnoif, but only in the univer«tlit) of the judgment of which it ifl *lie execution.'* — T. L.I CUAP. VIII. 1-19. 31', tract, whatever may liave been its extent. It was the open, easily cultivated part of the eartli (tliniigli It iiail already become sterile in the days of tlie Sethite fiamech), to which the early men in their gregaiious habits yet adhered. There had not come the roving, migrating, pioneering impulse which was first given alter the flood, and for the very purpose of breaking up the gregarious tendency whieh again manifested itself in the plain of Shinar. This reluc- tance to leave the adamah, or the old homeland of the race near Eden, shows itself in Cain's lan- guage. Gen. iv. 14 : " Behold thou art driving me forth this day, nanxn 'JQ bsTS , from the face of the adaraah, that I may become a wanderer y^XS in the (wide) eartli," as distinguished from the father- land where the protecting divine presence (T'??) was supposed still to dwell. Cain, bold and evil as be was, felt this. The thought, even though coming from his own vengeance-haunted imagination, was a terror to him, and we may rationally suppose that the feeling was still more strongly shared by his descendants, whom the account represents as Btill living near the Sethites and corrupting them by their vicinity. All great movements in the world have come from a superhuman impulse, breaking up previous habits, and strangely changing those fixed conditions of human society into wliich races, when left to themselves, .are ever tending ; sometimes even when their talk is loudest of progress and change as ever coming from themselves. The course of history is marked by such new move- ments, unaccountable in their beginning from any- thing in the previous human (which may probably have been tending strongly in the opposite direction), yet afterwards, from the very fact of sequence, seem- ing to fall inductively into the natural flow of events. At all events, if we take the Scripture text for our guide, there is no reason to believe that any of the antediluvians (with the exception, perhaps, of a few solitary rovers), had ever crossed the deserts, or ven- tured upon the seas, or scaled the mountains, or pen- etrated far into the dense wildernesses that separated the primitive adamah from the vast unknown of earth around them. We may fairly suppose, too, that it was one of the designs of the deluge-judgment to prevent a race which had so dehumanized them- selves, or, in the language of Scripture, " corrupted its way," from spreading ever the surface of the globe. But how diflferent was it when the movement came which is recorded Gen. xi. 8, whether we regard the " confounding of languages " there mentioned as the cause or the effect of the dispersion. It was, in either view, equally supernatural, or, if the term ia preferred, an extraordinary divine intervention, de- flecting the course of the human movement from what it would have been had it been left solely to the antecedent human tendency. They were settling down into the old adamah gregariousness, to be followed by the same impieties, not only (for that could be borne with), but by the dehumanizing vices that demanded extinction. " Wherefore the Lord scattered them from thence over the face of all the earth." The Hebrew verb is a very strong one, orx ys^l, "He drove them asunder" — He sent them far and wide — He broke them up. Compare Deut. xxxii, 8, Acts xvii. je. Their reluctance to leave the old home-land, like that of Cain in the ear- lier time, is shown by the same word, and that strong oaiticle \d bo expressive of caution and alarm ; xi. 4, y-ixn bs "':b br 7^23 -S, "lest we be scattered over the face of the icJinle earth " — the wide earth, the unknown, unbounded earth. We must take tb» langnage according to the fe.-ling aud knowledge ol the day. It was der itnaf)'iehhare Bann. as Lang4 expresses it. No. 15, p. 264, the illimitable exile ia sp'tce which had something of the terror dt^ endlosen Bmincs, of the endless exile in time. But though th« pioneering eftbrt needs something extraneous to start it, it is afterwards carried on by its love of novelty, which, when once excited, ever feeds the impulse, overcoming the sense of insecurity until it becomes a passion instead of a dread. Thus, as the terror of the unknown gives way, the new impetus soon ac- quires a rapidity more strange even than the former reluctance, as is attested by other and more modem examples in the world's history. In the long stagnation of the middle ages geographical know- ledge, at least among the Europeans, had actually receded. Less was known of the world in the d.aya of Bede and Alcuin than in those of Ptolemy. But how soon after the start given to Di Gama and Colum- bus, and by these to others, was the state of things, in this respect, wholly changed I The orbh terrarum immediately Ijegan to expand, and so rapidly was the horizon extended, that less than half a century added more to the knowledge and civilized occupation ot the earth than a thousand years had done before. In less than thirty years after Columbus had seen the light upon the shore of the first West India isle, Ma- gellan had advanced to the southern extremity of the .\merican continent and accomplished the circumnavi- gation of the globe. It was not because the men of the tenth and twelfth centuries lacked vigor of body or mind, but because God's time had not yet come. So was it when the first great dispersion of man- kind commenced. Before the flood, there is no evi- dence that even Egypt was known or inhabited— we mean scriptural evidence ; and notwithstanding the assertions of Bunsen and others, we think it can be shown (in its proper place) that there is no reliable evidence of any other kind. Dwelling as they did, mainly, in the region between the Euphrates and the Indus, the antediluvians had never ventured upon the wide desert that intervened, nor attempted the long way up the rivers and by the mountains of the North. But now the tribes of Ham are streaming down the Persian Gulf, following the Gihon as it winds round Southern .\rabia, until they reach the n;irrow part of the Red Sea. The new impulse soon carries them over into upper Egypt or the ancient ^-Ethiopia, whence they find tlieir way down into Mitzraim (the Narrows), the country of the lower Nile, whilst others start off again for the vast regions of Central Africa. One branch of the sons of Japheth direct their coursa to the dense Northern wilds, and thence dividing, be- gin their long march through Middle and Northern Europe in the one direction, or through Middle Asia and towards the American continent in the other Another branch of the same family roam tbrougb Asia Minor, one part crossing at the Bosporis {Boo. iropot, aa the Greeks afterwards translated the old name, in accordance with one of their fables), tha ancient Ox-ford, or cattle-passage, whence they pro- ceed into the Thraciaii and Danubian forests; whilst another host of pioneers make the jKgean isles theii stepping places to Greece, Italy, and Spain. Th« bold sons of Canaan have ventured upon ships, and are making their way to the extremities of th« Mediterranean and even to the Atlantic. In th( 318 GENESIS, OR TUE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. moan time the desceiuiants of Shem keep nearer to the old homeland, barely diverging into Elam (Persia) and Assyria, moTing m;unly up tlie Euphrates to Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, and tLeuce to Northern Arabia. There is every reason to believe that under this mighty impulse that drove them from Shinar, moi e was done in two or three centuries towards settling the earth than had been accomplish- ed in the 1,600 or 2,000 years of the antediluvian period ; and this fact alone, when taken in connection with its divine causality, is a sufiicient answer to those who think that the Hebrew chronology does not give time enough for the great historical be- ginnings that so soon made their appearance. The world has ever moved by starts, and races, hke individuals, oftentimes do more, and live more, in very short periods than they do in others compara- tively long. This is dwelt upon here as having a bearing upon the position of the human race, and the spread of its population, before the flood. The emphasis with which the new movement is announced in the .lilh chapter, and more fully described in the xth (see especially ver. 32), furnishes the strongest reason for believing tliat notliing of the kind, or on such a ecale, had ever taken place upon the earth before. "From these (nfcx'S) were parted (were divided, ITie; , isolated), the nations in the earth after the flooi." In the antediluvian period there seems to have been a distinction between yx and nanx, but the former word had not acquired the greater definitcness of after usage. In I'act. it must have been utterly indefinite. This is safely inferred from the views we are compelled to form of the primitive territorial notions of mankind. In the earliest times the concep- tion of the earth must have been that of unlimited extent, and of an undivided wild or waste. Nothing to the contrary had been made known, either by ex- perience or by revelation. It was simjily the con- trast of the sky above and the gromtd beneath, like the conception presented in the earliest Greek anti- thesis ef ouparbs and x^'-'"- We must ever bear this in mind when we attempt, as we ever ought to do in interpreting, to get back into the conceptions of the ancient narrator. In no other way shall we get the image of which the language is the necessiiry as well as the only adequate reflexion. There had not even come in the greater definitcness which belongs to the Greek ya7a, although the Noachian conception, with its heaven above and its abyss below, resembles very much that which is presented in the Homeric oath, Odi/8s. V. 184: 'lirro vvv T($5e Fata Kat Ovpavhi tvpitt vw€i>9iw, »till less was it (in conception, at least, whatever may liave been the speculative thought), tlie tellurinn Idea (see Cicero's use of the word tr/lux, Rcpub. vi. 17, iellus media et injlma et in iptain fernntur omnia)^ of a body, whether spherical or otherwi.se, lying in a limited space with space all around it. This is not rationalizing again.st the authority of Scripture. We must judge of this old writer's conception by his knowledge, real or supj)0>ed, which we have no reason to think was in any way changed by that di- rinc afflatus of truth and holiness which made him the faithful recorder of this wonderful scene. 'I'liis 10 the very ground on which we trust its graphical COrrectnesa, an repreBenting, not a mechanical know- ledge (connected with no sense-experience or actual memory in the narrator), but a vivid seeing, with a corresponding vividness of emotion. The same may be said of other parts of the account, which carry an air of absolute universality, simply because we interpret them by tlie absolute or scientific notion of our own day. Thus the expres- sion already referred to, " under the whole heaven," is the primary optical language for the visible hori- zon.* It might have been regarded as the real hori- zon, but if so it would only be tlie writer's thought, his speculative notion, and we have no right, as interpreters, to suiistitute this for what he actually sees and evidenily means to describe as seen. If any will insist U|:ion this language as denoting an absolute tellurian universality (as Wordsworth, Keil, and Ja- cobus have done), let them turn to the same words. Job xxxvii. 3, where they are applied to the thunder and the lightning, and connected with other lan- guage still more suggestive of extent in space. " Hark, the trembling of his voice, and the deep mutter- ing (nsri) that goeth forth from his mouth ; under the whole heavens, C"'C"i:n ^3 rnn , he directeth it, and its lightning, l'"!S$f7 ri'!E:3 bs , to the wings (or extremities) of the earth." It is the long rever- berating roar that is heard all rotmd the sky, and the vivid flash which for a moment liglits up the whole horizon. There are other passages where the expression would seem to take in more than the im- mediate sense, but it never goes beyond the concep- tual limit which is determined by the knowledge, real or supposed, of the utterer, or of those to whom it is addressed. As in Dent. iv. 19 : it means there generally the nations far and near, according to the geographical ideas of the times. Its absolute uni- versality would require us to believe that there is not an island in the Pacific, nor a region in the Arctic or Torrid Zone, to which the Jews were not to be dispersed. And so in Deut. ii. 25, wliei-e the same wide words, " under the whole heavens," are used in a still more limited sense of the nations immediately surrounding the Jews, though in every direction, — around them on all sides. In a similar manner are we justified in interpreting the seemingly universal terms which relate to the animals. They were all that the narrator knew. He receives the divine command as measured by his knowledge and convictions, and executes it accord ingly. They were the familiar animals by which he was surrounded in the district where he lived. In the terror produced by the great catastrophe, they instinctively come to the ark ; as in all great com- motions of nature the most ferocious beasts are known to seel; the protection of human sheltei-. Or we may rationally suppose (taking the supernatural as an essential part of the account), that they were deterndned by a peculiar divine inslinrt, which would be, to the lowei' nature, in analoi^y with ihe prophetic inxifilit given to the higher, t^o far as mere natural signs are concerned, their kei ner and more instinct- ive senses would discern the coming on ol'thi' deluge in its terrestrial and ufirial symptoms soonei' than it would become manifest to the human cognition, and is thej • [It iB the appcarnnce 80 graphically described, thouffh In other lan(,Ti„i;,., ,jui, xxvl. 10: ■':d bj" jn p'pi -llin C5 IIS p-brn 1? C'Srr, "Tlieclrelehehatt iimtkcd upon the faci' (if tli ^ watcrn, it tlie ending of tlie liplit in tlie darkiU'i's,'' — or where the visible disat \ ears tn the invielble.— T. L.i CHAP VUI. 1-19. 31{ crowd towards the ark or flutter around its protect- ing roof, there would be given just that impression of universality which the language convey?. The conviction he had upon his mind of the diiine com- mand, though from tlie very nature of the ease limit- ed by his knowledge of the living things immediately aro'ind him, would express itself In the same gereral term= He was directed to take of the nrna , the cattle, the common or domestic animals, clean and unclean.* It was to be from all, 53^ , a term general instead of distributive, and those taken of the n'ona were to be in pairs of species. Thus regarded, the language is all truthful iu the highest sense of the word truthfulness. It is subjectively truthful, that is, it gives the fact and the spectacle as It is seen and/eVf, — not as calculated, or with that logical and arithmetical precision whose tendency, in a matter of such iudeterminateness, would have been to produce distrust rather than the confidence of faith. Greater precision would have betrayed the mere wonder-maker, or the mere story-teJler, not speaking from any conceptual experience ; whilst, on the other hand, the largeness of the terms, even where it looks like hyperbole, is evidence of the actuality and truthfulne.ss of the emotion that pro- duced theuL Thus the impression made on the mind of the beloved disciple by his constant con- templation of the person and the acts of his adored Master : " And there are many other things which Jesus did, the which if they were written every one, I suppose that not even the world would contain the books that should be written." What words coulii more truthfully convey this inward state of soul ! *' And all Judea, iratra tj 'louSata, went out to him, and all the country round about Jordan, irarra 7; irepixu'po! TO ' 'loiiSduov, and were baptized." Matt. iii. 6. " Ai d there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devou" men, ft-om every nation, anh Tranos eii">vs, under the heaven." Acts ii. 5. The language in these cases is the trice and natural expression of emotion produced by a vast and exciting spec- tacle. How much more worthy of our trust it is — how much stronger a conviction of an eye-witnessed actuality does it produce, than it would have done had the writers been more guarded and exact in ♦ [There is no mention of " the wild animals ae includ- ed " in the n^na, as tliat judicious comiaentator. Murphy, well observes (p. 211). There were "the fowl, aud the creeping thing." The first i;icludeii the birds in general (who would be most defenceless, and who would most ua- tnraiiy, of themselves, resort to the ark fur shelter), and the smaller well-known animals, wlio would coioe under the general denomination. There is no evidence of its here including insects or reptiles. And then again, it must be ever borne in mmd how our view of the universal terms in respect to the animals is aftect«d by the prejudgment of the absolute tiniversality of the flood as c-'venng all th-- globe. The all in the one case is very much modified by the all in the other. If the flood was confined to the b*^ih of the Euphrates and Tigris, it would have swept awtiy tlie then existing human race, but not the animal races who had roamed farther into the wildernesses :ind deserts. There is not a svUable to show that lions came from Africa or bears frotn Siberia. The generality of the terms, then, cannot be carried farther than the ends intended, which rere the preservatiun of Noah and his family, as the seed Df ft new human race, and of the animals ill the district where he lived as " tt3 seed" of other animnls that would be wanted for the new population, either in iheii- immediate, •r their more remote and indirect, utilities. (_>n the question of the universality of the flood, the reader is reierred to the Commentary oh Genesis by ,lamGs Q. Murphy, LL.D., Professor of Hebrew, Belfast. On this ■abject especially is he learned and judicious, yet with a re- verence far remo ^ed ^om latitudinarianism. — T. L.] their numerical proportion > So is it in the mod( of representation that ive find in the account of th« flood. There is something iu this subjective truth fulness far more precious for ojr faith in the oW document than any objective or scientific accuraCT could liave been ; whilst, at the same time, it leave! us perfectly free to draw, from other ideas coniiecl«J>i with the event, such inferences of universality, or of partiality, as its relation to other theological '.ruth, as well as to later knowledge, may demand. Again : those parts of tliis account which relate the prophetic knowledge, or the prophetic conriction, present, indeed, something different frotn the optical representations, but are nevertheless to be inter- preted substantially on the same principle o. theii subjective truthfulness, leaving the higher objective truth for which tliey stand, or of which they are the human language, to be Interpreted by what we have called the higher method of theological exegesis. Now this is what we truly gather from the words given to us ; A righteous and holy man, living in the midst of a profane and sensual generation,-— a lonely man, holding high communion with God, and con- stantly in spiritual conflict with the earthly and the vile aroimd him, — has impres^^ed upon his soul a oonviction that the end of the world, or of the race, is near. It is so strong, so deep, and constant, that he feels it to come from God. It does come from God It is so vivid, that it is to him tlie actual divine voice to his inmost soul. It comes so near, that he recognizes in tbe sharp impression which it makes the very times in which the great catastrophe is to come, and has impressed upon his soul, as by a divine direc- tion, the way and the means through which he and his family are to be preserved. Thus " warned of God in respect to things not as yet seen, he prepares an ark for the salvation of his house (Heb. xi. 7), by which he condemned the world, and became an heir of the righteousness which is by faith." These divine conrictions are aU truthfully told, just as they are truthfully felt, and given to us from the sense or memory of the first narrator. We cannot doubt that he was thus impressed, that he thus felt, that he thus acted, that the events foUowmg corresponded to this invid impression, and that they are most fdthfully narrated. Thus believing in the suljjective, the con- viction of an objective supernatural, and of a divine objective reaUty, aud of a great divine purpose con- nected with the history of the world aud tlie Church, conies irresistibly to the spiritual mind having faith in a personal God constantly superintending the affairs of earth through a constant superintending providence, both geneial and special ■As compared with other stories of the great flood, it is the very simplicity of the account which furnishes the conrincing evidence of its having been an actual telling from the eye. Myths, so called, are never told in this wtiy. There is no conceptual lying back of them, presenting the appearance ol having ever come from any sense or memory. They arise, we know not how, like national songa that never had any individual composer. They represent ideas, notions, strangely combined, ratliei than conceptions having their ground in any sense- spectacle, real or supposed. In poetical picturir.4;, on the other hand, or in rhetorical description, th;a' is, indeed, a distinct conceptual, but it is one for the most part artificially made by the writer or narratoi himself. However accurate its limiung may be, it carries with it its own testimony that it nevei came from any actual or even possille seeing 820 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. Tiis Ovid's description of the flood is most vivid, ■jid in some respects most true to nature, or whiit .nay, very probably, liave been the actual state of things — such as fishes swimming among the oranches of the elm, or the sea-calves sporting D the vineyards ; but no eye ever saw tliis ; it e wlioUy imagined, whilst the power of thus iniagin- flg, and of thus painting it in language, is wholly jiconsistcnt witli that emotion which belongs to the actual spectacle of such an event. Especially IS this true of the more labored, or artistically poetical, in such descriptions. Ovid's picture of the south wind is, indeed, most admirable, but we ecogiiize in it only the highest style of art, won- ierful, indeed, in its grouping and in its coloring, vet without feeling, and producing no impression of reality. Madidis Notus evolat alls, Terribilem picea tectus caligine vultum ; Barba gravis nimbis, c:inis Huit unda capiUis ; Fronte sedent nebulee, rorant pennteque sinusque. Metamoi-ph. i. 264. 'The south wind flies abroad with humid wings, his ('.readl'ul face covered with pitchy darkness ; his )eard is loaded with showers ; the flood pours from is hoary hairs ; clouds sit upon bis brow ; his wings ind robes are dripping with the rain." We know at once that a man who writes thus never saw the flood, or anything like it. It is all poetry, not in the Bible Btyle, as the name is applied to the more emotional portions of the Scriptures, but in the Greek sense of wo'ir\iTis, iro'iTDxa, something made, a fictitious conipo- sitiou artificially colored and invented. Some have regarded the language, Gen. vii. 11 — '"the windows of heaven " and " the fountains of the great deep," as of this poetical or rhetorical kind. Thus Jacobus compares the first to an " eastern expression " denot- ing that "the heavens are broken up" with storms, imdeven Murphy speaks of it as a "beautiful figure;" but all such views detract from the real grandeur, as they also do from the truthfulness, of the account. This opening of the heavens, and breaking up of the deep, were realities to Noah, so conceived by him, and .as honestly related as the hfting up of the ark and the disappearing of the mountains. The awful scene itself would never have called out such imag- ings as those of Ovid, or suggested such language. The Syrian tradition, as given by Lt;ci4N in the Syria Dea, comes nearest to the simplicity of the scriptural narrative; but even there, there are.parts of the repre- ientation which we feel instinctively could never have come from any actual eye-witnessing. The rising of the rivers, for example, on which this tradition dwells, must have Ijccn a very insignificant part, if any part at all, of so sudden and terrific a spectacle, as it is 8«t foi th ui the Bible, and as it must have been, from the very nature of the case, when the floods from above came like bursting clouds or water-spouts, and the breaking and sinking of the earth made a scene BO different from anything that could have been pro- duced by a freshet, even of the most extensive kind. So, too, in the Arabian tradition, though In most things closely resembling the scriptural, we find the same tendency to embellishment. See it as given in the Koran, Surat xi. 40. There is also a mingling with it of the romantic or sentimental which shows the legendary or mere story-making style of perver- ■ion. It represents Noah as having a fourth son who is an unbeliever, and it attemjils to make an affect- ing sceue between this lo.st child, who flies to the mountain, and his imploring father, as the ark is borne past him by the sepanOnp waters T.ie Chal dsean is evidently a magnified Ci">py of the Heoren narrative, but in its enlargemont all propornoL j lost sight of. The ark is represented as a stadium or furlong, in length. It is in the same way tnej have treated the modest Hebrew chronology, keep- ing its genealogical division in the account of the ten generations before Xisuthrus, but running iLs deci nials and hundreds into thousands and hundreds of thousands to agree with the excessive antiquity of their fabled annals. It is the Bible record sweUed out by the inflated Oriental imagination, which every where, except in the ease of the Hebrews, was unre strained by any divine check upon the tendency ot each nation to give itself a mythical antiquity. There is one point in the Scripture narrative ol the flood which would seem to establish the fact of its hmited extent, had it not been for that prejudg- ment of universality which has influenced so many commentators. In ver. 19 the narrator seems to hurry towards the climax of the scene : " And tne waters prevailed exceedingly, nsta, ISia, and all the high hills under the whole heaven were covered." The verse Ibllowing explains and confirms this by an additional particular: "Fifteen cubits i.^ard did the waters prevail (ti3J, they were fifteen cubits strong, or, as we say, fifteen cubits deep), and the hills (the same word, D"nn, thus rendered ver, 19 were covered." Now take this in connection «itl\ ver. 4 of ch. viii : " And the ark rested (njni) in the seventh month, the seventeenth day of the mouth (at the end of five months, one hundred and filty days, or at height of the flood) upon the mount- ains of Ararat" (::"i^S ''"in in the plural — or out of the mountnins of Ararat taken as the name of a range or niountainous country, one of whose peak^ alterwards obtained the name by way of eminence.'' Here we evidently have the place from which thct-e fifteen cubits were reckoned, and it furnishes tiie key to the right understanding of what tlie writer meant to convey as the extent of his knowledge and experi- ence, whatever might have been his opinions as to anything beyoud. There is no evidence that this was the high peak of Ararat; the impression (from the use of the plural) is all the other way- Taking all these things into consideration, the explanation is most natural and easy. The ark had drifted up the basin of the Euphrates and Tigi is imtil it grounded on the highlands that formed its northern bank or border, and tliat, too, not far from a land of the olive and the vine. The surrounding mountains, or high hills, had previously been in sight, but at this tune, or just before it, they disappeared. These are the same "mountains under tne whole heaven" mentioned ver. 19. Filteen cubits strong were the waters, and the mountains were covered, \\'hen the ark rested, there was no land auywhere in sight. Noah a-scertains the depth by measinement, or by bis knowledge of the ark's draught of water, and as it did nut float again, he takes this time as the summit of the flood. He may have supposed the whole earth covered, as liir as he knew anything about the earth as a whole ; but we must take whiit he saw, what he knew, and what he describes as coming evidectly from his experience. Without some such view we liave no standard. It may be said, too, that thii moimtain on which the ark rested could not havn • (See Iho marginal note on these woria, BTlJt ^""'' paite 308.— T. L.1 CHAP. VIIL 1-19. 8U1 been the Ugh peak of Ararat, nor one from which that peak was in sight ; since, in the one case, the eurrouniiing mountains must have disappeared much earlier, and, in the other caae, the declaration of their disappearaiice would not have been true. Again, had it been the high peak of Ararat, then, in the going down of the waters, a very large jiart of it must have been wholly bare before the others be- came visible ( 1X13 ), as is said viii. 5 ; but tiiis is contrary to the whole impression derived from that part of the account. All these difficulties (difficul- ties, we mean, on tlie face of the account) become arcatly increased, if we suppose that the flood was •lOt only above Ararat, or one of the mountains of Ararat, but also covered the whole globe, and mount- ains known to be twelve thousand feet, or more than two miles, higher than any in Armenia. In such case, besides there being no standard of measurement for the fifteen cubits, there would be a strangeness and inconsistency in the language, since this highest mountain would be as much covered by a rise of one cubit above its summit as by iitleen. The expression inipUes excess, as measured from some known condi- tion, or it has no meaning. How did the describer know it ? This may be answered by saying that Noah knew it divinely, that is, by a knowledge and a memory having no basis in any actual knowing or sense-ex- perience. It was all imprtssion made upon liis mind. Now, had it been so related, it would have been per- fectly consistent with that subjective truthfulness on which we insist. Other things are thus stated among the immediate antecedents of the flood, but this ap- pears in the midst of the vividly optical, and in di- rect connection with facts having every appearance of being described from sense. As a thing utterly unknown and unknowable without such divine inti- mation, or as a fact that might have been, but which sense necessarily failed to reach, it would be like Ovid's " dolphins in the subaquean woods," or his "sea-calves swimming in the vineyards," except that it has an air of statisiical particularity, which, as thus given, affects its credit, either as prose or poetry. There are other things that, on the suppo- sition of universality, must have been utterly beyond experience, but which are very confidently stated, and vividly described, just as things would be that fall directly under the observation of the eye." A :*phere of water covering the entire globe would have left no means of determining the time of greatest elevation, or the period of abatement betbre the hills again appeared. The Jewish commentators maintain the universality as essential to the honor of their Scriptures. But they are critics who overlook noth- ing, and they therefore keenly see ihese difficulties. In order to avoid them, they distinguish between what was known from the spirit of prophecy, nxi:3 . and what is narrated from sense, nui'Jl . or experience. Our Rabbins, says Uaiiiionides, were led to this from the knowledge (afterwards obtained) that there were mountains in Greece (Europe, he means) higher than Ararat, which, he tells us, was in the lower part of the earth-sphere ("ili^B), not ♦ [Such, for example as the liom 7|"bn . viii. 5, a peculiar Hebrew idiom, denoting most graphically a graduid yet constant subsidence (Vulg., ibant et decrtscebani a'jtis'), or, the period of highest water, which could have had no mark for the eye, if they covered the highest land upon the «arth, twelve thouiaud fet-t. or more than two miles, above •he high peak of Ararat itself.— T. L.) far from Babylon. To overcome the objection, h< adopts the singular view, that the resting on Ararat, though at the height of the flood when the waiera became even, was some time after tne highest mountains were submerged. This submersion, or rather supermersion, came from the great commotion, the tossing or boiling of the waters (nriT^), — the violent eruption from the earth causing them to dash and surge over the highest parts, thus covering them, but not as an even mass or aquor. He makes a di»- tinction, which has some ground, between ~:'^, the calming of the waters, and TOn , their abating. It was after the going down of this wild commotion, or when the waters came to a level, that the ark hap- peiied to be (n'.p'Z ~ip'') over the region of Ararat, and settled down upon it. It was also a part of thin singular view that the ark, in consequence of its loaa and its great specific gravity, did not truly float, but was lilted up by the great force of the up-pouring waters, and this, he holds, is what is meant by the words vii. 18, D'sn •'3D bj ~|bn^ , "it went upon the face of the waterx^''^ — wherever the waters drove it. Such views, from so sober a commentator, are only of value as showing the immense difficulties at- tending this opinion of univer>ality — difficulties that come not more from outside objections than from the face of the account itself if we depai't from the plain optical interpretation. The whole argument may be briefly summed bj a careful consideration of the three main aspects ol the Noachian account: 1. The divine communica. tions warning Noah ol the impending judgment, and directing him to prepare an ark for the saving of himself and his house. Whetlier these were mad* in vision, or by vivid impressions upon the mind, they are truthfully received and truthfully related, that is, translated into human speech as repiesentiiig the conceptions and knowledge of the relator in re- spect to the subjects of such divine communicatioiL The human race were to be destroyed, and the earth, or land, they inhabited, was to be covered with water. In such warning, God did not teach him geography, nor give him the figure of the earth, nor che height of the unknown, far-distant mountains. 2. The directions in respect to the animals. These are to be interpreted in the same way, and with the same limitations of knowledge and conception. He was to take of the living thing (or the animals) under the threefold specification of the beheina (the cattle), the fowl, and the creeping thing. They were the animals with which he was familiar, as belonging to tlie region in which he lived. He was aided by a divine instinct in tlie creatures, supernaturally givcB in the begiiming, and now supernaturally excited But God did not teach him zoology, nor the vast variety of species, nor is there any evidence that ani- mals came from the distant parts of the unknown earth, such as the giraffe from Southern Africa, the elephant from India, or the kangaroo from Austra- lia. 3. The actual event itself, and this under two aspects : o. The flood as optically described by some one in the ark (Noah or Shem). Here we have cer- tain data which seem tmmistakable in the inferences to be deduced from them. If we look steadily at the connections of events as they are most artlessly nar- rated, the conclusion appears almost unavoidable, that the mountains mentioned, vii. 20, as covered by fifteen cubits, and that come again in sight, viii. 5, as seen liom the same place when''e they disappeared 52a GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. at the height of the flood, and when the ark ground- ed OB the sevi'nteenth of tlie seventh month, are the same " high hills under the whole heaven," that are mentioned vii. 19. We have here what Noah sau\ or knew from soise, — the visible objects around him, the grounding, the disappearing, the reappearmg — all icf'erring to the same phenomena, one part being IS much optical as anollier, and the knowledge of *ny one of these facts, as they appear on the face of the narrative, as much referrible to experience as that of any other. A. The inferred extent. Noah had no means of measuring the distance to which the ark drifted. We judge of it from what can be ascer- tained of its termini. It started from a place near the. old Eden-land (in the neighborhood of the Per- sian Gulf), and it struck on one of the mountains of Armenia in the north. This could not have been the high Ararat, for then the lesser Ararat, which is only seven miles distant, and four thousand feet, or nearly a mile, lower, must have been long under water, contrary to the vivid impression made by what is said vii. 20 and viii. 6. It could not have been the lesser peak, for then the higher (only seven miles distant) would have been clearly visible, and four thousand feet above the water during the whole time of the ark's resting. It must, therefore, have Deen some high litod on the borders of the mountainous •egion, and at quite a distance, S. or E., from either. rhiB distance of the ark's sailing before it grounded taking into view the fact that there was no land then visible from it in any direction, although ther» had been just before) would give a flood which prob- ably covered the old adamah, together with Baby Ionia, -issyria, the neighboring parts of Persia and Media, Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, Arabia, and a good portion of Asia Minor, with peaks, per* haps, here and there, projecting above its surt'ace Subsequent events seem lo confirm this view. From the unknown, rugged, mountainous region where the ark rested, the Noachida; soon found tlieir way back (at a time, too, when, as appears from xi. 4, the flood was in fresh remembrance) to the plain of Shinar. To this they were led by the primitive gre- garious tendency (see remarks, p. Sll), ami their aversion to being driven into the unknown, until there came that remarkable divine impulse which, for the first time, sent them far and wide to the re- motest regions of the earth. Each pioneering family carried with them the story of the terrible judgment, locating it in different lands according to the tradi- tions of their ancestors, and each distorting or em- bellishing it after their own mythical or legendary fashion. The Bible alone gives us the veritable ac- count, truthfully and vividly told, carrying every mark of being an actual eye-witnessing, and furnish- ing the best data for determining its locality, ita probable extent, its true chronology, and, what is of greater value than all else, its theological bearing, aa one of the great divine interventions in the history of the world and of the church. — T. L.J FOURTH PART. THE GENESIS OF THE NEW, WORLD-HISTORICAL, HUMAN RACE; OF THE CONTRASl BETWEEN THE FORM OF SIN THAT NOW COMES IN, AND OF THE NEW FORM Of PIETY ; OF THE CONTRAST BETWEEN THE BLESSING OF SHEM (CDLTUS, THEOCRACY) AND THE BLESSING OF JAPHETH (CULTURE, HUMANISM); OF THE CONTR.VST BE- TWEEN THE DISPERSION OF THE NATIONS, AND THE BABYLONIAN COMBINING OP THE NATIONS; BETWEEN THE BABYLONIAN DISPERSION, OR THE MYTHICAL HEA- THENISM, AND THE INDIVIDUAL SYMBOLIC FAITH IN GOD OF THE FATRLARCHS. THE FIRST TYPICAL COVENANT. Ch. VIII. 20-XI. 32. FIRST SECTION, fV Firtt l)/pieal CovenarU. The Primitive Precepta {Noachian Laws). The Symbol of the Rainbow. Chapter VIII. 20-IX. 17. 20 AnJ Noali biiilded an altar unto the Lord, and took of every ' clean beast and of 21 t'Tery clean fowl and oH'Krec burnt oilerings on the altar. And the Lord siuelled a sweet savour,' and the Lord said in his heart, 1 will not again curse the ground any more for mr.n'.s sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth [bore, 22 eiraaing] ; nc.tlier will I again smite any more everything living as I have done. While the earth remaincih | nil the duyn of th« earthj seedtime and iiarvest [tbo order of nature], and cold aud heat, and sunjmer and winter,' and day and night, shall not cease. CHAP. Vm. 20— IX. 1-17. 323 Ch. IX. 1 A.nd God [Eiohim] blessed Noali and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful. 2 and niultiplv and replenish the earth. And the fear of you and the dread of you, shali be upon every beai t of the eartli, and upon every fowl of tiie air, and upon all thai nioveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hands are they 3 delivered. Every moving thing that liveth sliall be meat for you; even as the greet 4 herb have I given you all things. But flesh which is the life thereof [itsBoui.itsaniiwtion], £ which is the blood tliereof, shall ye not eat. And surely your blood of your lives' [of each single life] will I require ; at the hand of every beast will I require it [take vengtiiict for it], and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man's brother will I require the 6 hfe of man. Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man ^ shall his blood be shed : for in 7 the image of God made he man. And you, be ye fruitful, and multiply ; bring forth 8 abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein. And God [Elohim] spake unto Noalu 9 and to his sous with him, saying [^iasb], And I, behold, I establish my covenant with 10 you, and with your seed after you; And with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you ; from all that go out 1 1 of the ark, to every beast of the earth [that shall proceed from tbem in the future]. And I will establish mv covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood ; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth. 12 And God [Eiohim] said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me 13 and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations: I do set my bow" in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and 14 the earth. And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the eartli, that the 15 bow shall be seen in the cloud : ' And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every livhig creature of all flesh ; and the waters shall no more 16 become a flood to destroy all flesh. And my bow shall be in the cloud; and 1 will look upon it, that 1 may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every 17 living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth. And God [Eiohim] said mito Noah, This is the token of the covenant, which I have established between me and all flesli that is upoQ the earth. l» Ch. viii. ver. 20. — 5373— /rem all the pure of the cattle, and from all the pure fowl. The word denotes selection. ft can hardly mean one of every kind deemed pure among the cattle ; much less can it have this large meaning in respect .0 the fowl (or the liiids), among whom the pure species far excelled tlie impure, which are mentioned as excejitiona twenty-four in number), Lev. si. 13 ; Deut. siv. 12. If Noah had had every earthly species of bird in the ark (seven >f ail thai were rei,'ardcd as pure), and ofl'ered of each in saci-ifice, it would have required .an immense altar. There was 5vidently a selection, and such use of the term bs^.; here may serve as a guide in respect to its antecedent uses, justifying us in limiting it to the more common kinds of all species known to Noah, and inhabiting the portion of the earth visited r>y the flood.— T. L.) ["^ Ver. 21.— nn^3 A word of a very peculiar form, like VS^S , Is. i. 31. Aben Ezra compares it with r,?ISX3, Hos. i. 4. It denotes rest intensively ; the rest, not of mere quietude, or cessation, but of satisfaction, complacency, delighL ^n odor of rest — of complete and gratified acceptance. Compare the suggested language, Zeph, iii. 17, expressing God's ireat satisfaction in .Jerusalem, ln^riX3 llJ^in' , He shall rest in his love. The word niT'a occurs here for the first .ime, and is evidently meant to have a' connection with the name ns (Noah), but becomes the common phrase (n^T nn^3) to denote the pleasant odor of the sacrifice, in Exodus, Leviticus, etc. Hence the New Testament Hebraism us ieen in the word ei/uiSta, in such passages as 2 Cor. ii. lo, a sweet savour of Christ, Eph. v. 2, a sweel-siwlling savour, Phil, X. 18, as also the u^e of oafi-q, 2 Cor. ii. Ui, the savour of life unto life. The Jewish interpreters here, as usual, are ifraid of the anthropophatism, and so the Targum of Onkelos renders generally. The Lord received the offering graciously. in like manner the Jewish translator Arabs Erpenianus. Aben Ezra affects a horror of the literal sense, nb'bn , h6 uays— *' O profane ! away with the thought that God should smell or eat." With all their reverence for their old Scrip- tures, these Jewish interpreters had got a taste of philosophy, and hence their Philonic fastidiousness, as ever manifested in a desire to smooth over all such language. — T. I..] [3 Ver. 22.— Zl"in , rendered winter — more properly avAumn, though it may include the winter, as y^p may include the spring.— T. L.] [* Ch. ix. ver. 5.--D3^r"K;E5b DSBT , your blood of (or for) your souls. Maim-inides renders it Slnf DDTST CSTlTiUES , your blood which is your souls. LXX., aVa Ton. li/vxi^v vijmiv, blood of your souls.— T. L.] [» Ver. 6.— CT S2 . E. V. by man. This would seem i-ather to require the term "1^3 . by the hand of man, the usual Hebrew phrase to denote instrumentality. That it was to be by human agency is very clear, but the ~ in mx3 may be better taken, as it is bj Jona ben Oannach (Abul-W.alid), in his Hebrew Grammar, p. 33, to denote substitution,— fa^ nan, in place of man— life for life, or blood for blood, as it is so strongly and frequently expressed in the Greek tragedy The preposition 1, in this place, he says, is equivalent to "!i;;'3 , on account of, and he refers to 2 Sam. xiv. 7, " Give OS the man who smots his brother, and we will put him to death, :"'nN; IIJS33 , for the soul (the life, or in place of) hit brother,'' Exod. xx. 2, IT 3" 32 "iS'Qil , " and he shall be sold /or his theft," 'as also, among many other places, to Gen, Jliv. 5. 12 wHr lyna X-n", where, instead of " divining by it," as in our English versions and the Vulgate, he givtj what seems a more consistr LXX. in Gen. ix. ', where they have 324 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. oolhing for D^X3 but ai^i Tou atfiaToc auTow, in re/urn /or fti5 6/ood. Arabs Erpenianiis renders it .L^aaJ! Um3 ,1 fry the irordy or command^ of maji, indicating a judicial sentence. So the Taigum of Onkelos, by the witnessr-s accord^ nff /* the word r>f judgment, and so also Eashi and Aben Ezra, C^T"Z DIX^ , hy man, tliat is, by the witnesses.— T. L.) [• Ver. 13. — ^P'"p, my how, as just before, ver. 11, "'n^"^Z , my covenant. The language seem;?, on the very face oi it, to implv a thing previously existing, called, from its remarkable appearance, the bow of God, and now appjinted 3s a sign ol the previously existing covenant. Had it been a new creation, the language would more properly have been I will make, or set, a buw in the cloud. See remarks (in the Introd. to the i. ch. p. 144) on the rainbow as the symbol of coastancy in nature, from it« constant and regular appeai-anoe whenever the sun shines forth after the lain. Fcv ftu^her vie^ s on this, and for the opinions of the Jewish commentators, see also note, p. 328. — T. L.] [' Ver. 14. — This verse should be connected, in translation, w;th the one following. As it is rendered in E. Y., thi •ppearing of the bow is made the subject of the sentence (though apparently the predicate), whereas the sequencf or i\% oonjunction ^ , and of the tenees, would give the sense thtis: And it shall come to pass, when I britig the cloud, etc., a Id whenever the bow appears in the cloud, that I will remember my covenant ; the conjunction before "Tl'^St having an Uative force.— T. L.] ' "' EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL 1. Vers. 20-22. The offering of Noah and the acceptance and promiae of Jehovah. The offering of Noah is not, as has been maintained, to be refer- red back from the later time of the law, to the primi- tive history. It reflects itself, moreover, in the my- thological stories of the flood (Delitzsch, p. 268). An altar to the Lord. The altar is called naio , place of slaying the victim, from n3T, as SuuiaiTTT)- pioy from Aifiy. That the sons of Adam offered without an altar ia a mere supposition. According to Keil there was no need of an altar, because God was still present in paradise to men. In the judg- ment of the flood was paradise destroyed ; the place of his presence was withdrawn, and he had taken his throne in the heaven, that from thence, hereafter he might reveal himself to men. (Comp. ch. ii 5,7). "Towards heaven must now the hearts of the pious lift up themselves ; their offerings and their prayers must go up on high, if they would reach God's throne. In order to give the offerings this upward direction, elevated places were fixed upon, from which they might ascend heavenwards in fire. Hence the offerings derived their name of niby from nb", the ascending, not so much because the animal offered was laid upon the altar, or made to ascend the altar, but rather because of the ascending (of the flame and smoke) fioiu the altar towards heaven. (Comp. Judg. x-k. 40; Jer. xlviii. 15; Amos iv. 10). In like manner Delitzsch in relation to Ps. xxix. 10; (according to Hofmann : "Prophecy and Fulfihnent," pp. 80, 88). If by this is meant that the religious consciousness, which once received God as pre.sent m paradise, must now, through its darkness by sin, revere him as the Holy One, far off, dwelling on high, and only occasionally revealing himself from heaven, there woidd be nothing to say against it ; but if it is meant a-s a literal transfer of the place of the divine dwelling and of the divine throne, it becomes a mythologizing darkening of the divine idea (.sec Ps. 13!»). Clirist was gieater than the paradisaical Adam ; notwithstanding, in jirayer, lie lifted up his eyes to heaven (John xi. 41); and al- ready is it intimated. Gen. i. 1, that from the begin- ning, the heaven, as the symbolical sign of (iod's exceeding highDes.s, had precedence of the earth. Thiit, however, the word nbiJ may have some re- lation, at least, to the ascendency ol the victim upon the altar is shown by the expression nbrn in the Hiphil. The altar was creeled to Jehovah, whoso worship had already, at an carlirr period, commenc- ed (ch. iv. 4). Everywhere when Eloliini had re- vealed himeelf in his first announcements, and had thus given assurance of himself as the trusted am the constant, there is Jehovah, the God amen, in ever fuller distinctness. As Jehovah must he es- pecially appear to the saved Noah, as the one to whom he had fulfilled his word of promise in the wonderful relation he bore to him. — Of every clean beast. — According to Rosenmuller and others, we must regard this as referiing to the five kinds of offerings under the law, namely, bullock, sheep, goats, doves, turtle doves. This, howeyer, is doing violence to the text ; there appears rather to have been appointed for offering the seventh surplus example which he had taken, over and above the three pairs, in each case, of clean beasts. — And offered it as a burnt offering. — We are not to think here of the classification of offerings as deter- mined ill the levitieal law. The burnt offering forms the middle point, and the root of the difl'erent ofter ings (comp. ch. xxii. 13i; and the undivided unity is here to be kept in view. There is, at all events, contained here the idea of the thank offering, al- though there is nothing said of any participation, oi' eating, of the victim offered. The extreme left side ot the offering here, as an ofl'ering for sin and guilt, was the Ilerem or pollution of the carcases exposed in the flood (like the lamb of the sacrifice of Moses as compared with the slain first-born of the Egyp- tians) ; the extreme right side lay in that consecrat- ed partaking of flesh by Noah which now commenc- ed.— And the Iiord (Jehovah) smelled a sweet savor. — The savor of satisfaetion. An anthropo- morphic expression for the satisfied acceptance of the offering presented, as a true offering of the spirit of the one presenting it.* — And said in his heart. — Not merely be said to himself or he thouglit with * [The tlame mounting heavenward from the great altar of Noah, the vast colxmin of smoke and incense majestically ascending in the calm, clear atmosphere, transcending seem- ingly tlie common law of gravity, and thus comi)ining the ideas of tranquillity and power, would of itself present a striking image of the natural sublime. But, beyond this, there is a moral, we may rather say, a spiritual suMiniity, to one who regardsthe scene in those higher relations which the account here indicatcfl, and which other portions of Scripture make so clear. It oilers to our contcmiilation the most vivid of contracts. There comes to mind, oo *he one hand, the gross selfishness of the antediluvian w t.d, ever tending downward more and more to tiirth and a sensual auimality — in a word, devoting life to that which is lowel than tlio lowest life itself; wliilst now, on the contrary, there rises up in all its rich siiggestivcness, the idea o' sacrifice, of life devotion to that which is higher than ali life, as symbolized in the flame ascending from tlio otlered viclim. It is, moreover, the spirit of confession, of peni- tt'iice, of I'erl'ect resignation to the \\ ill ofOod as the ration- al rule of life, — all, too, prefiguring One who made the gi-eal sncrilice of liiniself fur the sins of tho world, and who, al- though historically nnlcnow7i to Noali, way essentially oln- liraced in that recognition of human demerit, and of th* divine holiness, which is sty ed "the righteousnos* of faith.'' CHAP. VIII. 20— IX. 1-17. 323 himeelf ; it meai 3 rather, he took counsel with, his heart and eiecuced a purpose proceeding from, the emotion of his diviue love. — I ^irill not again curse. — In words had he done this, Gen. iii. 17, but actually and in a higher measure, in the deeiee ol' destruction Gen. vi. 7, 13. With the last, there- fore, is the tirst curse retracted, in as far as the first prehminary lustration of tlie earth is admitted to be a baptism of the earth. According to Knobel, the pleasing fragrance of the offering is not the moving ground, but merely the occasion for this gracious re- solve, liut what does the occasion mean here ? In 80 far as the saving grace of God was the first mov- ing ground for Xoah's thank offering, was this latttT also a second moving ground (symboliciiUy, causa meriioria) for the purpose of 8. It is in .hese BtroHK contrasts,— in these apparent inconr-iHlencioH, Ha some would ca I them,— that Ihe great power and pathos Dftfae Scripture appear ~T. L.i foundations." — And the fear , f you. — You- fear as tlie effect, xniB . The exciting of fear an.; '"rvot are to be the means of man's doiiiinion ov».i the ani mals, Dehtzsch remarks: "It is. beeausi the ori- ginal hai'mony that once existed between mai» and nature has been taken away by the fall and its con- sequences. According to the will of God, man ia still the lord of nature, but of nature now as an unwilling servant, to be lestrained by eflbi t, to be subjugated by force." Not throUf^hout, however, is nature thus antagonistic to man ; it is not the case with a portion of the animal world, namely, the domestic animals. It is true, there his come in a breach of the original harmony, but it is not now for the first time, ami the most pecuhar striving of the creature is against its doom of perishability (Rom. viii. 20). Moreover, it is certainly the case, that, the influence of the /ear of man upon th'> animals is fundamentally a normal paradisaical relaivu. But a severer intensity of this is indicated b) the word dread. Knobel explains it from the fact, that hence- forth the animal is threatened in its life, and is now exposed to be slain. Since the loss of the harmonic relation between man and the animals (in which the human majesty had a magical power over the beast), the contrast between the tame and the wild, between the friendly innocence and the hostile dread of the wilder species, had increased more and more, unto the time of the flood. Now is it formally and legally presented in the language we are considering. Man is henceforth legally authorized to exercise a forcible dominion over the beasts, since he can no longer rule them through the sympathy of a spiritual power. Also the eating of flesh, which had doubtless existed before, is now formally legalized : by which fact it is, at the same time, commended. A limitation of the pure kinds is not yet expressed. When, however, there is added, by way of appendix, all that liveth (that is, is alive), the dead carcase, or that which hath died of itself, is excluded, and with it all that is oB'ensive generally. There is, however, a distinct restriction upon this flesh-eating, in the prohibition ot the blood : But flesh with the life thereof. — Delitzsch explains it as meaning, " that there was forbidden the eating of the flesh when the animal was yet alive, unslain, and whose blood had not been poured out, — namely, pieces cut out, according to a cruel custom of antiquity, and still existing in Abys- synia. Accordingly there was forbidden, generally, the eating of flesh in which the blood still remained," It is, however, more to the purpose to explain this te.\t according to Lev. xvii. 11, 14, than by the sav- age practices of a later barbarous heathenism, or by Rabbinical tradition. " With its Ufe," therefore, means with its soul, or animatmg principle, and this is explained by its blood, accoidmg to the passage cited (Deut xii. 23) ; since the blood is the basis, the element of the nerve-lite, and in this sense, the souL The blood is the fluid-nerve, the nerve is the con- structed blood. The prohibition of blood-eating, the first of the so-called Noachian commands (see below), is, indeed, connected with the moral rerrobatiou of cruelty to animals, as it may proceed to the mutila- tion of the Uving ; it is, therefore, also connected with the avoidance of raw flesh CH nua , or living flesh, 1 Sam. ii. 15. Knobel). "The blood is regarded as the seat of the soul, or the Hie, and is even denoted as 113BS, or the soul itself (Lev. i. 5), as the anima purpurea of Virgil, yEn. ix. :i48; even as here iulci ia explained by the apposition "ic" . But the lil'e be UHAf. VUl. 20— IX. 1-17. 32^ longs to Gofi, the Lord of all life, and must, there- fore, be brought to him, upon his altar (Deut. xii. 27), and not be consumed by man." Knobel. This is, therefore, the second idea in the prohibition of the blood. As life, must the life of the beast go back to God its creator; or, as life in the victim offered in sacritice, it must become a symbol that the soul of njau belongs to God, though man may par- take of the animal materi;ility, that is, the flesh. Still stronger is the restriction that follows: And ■urely your blood of your lives. — "Tlie soul of the beast, in the blood of the beast, is to be avoided, and the soul of man, in the blood of man, is not to be violated." Delitzsch. At the ground of this con- trast, however, lies the more general one, that the slaying of the beast is allowed whilst the slaying of man is forbidden. — Will I require; that is, the corresponding, proportionate expiation or punish- ment « ill I impose upon the slayer. The expression n3''ni.'S3i3, Knobel explains as meaning "for your souU," for the best of your life (comp. Lev. xxvi. 45 ; Deut. iv. 15 ; Job xiii. 7). According to Delitzsch and Keil b expresses the regard had for the individ- ual. And this appears to be near the truth. The blood of man is individually reckoned and valued, according to the individual souls. — At the hand of every beast, — The more particular legal regulation is found in Esod. xxi. 28. Here, then, is first given a legal ground lor the pursuit and destruction of human m'lrderous and hurtful beasts. Still tliere is expressed, moreover, the slaying of the single beast that hath killed a man. " In the enactments of So- 'on and Draco, and even in Plato, there is a similar rovision." Delitzsch. — And at the hand of man. *- ' nx B'^X, brother man, that is, kinsman; comp. ch xiii. 5 ; so, "iliS IIJ^X , a priest-man, etc. By the words Tins CJ^S is not to be understood the next of kin to the murdered man, whose duty it was to execute the blood-vengeance (Von Bohlen, Tuch, Baumgarten), as the one from whom God reciuired the blood that was shed, but the murderer Idmself In order to indicate the unnaturalness of murder, and its deep desert of penalty, God denotes him (the murderer) as in a special sense the brother of the murdered." Knobel. Besides this, moreover, there is formed from ttJ'^X the expression everi/ man (De- litzsch, Keil). Every man, brother man. — The life of man. — JIan is emphasized. Therefore follows, emphatically, the formula : Whosoever sheddeth man's blood, and at the close again there is once more yuan (Clxn) prominently presented. — By man shall his blood be shed : " namely, by the next of kin to the murdered, whose right and duty both it was to pursue the murderer, and to slay him. He is called C^n bxa, the deraander of the blood, or the blood-avenger. The Hebrew law imposed the Eenalty of death upon the homicide (Exod. xxi. 12; lev. xxiv. 17), which the blood avenger carried out (Nimib. XXXV. 19, 21); to him was the murderer dcliTered up by the congregation to be put to death (Deut. xix. 12). Among the old Hebrews, the blood- Tengrance was the usual mode of punishing murder, tnd was also practised by many other nations." Dehtzsch and Keil dispute the relation of this pas- dage to the blood-vengeance. It is not to be misap- l-rehcnded, 1. that here, in a wider sense, humanity itself, seeing it is always next of kin to the murdered, is appointed to be the avenger; and 2. that the ap- pointment extends beyond the blood-vengeance, arc becomes the root of the magisterial right of punish- ment. On the other hand, it caunot be denied tiial in the patriarchal relations of the olden time it was a fundamental principle that the ne.\i of kin were not only ju.stified in the execution of the law of blood but on account of the want of a legal tribunal, were under obligation to perform the ollice. This primi- tive, divinely-sanctioned custom, became, in its ideal and theocratic direction, the law of punishment as magisterially regulated in the Mosaic institutions (but which still kept in mind the blood-vengeimce), whereas, in the direction of crude heathenism, which avenged the murder even upon the relations of tha murderer, it became itself a murderous impulse. Dehtzsch remarks, that God has now laid in the hands of men the penal force that belonged to him alone, because he has withdrawn his visible pres- ence from the earth, — according to the view, before cited, of his transfer of the divine throne to the heavens. — For in the image of God made he man. — This is the reason for the command against murder. In man there is assailed the image of God, the personality, that which constitutes the very aim of his existence, although the image itself, as such, is inviolable. In murder the crime is against the spirit, in which the divine kinsmanship reveals itself, and so is it a crime against the very appearing of God in the world in its most universal form, or as a prelude to that murder which was committed against the perfect form of man (or image of God in man), Zach. xii. 10; John ill. 10, 16). — But be ye fruit, ful. — The contrast to the preceding. The value of human life forbids its being wasted, and commands its orderly increase. — Bring forth abundantly in the earth — In the spreading of men over the earth, and out of its supplies of food (by whicli, as it were, the Ufe of the earth is transformed into the life of man) are found the conditions for the multipUcation of the human race. Thus regarded, there is only an apparent tautology in the verse, not an actual one. a. Vers. 8-17. The covenant of God with Xoali, with his race, and with the whole earth, — To Noah and to his sons with him Solemn covenanting form. The sons are aildressed together with Xoah ; for the covenant avails expressly for the whole hu- man race. — And I, behold I establish, — The words, and I, ( ^3X1 ) form a contrast to the claiD>a of God on the new humanity as an introduction to the promise. According to Knobel, God had es- tablished no covenant with the antediluvians. Not, indeed, in the literal expressions here employed ; since it was after men had had the experience of a destroying judgment. According to the same (Kno- bel), the Jehovist, in ch. viii. 21 presented tha matter in a way different from that of the Elohist here. Clearly, however, does the offering of Noah there mentioned, furnish the occasion for the entire transaction that follows in this place. The making of a covenant with Noah is already introduced, and announced eh. vi. 13; it stands in a development conditioned on the preservation of Noah's faith, just as a similar development is still more evident in tha life of Abraham (see Jas. ii. 20-23). Keil remaika that " r-'na C^pn is not equivalent to P''-ia p-^S , that is, it does not denote the formal concluding, bu« the establishing, confirming, of a covenant, — iu other words, the realization of the covenanting promise " (comp. Gen. xxii. with Gen. xvii. and xv.). Delitzsch • " Tliere begins now the t ra of the divine avo o 328 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. (Rom. Ui. 26) of wliich Paul preached in Lystria ;Acts xiv. 15)." In its most special sense, this era iie^jius with iJie origin of heatlienisni, that is, from the Babylonian dispersion. With a right fulness is the snimal world also mcluded in this covenant, for it is e'oliistic, — universaUstic ; it keeps wholly predominant the characteristic of compassion for the creaturely life upon the earth, although man forms it.s ethical middle point, with which the .inimal world f.nd the kosmos are connected. The covenant with the beasts subsists not for itself, and, in respect to its nature, is only to be taken symbolically. — Shall not be cut oflf any more. — This is the divine covenant promise — ao new destruction, — no end of the woild again produced by a flood. — My bow in the cloud, it shall be for a token. — In every divine covenant tliere is a divine sign of the cov- enant ; in this covenant it is said : viji bow do 1 set. According to Knobel the rainbow is called God's ^cw, because it belongs to the heaven, God's dwelling place. It is a more correct interpretation to say, it ie because God has made it to appear in the heaven, as the sign of his covenant. According to the same, the author of the account must have entertained the supposition that there had never been a rainbow before the time of the flood. Delitzsch is of the same opinion.* It is, indeed, a phenomenon of refraction, which may be supposed of a fall of water, and some- times, also, of a dew-distilling mist. But the far visible and overarching rainbow supposes the rain- cloud as its natural conditioning cause. We have already remarked that from the appointment of the rainbow, as the sign of the covenant, it by no means follows that it had not before existed as a phenome- non of nature (ch. ii.). The starry night, too, is m^ide the sign of a promise for Abraham (ch. xv.). Keil is not willing to infer that hitherto it had not rained, but only presents the conjecture that at an earlier period the constitution of the atmosphere mav have been dirtereut. — And I will look upon it that I may remember. — An anthropomorphising form of expression, but which like every other expression of the kind, ever gives us the tenor of the divine thought in a symbolical human form. Here it is the expression of the self-obligating, or of the conscious covenant truthfulness, as manifested in the constant sign. "In his presence, too, have they power uid most essential significance." (Von Gerlach). [XOTK ON THE APPOIiNTMENT OF THE RaINBOW AS THE 8iGN OF THE COVENANT. — 1» regard to this it may be well to give the views of some of the older Jewish commentators, if for no other purpose, to ehow that what is really the most easy and the most natural interpretation comes from no outside pri-s- Bure of science, but is fairly deducible froni tlie very letter of the passage. Thus reasons ilaimonides respecting it : " For the words are in past time, ■'Brj T]'-"[5 nx , my bow have I set (or did set) in the cloud, not, 1 am now setting^ or about to set, whicli would be expressed by iriS '^rx , accoriling as oe had said just before, "in: ■'3X irx pinan , the covenant wliich / am now establishing. More- jver the fonn of the word ^Pttif? my bow, shows that there was something to him so called from the • ^ginning. And so the Scripture must be inteiiiiet- • jThp opinion of Delitzsch Is not so broad as this. Ho tie«m>^. mther, to hold that the rainbow existed in M:iturc bc/vre the liood, but had not opptnrtdt ou account of the • I'y'jnoc of tho conditioDi. 8co Dbli'izsch, p. 276.— T. L.J cd : the bow which I put ( ^nrj ) in the cloud .'n th* day of creation, shall be, from this day, and hencO' fortli, for a sign of the covenant between me and you, so that every time that it appears, I will look upon it and remember my covenant ol peace. If it is a.sked then, what is meant by the bow's being a sign, I answei that it is like what is said Gen. xxxi. 48, in the eov enant between Jacob and Liban, n? nin bjtl TMT^^ lo^ this heap is a witness^ etc., or Gen. xxxi. 62^ naSBil iTIS , and this pillar shall he a leitness, etc. And so also Gen. xxi. 30, "'IJ^ npn mc"33 yzvi r» , seven iambs shall thou take from my hand, n"!;b fur a witness. In like manner everything that ap- pears as thus put before two, to cause them to re- member something promised or covenanted, is called nist . And so of the eircumeisiou ; God says, it shall be a sign of the covenant, r^^a rixb , between me and you. Tlius the bow that is now visible, and the bow that was in nature (J'3::3 ) from the be- giiming, or from of old ( cbisa ) are one in this, that the sign which is in them is one." He then proceeds to say that there are other and mystic interpreta- tions made by some of the Rabbins, but this great critic is satisfied with the one that he has given. Aben Ezra says that the most celebrati'd of the Jewish Rabbins held the same opinion as Maimonides, namely, that the rainbow was in nature from the be- ginning, though he himself seems to dissent. " And I will look upon it to remember the ciis ^'^13 , the covenant of eternity." Let us not be tioubled about the anthropopathism, but receive the precious thought in all its inexpressible tender- ness. Lange most beautifully characterizes such mutual remembrance as eye meeting eye. We all know that (ioil's memory takes in the total universe of space at every ujonient of time: but there are some tilings which lie remembers as standing out from the great totality. He remembers tlie act of faith, and the sign of faith, as he remembers no other human act, no other finite phenomenon. May we not believe that there is the same mutual re- membrance in the Eucliarist*:' The ^^ remember ine^^ implies " I will remember thee." The eye of the Redeemer looking mto the eye of tlie believer, or both meeting in the same memorial : this is certainly a " real presence," whatever else there may be of depth and mystery in that most fundamental Chris- tian rite — the evangelical cbiv IT^na PiS , or sign of the everlasting covenant. The Hebrew mx is not used of miraculous signs, properly, given as proofs of mission or doctrine. It is not a counteractian of natural law, or the bringing a new thing into nature. Any fixed object may be used for a sign, and here the very coveiuint itself, oi a most important part of it, being the stability of nature, there is a most striking consistency in the fact tluit the sii/H of such covenant is taken from na- ture itself The rainbow, ever ajipearing in the " sunshine after rain," is the very symbol of constant ft/. It is selected from all others, not only for its splendor and beauty, but for the ref/ularity with which it clieers us, when we look out lor it after the storm. Noah needed no witness of the supernatural The great in nature, in that early age when all wa» wonderful, was regarded as manii'esting (lod etiualli with the supernatural. Besides, in the flood itself there was a sufficient witness to the extraordinary CHAP. VIII. 20— IX. 1-17. 32'.« There was wanted, then, not a miracle strictly as an attestation of a message, or as a sign of belief, like the miracles in the New Testament (when there was a necessity for breaking up the lethargy of natural- ism), but a vivid memorial for the conservation rather than thi> creation of faith. The Hebrew word for miracle is more properly xis , though it may be ased simply for prodigy^ Uke the Greek rfpa?, in dis- tinction from the New Testament anut'tov, which is properly & proof or attestation of a miraculous kind. Tffjos simply means anything wonderful, whether in nature or not. Superstition converts such appear- ances into portents, or signs of something impending, but in the Bible God's people are expressly told " not to be dismayed at the signs of the heaven.-; as the heathen are." Jer. x. 1. The word there used is this same ninix in the plural, but accommodated to the heathen peivcisioii. To the believing Israelites the signs of the heavens, even though strange and unusual, were to be regarded as tokens of their cove- nant God above nature yet ruling in nature, and ever regulating the order of its phenomena. There is a passage sometimes quoted from Homkr, 11. xi. 27, 28 : 'lpi(Tut.v eoiKOTes o(TT€ Kpoviiiiv 'Ef vitrei CTTjjpife TEPA2 fj.ep6nuitf ayBpioiTtoy. " Like the rainbows which Zeus fixed in the cloud a sign to men of many tongues." But repas there has the sense of prodigy, or it may denote a wonderful and beautiful object. We cannot, theietbre, certainly infer from this any traditional recognition of tlie great sign-appointing in Genesis. So Plato quotes from Hesiod the genealogy of Iris (the rainbow), as the daughter of ©aunt's or Wonder, as a sort of poetical argument that Wonder is the parent of philosophy, as though the rainbow were placed in the heavens to stimulate men in the pursuit of curious knowledge. But it is the religious use that is prom- inent in this as in all the Bible appeals to the obser- vation of nature. It is for the support of faith in the God of nature, " that we may look upon it and remember ; " and this is admirably expressed in a Rabbinical doxology to be found in the Talmudic Kidduscliin, fol. 8, and which was to be recited at every apjiearance of the rainbow, n;n^ nnx "'■"'3 ir 'S-iribx, "Blessed be thou Jehovah our God, King of eternity (or of the world), ever mindful of thy covenant, faithful in thy covenant, firm in thy word," comp. Ps. cxix. 89, Forever, 0 Lord, thy word is settled in lieaven. The Targum of Oiikelos translates Gen. ix. 13: "And it shall be a sign, "|^a sols 1^-1 ■'"ilS^O, between myMorrf and the earth." It is not unreasonable to suppose some reference to this place in that difficult passage Hab. iii. 9, TjntlJp TiSP f^^^S , most obscurely rendered in our English version, " thy bow was made quite naked — the oaths of the tribes — the word." Kimchi trans- lates it revealed, made manifest. It is commonly thought that all that is said in that sublime chapter has reference to events that took place during the exodus, but there is good ground for giving it a wider ange, so as to take in other divine wonders, in crea- aon and in the patriarchal history. — T. L.] DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAD. 1. There are the most distinct indications that the flood, as the greatest epoch of the primitive time, made a turning point, not only in the spiritual life of humanity, but also in its physical relations, — yea in the very life of the earth itself Only we may nol\ in the first place, regard this turning point as s sudden change of all relations ; just as little aa the fall ((Jen. iii.) suddenly brought in death, or as ths cimfiision of tongues produced immetliately the wide-spread diversities of language. And, in tha second place, ag;un, it must not be regarded as ( change of all relations for the worse. There is an^ posed to liave been a change of the atmosphere (con- cerning the lain and the rainbow, see above). At all events, the paradisaical harmony of the earth had departed at an earlier day. But, on the other hand, there comes in now a more constant order of the atmospherical relations (ch. viii. 22). Again, some have called it a sudden change in the duration of human life. But to this is opposed the fact that the aged Noah lived 350 years after the flood. It ii evident, however, that during the period of Noah's life the breaking through of death from the inner to the outer life had made a great advance. And to this the fear which the flood brought upon tho children and grandchildren of Noah (not upon him- self) may have well contributed. As far as relates to the increasing ferocity of the wild beasts towards men, the ground of their greater estrangement und savageness caimot be found in their deliverance in the ark. .Already had the mysterious paradisaical peace between man and beast departed with the fall. Moreover, the words : "all flesh had corrupted its way," (ch. vi. 12) indicate that together with raeti's increasing wickedness the animal world had grown more ferocious. But if the mode of life as developed among men made the eating of flesh (and drinking of wine) a greater necessity for them than before, then along with the sanctioning of this new order of life, must there have been sanctioned also the chase. And so out of this there must have arisen a state of war between man and the animal world, wluch would have for its consequence an increased measure of customary fear among the animals that were pecuUarly exposed to it. 2. Immediately after the flood, Noah built an altar to Jehovah, his covenant God, who hud saved him. The living worship [cultns) was his first work, the culture of the vineyard was liis second. The altar, in like manner, was the sign of the ances- tral faith, as it had come down from paradise and had been transmitted through the ark. This faith was the seed-corn as well as sign of the future theocracy and the future church. It was an altar of faith, an altar of prayer, an altar of thanks- giving, for it was erected to Jehovah. But it was also an altar of confession, an acknowledgment that sin had not died in the flood, that Noah and his liouse was yet sinful and needed the symbolic sancti- fication. In this case, too, was the offering of an animal itself an expression of the greater alacrity in the sacrifice since Noah had preserved only a few specimens of the clean animals. This readmess in the offering was in that case an expression of his faith in salvation, wherein, along with his prayer for grace and compassion, there was inlaid a supplication for his house, for the new humanity, for the new world. His offering was a burnt-oliering, a whole burnt-offering (Kalil) or an ascending in the flame (Olah), as an expression that he, Noah, did thereby devote himself with his whole house, his whole race, and with the whole new earth, to the service of God. The single kinds of offering were all included in tliia central offering. It was this sense of his ofl'erinj 330 GENESIS OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. which made the strong burnt odor of the burning flesh, - ''sweet savor" for Jehovah in a nieta- phoricd^ sense. The attestation of Jehovah malst with these grants that guarantee the existence and well-being of the human race, stand the demands or claims made in respect to human conduct. The first is the avoidance of the eating of fle.sh with the blood, whereby there is together establislied the sanctification of the enjoyment, the avoidance of savageness as against nature, and of cruelly as against the beast. The second not only forbids the shedding of human blood, but commands also the punishment of murder ; it ordains the ma- gistracy with the sword of retribution. But it ex- presses, at the same time, that the humane civil organization of men must have a moral basis, namely the acknowledgment tliat all men are brothers (vns II) ^S every man, his brother man), and with this again, a religious basis, or the faith in a person- al God, and that inviolability of the human person- ality wliich rests in its imaged kinsmanship with God. On this follows the establishment of the cov- enant. Still it is irot made altogether dependent on the estJiblishmeni of the preceding claims. It is a covenant of oromise for the sparing of all living that reaches beyond this, because it is made not for in- dividuals but for all, not merely for the morally ac- countable but for infants, not merely foi men but also for the animal world. Notwithstanding, how- ever, this transcending universality of the divine covenant, it is, in truth, made on the supposition th:it faith in the grace and compassion of Jehovah, jiiety in respect to the blessing, the name and the image of Eiohini, shall correspond to the divine faithfulness, and that men shall find consolation and composure in the sign of the rainbow, only in as far as tliey preserve faiili in (iod's word of promise. 3. In the preceding Section we must distinguish biitween what God says in his heart, and what Klo- bim says to Noah and his sons. The first word, which doubtless was primarily comprehensible to >foah only, is the foundation of the second. For God's grace is the central source of his goodness to a sinful world, an on the side of men the believing »re the central ground for the preservation of the world, as they point to Christ the absolute centre, Ae world's redeemer having, however, bis preserv- ing life in those who are his own, as Ins word testi fies: Ye are the salt of the earth. We must, thea again distinguish between the word of blessing, which embraced Noah and his sons, and with them humanity in general, and the word of the coTe^jct which embraced all living (ch. ii. 10). 4. The institutions of the new humanity: 1. A\ the head stands the altai witti its bumt-oiferuig aa the middle point and commencing point of every offering, an expression of feeling that the life which God gave, which he graciously spares, which he wonderfully preserves, shall be consecrated to him, and consumed in iiis service. 2. The order of na- ture, and, what is very remarkable, as the ordinance of Jehovah, made dependent on the foregoing order of his kingdom of grace. 3. The institution of the marriage blessing, of the consecration of marriage, of the family, of the dispersion of men. 4. The domin. ion of man over the animal world, as it embraces the keeping of cattle, the chase, manifold use of the beasts. 5. The holding as sacred the blood — the blood of the animal for the altar of God, the blood of man for the priestly service of God ; the institu- tion of the htmianitat,* of the humane culture and order, especially of the magistracy, of the penal and judicial office (including personal self-defence and defensive war), ti. The grounding of this humaiitat on the rehgious acknowledgment of the .spii tual personality, of the relation of kinsman tliat man bears to God, of the fratern;il relation of men to «ach other, and, consequently, the grounding of the ftate on the basis of religion. 7. The appointment of the humanization of the earth (ver. 7) in the comnand to men to multiply on the earth — properly, upon it, and by means of it. As men must become divine through the image of God, so the earth must be humanized. 8. The appointment of the covenant of forbearance, which together with the secui ity of the creature-world against a second physical flood, expresses also the security of the moral world against perishing in a deluge of anarchy, or in the floods of popular commotion (I's. xciii). 9. The appointment of the sign of the covenant, or of the rainliovv as God's bow of peace, whereby there is at the same time ex- pressed, in the first place, the elevation of men above the deification of the creature (since the rainbow is not a divinity, but a sign of God, an appointment which even the idolatrous nations ajipiar not to have wholly forgotten, when they denote it God's bridgi', or God's messenger); in the second place, their intioductiou to the symbolic comprehension and interpretation of natural plienomeua, even to the symbolizing of forms and colors ; thirdly, that God's compassion remembers men in their dangers, as indicated by the fact, that in the sign of the rainbow hiseye n.cts tlicireye; fourth- ly the setting up a sign of light and lire, which, along with its assurance that the earth will never again be drowned in water, indicates at the same time its future transformation and glorification! through light and fire, 6. In the rainbow covenant all men, in their deal- ings with each otlier, and, at the same time, with all animals, have a conimon interest, namely, iti the preservation of life, a common promise, or the a.ssutt ance of the divine care for life, and a common luty in the sparing of life. fi. The offering as acceptable to God, ind its prophetic significance. ♦ [Our word fiumanity will not dc here at all ; as it cone* Bpontls to the Uemian itunsclilte.il ; whilst our huniHnitari- anism, on account of its abuse, w>J.l be etill warte. It it defined by what follows.— T. L.] CHAP. VIII. 20— IX. 1-17. 3» 7. The disputes concerning original sin have variously originated from not distinguishing its two opposing relations. These are, its relation to actual sin, Rom. v. 12, and to the desire for deliverance, Horn. vii. 23-25. 8. The magical or direct power of man over the beasts is not laken away, hut flawed, and thereupon repaired through his mediate power, derived from that superiority which he exercises as huntsman, fisher, fowler, etc. In regard to the first, compare Lange's "Miscelhuieous Writings," vol. iv. p. 189. 9. The ordinance of the punishment of death for aurder, involves, at the same time, the ordinance of the magistracy, of the judicial senteiice, and of the penal infliction. But in the historical development of humanity, the death-penalty has been executed with fearful excess and I'alse application (for exam- ple, to the crime of theft); since in this way, gener- ally, all humane savageness and cruelty has mingled in the punitive office. From this is explained the prejudice of the modern humanitarianism against capital punishment. It is analogous to the prejudice against the excommunication, and similar institutes, which human ignorance and furious human zeal have 80 fearfully abused. Yet still, a divine ordinance may not be set aside by our prejudices. It needs oidy to be rightly understood according to its own •limitation and idea. The fundamental principle for all time is this, that the murderer, through his own act and deed, has forfeited his right in human soci- ety, and incurred the doom of death. In Cain this principle was first realized, in tliat, by the curse of God, he was excommunicated, and driven, in self- banishment, to the land of Nod. This is a proof, that in the Christian humanitarian development, the principle may be reaUzcd in another form than through the Uteral, corporeal shedding of blood (see Lange's treatise Gesttzliche Kirche als Sinnhild, p. 72'). It must not, indeed, he overlooked, that the mention is not merely of putting to death, but also of blood-shedding, and that the latter is a terrific mode ot speech, whose warnings the popular life widely needed, and, in many respects, still needs. Luther : " There is the first command for the em- ployment of the secular sword. In the words there is appointed the secular magistracy, and the right as derived from God, which puts the sword in its hands." Every act of murder, according to the Noachian law, appears as a fratricide, and, at the same time as malice against God, 10. To this passage: "for in the image of God made he man," as also to the passage, James iii. 9, has the appeal been made, to show that even after the fall there ia no mention of any loss of the divine image, but only of a darkening and disorder of the same. Others, again, have cited the apparently op- posing language, Coloss. iii. lU, and similar passages. But in this there has not always been kept in mind the distinction of the older dogmatics between the conception of the image in its wider sense (the spirit- u;tl nature of man) and the more restricted sense (the spiritual constitution of man). In like manner el.ould there be made a fiirther distinction between ^^e di^^position of Adam as conformed to the image (m^de in, or after the image) and the image itself as freely developed in Christ (the express image, Heb. xiii ), as also finally between the natural man consid- ered in the abstract, in the consequences of his fall, and the natural man in the concrete, as he appears in the operation of the gratia prcevetiiens. This perfect developed image A(fam could not have lost, for he had not attained to it. Neither can men lose th< ontological image as grounded in the spiritual na- ture, because it constitutes its being ; but it maj darken and distort it. Tlic image of God, however in the ethical sense, the divine mind {i'riua ir«u- wuTos), tliis he actually lo.st to the point where tha ffratia pniveniens laid hold on him, and made a poini of opposition between his gradual restoratija and the fall in ahstracto. But to what degree this image of God in fallen man had liecome lost, is shown in this very law against muider, which expresses the inalienable, personal worth, tliat is, the worth that consists in the image as still belonging to man, and thus, in contrast with grace, nmst man become con- scious of the full consequences of his sinful corrup- tion according to the word : what would I have been without thee 'i what would I become without thee ? 11. With this chapter has the K'lbbinical tradi- tion coimected their doctrine of the seven Noachio precepts. (Buxtorf ; Lexicon Talmudicum, article, Ger, 15). They are: 1. De judiciis; 2. de benedic- tions Dei ; 3. de idolairia fugienda ; 4. de scorta- tione ; 5. de effusione sanguinis; 6. de rapina , 7. de meinbrn de animali vivo sc. non tollendo. The earUer supposition, that the Apostolical decree (Acta XV.) had relation to this, and that, accordingly, in its appointments, it denominated the heathen Christian*" as proselytes of the gate (on whom the so-called Noachian laws were imposed) is disputed by Meyer, in his "Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles" (p. 278), though not on satisfactory grounds. The matter of chief interest is the recognition, that in the Israelitish consciousness there was a clear distinction between revealed patriarchal precepts and the Mo- saic law. Sucli a distinction is also expressed by Christ, John viL 22, 2;-;. So, too, did the Levitical law make a distinction between such precepts a3 were binding upon aliens (proselytes of tlie g^te; and such as were binding upon the Jews (Lev. xvii. 14 ; see Bibctwerk; Acts of the Apostles, p. 215). It lies in the very nature of the case, that in Acts xv. the seventh precept of the tradition, according to its wider appomtment, was divided into two (namely, abstinence from blood and from thinis strangled), and that, moreover, only those points came into the general view, in respect to which heathen Christians, as freer Christians, might be liable to fail. It was, in fact, a monotheistic pat.iarchal custom, which, aa the expression of the patriarchal piety and humane- ness, became the basis of the Mosaic law, and on this basis must the heathen Christians have come together in ethical association, if, in their freedom from the dogmas of the Mosaic law, they would not endanger even the cburchly and social communion of the Jewish Christians (see Lange : Oeschichte de» Apostolischen Zeitalters, li. p. 187). The prohibition of blood-eating has here no longer any dogmatic sig- nificance, but only an ethical. The Greek Church mistook this in its maintenance of the prohibition (TruUanic Council, 692), whereas, the Western C'hurch, in the changed relations, let the temporary appointment become obsolete. 12. On the symbolical significance of the rain oow, see Delitzsch, p. 277, and Lange's " Miscella neous Writings," i. p. 277, from which Delitzsch gives the following passage : " The rainbow is the colored glance of the sun as it breaks forth from the night of clouds ; it is its triumph over the floods — a solar beam, a glance of light burnt into the rain-cloud in sign of its submission, in sign of the protection of all living through the might of the sun, or rather the 332 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. compassion of God." To this adds Delitzsch : " As it lights up tlie dark ground that just before was dis- charging itself in flashes of lightning, it gives us an iiiea of the victory of God's love over the black and fiery wrath ; origiiuiting a.s it does from the effects of the sun upon the sable vault, it represents to the feenses the readiness of the heavenly light to pene- trate the earthly obscurity ; spanned between heaven ted earth, it announces peace between God and man ; arching the horizon, it proclaims the all-embracing universality of the covenant of grace." He tlien (rites some of the mythical designations of the rain- bow. It is called by the Hindoos, the weapon of Indras; by the Greeks, Iris, the messenger of the gods ; by the Germans, Bifrost (livinri uat/), and Aeen-briicke, ''^bridge of Asen ;'''' by the Samoeids, the seam or " border of God's robe." Tiiere are, be- sides, many significant popular savings connected with its appearance. Knobel : " The old Hebrews looked upon it as a great band joining heaven and earth, and biiidingthem both together; as the Greek (pis comes from ttfu!, to tie or bind,* they made it, therefore, the sign of a covenant, or of a relation of peace between God in heaven, and the ereatures upon the earth. In a similar manner the heavenly ladder. Gen. xxviii. 12." On this, nevertheless, it must oe remarked, that the Hebrews were conscious of the symbolic sense of the designation ; not so, however, the Greeks, who were taken with the fable merely. In like manner, too, did the Hebrew view rest upon a divine revelation. How tar the mere human inter- pretation may be wide of the truth, is shown by the fact, that classical antiquity regarded the rainbow as for the most part announcing " rain, the wintry storm, and war." [XOTE ON THE ANCIENT, THE UNIVERSAL, AND THE Unchanging Law of Homicide. — The divine statute, recorded ch. ix. B, is commonly assailed on grounds that are no less an abuse of language, than they are a perversion of reason and Scripture The taking the hfe of the murderer is called revenge — no distinction being made between this word, which ever denotes something angry and personal, and vengeaiice, which is the requital of justice, holy, in- visible, and free from passion. On this false ground there is an attempt to set the Old Testament in oppo- sition to the New, notwithstanding the express words of Christ to the contrary. This perverse misnomer, and the argument grounded upon it, apply equally to all punishment, strictly such — to all retributive jus- tice, or to any assertion of law that is not resolvable into the merest expediency, excluding altogether the idea of desert, and reducing the notion of crime sim- ply to that of mischief, or inconvenience. It thus becomes itself revenge in the lowest and most per- sonal sense ol the term. Discarding the higher or abstract justice, giving it no place in human law, severing the earthly government wholly from the divine, the proceeding called punishment, or justice, is nothing more nor less than the setting the mere personal convenience of the majority, called society, against that of the smaller numbers whom such soci- ety calls criminals. This has all the personality of revenge, whether with piission, or without ; whereas, •he ibstract justice, with its moral ground, and ita dft of intrinsic desert, alone eseajies the charge. Intimately connected with this is the question re- sjiecting the true idea and sanction of human gov- ♦ [Plato, ill the CratyluM, fanciftllly coniie, The magistracy is God's ordinance, and derives the swo'd from no other authority (Rom. xiii. 14). Starke prefers the view that the rainbow had existed before the flood, as in like manner he supposes, that before the flooif men might eat of flesh. — Ver. 15, I.UTHKii: When the Scripture saya " God remembers," it mearif Oia* CHAP. rX. 16-29. 335 me foe! and are conscious that he remembers it, aamely, when he outwardly presents himself ii' such a manner, that we, thereby, talce notice that he thinks thereon. Therefore it all comes to this : as I present myself to God, so does he present himself to me. Schroder : After God's curse on the occasion of the fall, we meet with the offerings of Cain and Abel ; again do offering and altar connect themselves with the judicial curse of the flood. — " The Lord smelled a sweet savor," in the Hebrew, a savor of rest (rest- ing, or satisfaction) ; (" it denotes that God rests from his wrath and has become propitiated." Luther). Therefore is it a savor of satisfaction — a chosen ex- pression that becomes fixed in its application to the burnt-offering. — " Jehovah spake to his heart," that is, be resolved with himself. In the creation of man, oh. i. 26 ; ii. 18, and also in his destruction, there precedes a formal decree of God ; and no less doeJ the divine counsel precede the covenant for man'f preservation. Prayer was always connected with th« sacrifice ; in fact, every offering was nothing eisa than an embodied prayer. — While the earth remain- etk. There is, therefore, even to the earth in it« present state, a limit indicated (2 Pet. Ui. 6, 7, 10; Isaiah Ixvi. ; Rev. xx. 11 ; xxi. 1). — Ch. ix. 1, Thf Noachian covenant is a covenant of Elohim, a cove naut with the universal nature. Luther finds in our Section the inauguration of an order of instruction, of economy, and of defence (Noah's offering, the blessing of the family, inauguration of the magis- tracy).— Ver. 1, God does not love death, but life. The covenaut is re-established, for as made with Adam it had failed. According to Calvin the rain- bow had existed before, but was here again conse- crated as a sign and a pledge. SECOND SECTION. 21k* Revelation of Sin and of Piety in Noah's Family — Tfie Curse and the Blasinff of Noaa — The twofold Blessing, and the Blessing in the Curse itself. Chapter IX. 18-29. 18 And the sons of Noah that went forth of the ark were Shera, and Ham, and 19 Japheth ; and Ham is the father of Canaan. These are the three sons of Noah ; and 20 of them was the whole earth overspread. And Noah began' to be a husbandman, and 21 he planted a vineyard; And he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was un 22 covered within his tent. And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of hia 23 father, and told his two brethren without. And Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness ot their father ; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their fatlier's nakedness. 24 And Noah awoke from his wine [his sleep of mt«xication], and knew what his younger son 25 had done unto him. And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants'" shall he 26 be unto his brethren. And he said, Blessed be the Lord God of Shem [Jehovah, God 27 of the name, or who preserves the name] ; and Canaan shall be his servant. God shall enlarge Japheth' [one who spreads abroad], and he shall dwell* in the tents of Shem; and Canaan 28 shall be his servant. And Noah lived after the flood three htuidred and fifty years. 29 And all the days of Noah were nine hundred and fifty years ; and lie died. \} Ver. 20. — n^TXil ^^X Flj 3 n'1 , rendered "and Noah began to be a husbandman," — man of the adamah, ot man of flip soif—yeuffy6^—agricola. It cannot mean that this was the first time he had practised husbandry, but the beginning of it after tne flood, when he and his sons had descended into the low country. — T. L.] [3 Ver. 25. — C"t3~ "I^^l , " a servant of servants " — a Hebraism to denote the intensity or degradalion of Canaan's servitude — the lowest and vilest of servants, or, as they are afterwards characterized, ** hewers of wood and drawers of vater,^' in distinction from the ordinary subjugation of a conquered people. For remarks on ^t3^n 133 , "fti's younger ion," or little son, and its reference to Canaan alone, see appendcl Note, p. 337, on Noah*s curse and blessings. — T. L.l [' Ver. 27.— rS"b f ST' "shall enlarge Japheth." Europe (evpiimj), wide-faced, extensive, spacious. This sup- posed residence, as it mainly was, of the sons of Japheth, had this name very early. From its unknown extent it was (ircbably so called in comparison wi' h the bettrr known parts of conti^ous Asia. The Greeks may have simply trans* ated the earlj tradition of the prophecy into the name evptltin), and afterward perverted it, according to their usual' course, by one of their absurd fables. — T. L.] (< Ver. 27.— paj'i", "and he shall dwell," etc. Who shall dwell? The Jewish authorities, with few excel toM ■ay it is God, the subject of the verb just preceding, and this is, doubtless, according to grammatical regularity. Set Aben Exra, Rashi, and others. Sometimes, to avoid the seeming anthropopathism, they substitute for God th« word i^ix, his light, or nj^ZC (SheUnah), deriving it from this very verb ■3\!:'' . Thus, the Targnm of Onkeloa; b'Sn n:3'j1Da nri:2tl) ■^■^C^l, "lUs Shektnah [or indwelling) shall abide in the dwelling Imashker.eh) of Shem." Bo the Arab c. both of the Polyglott and of Arabs Erpenianus, »m La^CJ»I jj ^)y^ ^^wX-jO« , " His Light alikl' dwell in the tents of Shem." See further, appended note, p. 337. on the blessing of Noah. -T. L.' »36 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. EXEGETICAI- AND CRITICAL. 1. The Signiiicance of this Jr/wrlstic Sectio^t. This second event in the life of Noiih after tlie fiomi is evidently of the highest meaning ; as was the first, namely, Noah's offering and God's blessing and cov- enant. In the first transaction there are delineated the ground-features of the new constitution of the eartli, as secured by the covenant of God with the pious Noah. In the present Section we learn the ad- vance of culture, but we recognize also the continu- ance of sin in the new hiunan race ; still, along with the earlier contrast between piety and perverseness, there comes in now the new contrast of a blessed life of culture as compared with the religious life of a divine cultua^ or worship. In what Noah says of his sons, we read the ground-forms of the new state, and of the world-historical partition of mankind. In Knobel's representation of it, this higher signifi- cance of the Section is wholly effaced. In the curse upon Canaan (according to this view), and in his appointment to servitude, the Jehovist would give an explanation of the fact, that the Caiuianites were subjugated by the Hebrews, and that Pha'ni- cian settlers among the Japhethites * appear to have had a similar fate. But that the curre was pro- nounced upon Canaan, and not upon Ham, was be- cause other Hamitic nations, such as the Egyptians, etc., were not in the same evil ca»e. Still, it is not Canaan, but Ham himself, who is set forth as the shameless author of the guilt, (? ) because the writer would refer certain shameless usages of the Hauiitie nations to their first ancestor. Now, on the simple supposition of the truth of the prediction, and of the connection between (he guilt of the ancestor, and the corruption of his descendants, tliis construction must fiill to the ground. Knobel cites it as "an ancient view," that the cursings of those who are distinguished as men of God, have power and effect as well as their blessings. 2. Yer. 19. By them was the whole earth overspread. — A main point of our narration. " The second event in the life of Noah after the flood shows us the germs for tlie future development of the human race in a threefold direction, which is prefigured in the character of his three son.s." To this end the repetition of their names. The mention of Canaan introduces the mention of the land in the following verse, as used for the inhabitants of the Land; as in ch. x. 26 ; xi. 1, and otlier passages in which cities and lands are frequently named instead of their population." Keil. 3. Vers. 2o, 21. Noahh Work, Iris ItuUlgetice and hia Error. The translation : " and Noah began to be a husb.-mdman" is rightly set aside liy I)elitz.sch and Keil. The worri for husiiaiidman lias llic arti- cle, and is, tlierefore, in ap|iosition with Noah. Noah, as husbandman, began to plant a vineyard. The agriculture that had been interrupted by the flood, he again carrii.'S on, and makes it more com- plete by means of the new culture of the vine. Ar- menia, where he landed with the ark, is an anciently known vine-land. "The ten tliou.-^and (Xkn., Amiii. 4, 4, '.') found in Armenia old and well flavored • (The Phoenifiana, ns distiiipii«hod from tho Onnnnn- itM antl .Sidonians, were probably .Slirmilejs, as they Mpiike the Sh'rraitic lantrua(*e, uml tliuHm:ido it the lanEniapn ot the whole di-'trict, Tbi.ic(irrOK]iondn to w))at \s Biiid by Herodo- tus an'i Stnibo, that they camo from the Persian Gulf— the land of Sbinar. the old liomi^luiid T. L.1 wines: even at this day the vine grows there, pro ducing wine of great excellence, even at the hejghl of four thousand feet above the level of the se« (Ritter: Geography, x. p. 66^). That the culture of the vine came i'rom Asia is well known. Th« Greek myth ascribes it to Dyonysus or Bacchus, representing it, sometimes, as deiived from the In- dians, and again, as belonging to the Phrygians, who were related to the Armenians (Hioo.' Sic. 362; Strabo, 10)." Knobeh The story designat is a hill on the northwest, adjacent to the Great Ararat, and furnishing the means of its ascent, as the region where Noah set out his vine-plants. The village of Argnri (Agorri), which in 1840 was destroyed in an eruption of Ararat, stood upon the place referred to. Frequent projections of stones, and outpouring streams of lava and mud, have, in the course ol time, destroyed all the fertile soil of Ararat (K. Koch, in "Piper's Year Book," 1852, p. 28)." Delitzsch. The wine-garden of Noah is a mild reflex of paradise in the world of the fallen human race ; and this enjoyment, in its excessively sinful use, to which Noah led the way, although he was not aware of its effect, has become a reflex of -Adam's enjoyment of the tree of knowledge ; with this difference, how. ever, that Noah erred m ignorance, and not in the form of conscious transgression. Intoxication by wine makes men lax in respect to sexual sin ; and this connection is gently indicated in the fiiot that Noah, as he lay unguar-dcd in his tent, exposed him- self contrary to the law of modesty. In the error of the father there reveals itself the character of the sons. 4. Vers. 22, 23. The Brhavior of the Som Ham's conduct was, at first, a sin of omission. He saw the nakedness (the shame) of his father, and neither turned away his eyes nor covered him ; thei he told it to his brethren without, and this was his sin of commission. His behavior had the chanictei not merely of lustful feeling, but of utter shameless ness; whereas the act of the two brothers presents a beautifully vivid image of delicacy, being at the same time an act of modesty and of piety. Reverence, piety, and chastity, are, in children, the three foun- dations of a higher life ; whereas in impiety and sen- sual associations, a lower tendency reveals itself. Out of the virtues and the vices of the family come the virtues and the vices of nation.*, and of the world. At the same time, the mariner in which the two sons treat the case, presents a charming image of prudence and quick decision. They seize the first best robe that conies to baud, and that was the n^Btt." , sjiread it out, and as they go backward with averted faces, lay it upon the nakedness of their father. fi. Vers. 24-29. Koah's Curse and Blessing. His end. — And Noah awoke from his wine ; that is, tire intoxicalion fVoni wine (see 1 Sam. i. 14; XXV. 37). — And knew. — This .«ecras to suppose that his sons had told him, which, howei'er, may have been occasioned by his asking aliout the robe that covered him. The whole proceeding, however, must have come to light, and that, too, to his t\vn\ liumih- ation. — His younger son (liii'ially, his son, the liV lie, or lire less; see cli. v. ;i2).— The eH'ect upoa him of the account is au elevated prophitic stale cf soul, in which the language of the seer takes the form of poetry. — Cursed be Canaan. — The fact that he did not cur.se the evil-doer himself, but hit son, is (\\plaincd away, according to Origen, in a He- brew Midrash, which says that the young Cimaan had first seen his mandfathcr in this condition, aii4 JHAP. IX. 18-29. 33T told it to hia father — clearly an arbitrary exegesis. According to Havernilt and Keil, all the sons of Ham were included in the oui-se, but the curse of HaiD was concentrated on Canaan. Keil and Heng- Btenberg find, moreover, a motive in the name 'iS!3 , which does not mean, originally, a low country^ but the servile. " Uam gave to his sou the name of obe- dience, a thing which he himself did not practise." Hengstenberg supposes that Canaan was already fol- lowing his father's footsteps in impiety and wicked- ness. According to Hofmann and Delitzsch. Canaan had the curse imposed upon him because he was the youngest son of Ham (ch. x. 6), as Ham was the youngest son of Noah. " The great sorrow of heart which Ham had occasioned to his father was to be punished in the sufl'ering of a similar experience from his owu youngest son." Rightly does Keil reject this. The exposition of Knobel we have already cited; according to it the later condition of the Ca- naanites was only antedated in the prophecy of Noah. Before all things must we hold fast to this, that the language of Noah is an actual prophecy ; and not merely an expression of personal feeUng. That the question has nothing to do with personal feeling is evident from the fact, that Ham was not personally cursed. According to the natural relations, the youngest grandchildren would be, in a special man- ner, favorites with the grandfather. If now, not- withstanding this, Noah cursed his grandchild, Ca- naan, it can only be explained on the ground that in the prophetic spirit he saw into the future, and that tne vision had for its point of departure the then present natural state of Canaan. We may also say, that Ham's future was contained in the future of Cauiiau ; the future of the remaining Hamites he left undecided, without curse and without blessing, al- though the want of ble.ssing was a significant omen. Had, however, Noah laid the curse on Ham, all the sons of Ham would have been denoted in like man- aer with himself; even as now it is commonly as- sumed that they were, though without sufficient ground (see Dklitzsch, p. 281). There is do play upon the name Canaan, as upon the name Japheth — a thing which is to be noted. But that in the behavior of Canaan Noah had a point of depart- jre for his prophecy, we may well assume with Hengstenberg —A servant of servants ; that is, the lowest of servants. If the language had had in view already the later extermination of the Canaan- ites, it must have had a different style. The form of the expression, therefore, testifies to the age of the prophecy. We must also bear in mind, that the re- lation of servant in this case denotes no absolute relation in the curse, or any developed slave relation, any more than the relation of service which was im- posed upon Esau in respect to Jacob. There even lies in it a hidden blessing. The common natures must, of themselves, take a position of inferiority ; through subordination to the nobler character are they saved, in the disciphne and cultivation of the Spirit. — Blessed be Jehovah, God of Shem. — The blessing upon Shem has the form of a doxology to Jehovah, whereby, as Luther has remarked, it is distinguished as a most abundant blessing, which finally reaches its highest point in the promised seed. " If Jehovah is the God of Shem, then is Shem the recipient and the heir of all the blessings of salvation which God, as Jehovah, procures for humanity." Keil. — And Canaan shall be his servant.- -The word i^s (regularly ons) is taken by Gesenius as a poeti- eal expression for ib ; DeUtzsch refers it, as plural 22 to both brothers — Keil and Knobel to their descend- ants. The descendants, how^ever, are represented G the ancestor, and, therefore, the explanation of (ieoe- nius gives the only clear idea. — God shall enlarge Japheth, [or, as Lange renders it], God give en- largement to the one vrho spreads abroad. — In the translation we retain the play upon the word, and the explanation of the name Japheth. Keil ex- plains the word (meaning literally, to make room, to give space for outspreading) as metaphorical. To make room is equivalent to the bestowment of hap- piness and prosperity. It must be observed, how- ever, that the name Shem, and the blessing of Shem, denotes the highest concentratio7i ; whilst in oppoai tion to this the name Japheth and the blessing ol Japheth, denotes the highest expansion., not onlj geographically, but also in regard to the spread of civilization through the earth, and its conquest both outwardly and intellectually. This is the spiritual mission of Japhethism to this day — namely, the mental conquest of the world. The culture life of Japheth, as humanitarian, scientific, stands in hap monious contrast with the cultus, or religionism, of Shem. Therefore, too, must Japheth's blessing come from Elohim. — And he shall dwell in the tents of Shem. — The words, Ac shall duvll, are by some (Onkel, Dathe, Baumgarten) referred to Elohim. But this bad already been expressed in the blessmg of Shem, and had therefore nothing to do with the blessing of Japhetfi. What is said relates to Ja- pheth ; and that, too, neither in the sense that the Japhethites shall settle among the Shemites, or that they shall conquer them in their homes (Clericus, Von Bohlen, and others), but that Japheth's dwell ing in the tents of Shem shall be in the end his uniting with him in rehgious communion (Targum Jonathan, Hieronymus, Calvin, and others). The op- posite interpretation (Michaehs, Gesenius, De Wette, Knobel, and others), which explains Shem here (DUJ) as meaning literaUy name, or fame (dwell in the tents of renown), appears to have proceeded from a mis- apprehension of the prophetic significance of the language. To dwell in the tents of any one, Knobel holds, cannot mean religious communion. That would be true, if the one referred to had not imme- diately before been denoted as an observer of the true reUgion. That the Japhethites, that is, the Greeks, early dwelt in the tents of renown, is, in this respect, a matter by itself, which had already been set forth in Japheth's own blessing, as implied in what is said of his expansion. As the brothers, whatever contrast there might have been in their characters, had been one in their piety towards their father, so must their posterity become one in this, that they shall finally exchange with each other theif respective blessmgs — in other words, that JaphetK shall bring into the tents of Shem what he has woo from the world, and, in return for it, share in the blessing of the Name — the name Jehovah, or the true religion. — And Noah lived. — In the Armenian legend, Arnojoten, in the plain of the Araxes, has the name of his place of burial. With the death of Noah, the tenth member of the Genealogical table, ch. v., finds its conclusion. [Note o.v the Curse of Canaan — thk sup- posed Cdrse of Ham — the Blessing of Siiksi AND Japheth. Gen. ix. 24. And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his youngest sort had doiu unto him. ^p^'" , LXX. Hivriifc, became fully con- scious of his condition, Comp. 1 Cor. XV. 24. ~Ti. knew, became seiuible of. It is not the wi.rd ...iit aoS GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. <»ould have been employed had he learned it from me inlbi-mation of others. It denotes intelligence — bv the eye, as Is. vi. ". — by the touch, Gen. xix. S3, —experience by any sense, Deut. xi. 2, — or by the exercise of the' mind as following such experience, Judg. xiii. 21. Had done unto him, ib '^'^v This \a souiothing more than an omission or a neglect. The word is a very positive one. Something unmis- takable, something very shameful had been done onto the old man in his unconscious state, cither the stripping off his robe, or some act of abuse or mock- ery of such a nature that it becomes manifest to him immediately on his recovery. It may be remarked, too, that -CS rx may more properly be rendered, indefinitely, u thing which, or sometliing which, his youngest son had done unto him. But who was the eulprit ? Of this, too, the patriarch appears to have been immediately sensible, or to have immediately inferred it from something he must have known of the supposed perpetrator. He seems to have had no doubt. Now Ham had done nothing to his father. On discovery of his state he hastens to his brothers, it may be with the same filial intentions that they more promptly carried out. The sight appears to nave been aceideutal and involuntary. The word is eis, youngest of all. See also Gen. xxix. IS, where, from a sunila? association of ideas, Rachel is called njajsn r^ria , thy little daughter, though in that case there werf but two of them. Everything points to Canaan as the youngest son, at that time, of all the Noachic family. He WHS the direct object of the curse, which, instead of a.^eiidiiig to the father, contrary to everything else of the kind in the Bible, was so fully accomplished in Canaan's own direct descendants. So clear is this, that some of the best commentators, including most of the Jewish, although still keeping Ham as the main figure, in consequence of the old prepossession, reureseiit Canaan as playing an active part in the business. It is the current Jewish tt-adition, that he first saw the exposure and told it U> his father. Others ascribe to him a shameful act of mutilation, from whence it is thought came the old fable of Saturn. "It was Canaan that did it," says Abeu Ezra, " although the Scripture does not in words re- veal what it was." Rashi also gives the story ol mutilation, ''010 :'~'2"X IT"', and he refers to the Sanhodrin of the Talmud. That most acute critic, Scahger, not oidy ascribes the act to Canaan, whether it was a positive exposure or anything else, but acquits Ham of all positive blame : ■' Quid Cham fecit patri suo ? Nihil ; taulum fratribus de patrii pro/jro nunciua fuit." ScALiG., Elench., p. 04. Ham might have been called the younger son in res|)ect to Shem, as he was the elder in respect to Japhelh, but this would neither answer to lap "3 here, nor suit the evidently intended distinctiveness of the designation. On the other hand, he was in no sense minimus or youngest, unless there is wholly disregarded the order in which the names occur at every mention of the three : Shem, Ham, Japheth. See (ien. v. 32; vi. 10; vii. 13; ix. IS; x. 1. This would make hun the middle one, at all events, whether Shem or Japheth were regarded as the eld- est. The deternunation of the latter question would depend upon the interpretation of Gen. v. :'.2, and X. 21. "Noah was five hundred years old and begat Shem, llani, and Japheth." It is not at all credible that the births of ihe-^e sons should have been so ne:ir together that they all took place tit, or even alxiiit, the time when Noah was five hundred years old. It appears from Gen. .\i. 10, that Shem was horn about this time, making him almiit one linn:iri'd years olil at the begiiming of the year after the flood Now, if we render Gen. v. 32: "Noah was five hun- dred years old, and had begotten," or, when he hao CHAP. IX. 18-2!>. 33S oegottcu, etc., making the series cud at tbat time, which is perfectly consistent with the Hebrew idiom, then the first-named would probably have been the youngest, as last begotten, and marking the date. If they were all born afterwards, the inference would, for the same reason, have been just the other way. '.n favor of the first view, which would make Japlieth the elder, there is the rendering which our Englir-h version gives to Gen. x. 21 : Shein, the brotlier of Japlieth the elder, instead of, the elder brother of Ja- phe;h. Some commentators have favored tliis on the ground that Shem must hiive been born after Xoah was five hundred years old, because his own age is stated as being one hundred years, two years (C^nsii' or the second year, or, as the dual form more strongly implies, between one and two years) after the flood. But besides the minute trifling of such an interpre- tation, there is a grammatical difficulty in the way which is insuperable. In the expression TE" TiX^ Snsn , the two first words being in regimen, the epithet "5^^5^^ must belong to the whole as a com- pound : Japhtih'.i brother, the elder ; otherwise it would be like making tlie adjective in English agree with the possessive case. Compare Judges ii. 7, binjn nin''_ niJSO bs, every great work of the Lord; 1 Sam. xvii. 28, bnsri THS SS^bs, Eliab his elder brother, where the pronoun corresponds to the noun in regimen, and, especially, such cases as Judges i. 13; iii. 9, which are precisely like this, logically and grammatically: "itSiSP zbo 'ns . Caleb\i younger brother, not, the brother of Caleb '.he younger. So far the sense may be said to be fixed grammatically, but the fair inference from the context, and the fact that appears in it that there were three brothers, would seem to give it not only a comparative, but a superlative sense ; the brother of Japheth, the elder one, — implying that there were two brothers older than Japheth, and that Shem was the oldest of them. If we look at the whole context (Ham and his genealogy having been just disposed of), we shall see that there was more reason for the narrator's saying this than for merely mentioning that Shem was older than Japheth. These consider- ations would seem to fix the position of Ham as the middle son; although, without them, it n]ight have been reasonably argued that Ham himself was the oldest, from the fact that his descendants, with the exception of Canaan (unless we may reckon the Phoenicians among then)), so get the start, in history and civilization, of both Shem and Japheth. A very strong argument against the hypothesis that Ham was cursed here instead of Canaan, arises from the want of allusion, in all other parts of the Scripture, to any such sweeping malediction as in- volving all Ham's descendants. The accomplishment of the curse upon Canaan is mentioned often, and ',he frequent allusion to them as " hewers of wood %nd drawers of water," is only an emphatic repetition «f Noah's words, D^t:?. i^V, Mrvant of ■<:ervants — not slare of slaves, as some would take it, but an intensive Hebrew idiom to denote the most complete Bubjugation, such as the Cauaanites were reduced to kn the days of Joshua and Solomon.* How utterly • (The fact that, of all the descendants of Ham, Cauaan WBS \ 16 nearest object of interest to the Jews, and so histor- ically of most importance lo thera. {dves the reason of the SOBcewbat peculiar deeitmation. Gen. ix. 18, where a kind ?f note is ufllsed to Ham's name, i-tating tbat be was the father cf Canaan, or rather that this was another name Strange would such language have sounded, had ii been applied, at any time during the national exist ence of the Jews, to the lordly descendants of Cush, Mitzraim, and Nimrod ! " Shall be servant to tliem,'" "'sb , a collective term for the descendants of Shem, who had just been blessed. So is it taken by all thf Jewish expositors, who regard the antecedent Id ver. 20 as being Shem alone, no other being men tioned or implied, and in ver. 27, as being Sliem and the (jod of Shem who should dwell in his tents. See also Gesenius, Lehrgeb., p. 221. Instead of having ever been servant to Shem, cither in the political or commercial sense, Mitzraim held the IsraeUtes for centuries in bondage ; Cush (the JSthiopians and the Lubims) conquered them (see 2 Chron. xii. 3 ; xvi. 8) ; the nation that Nimrod founded sacked their cities and brought their land under tribute. Instead of being servants to Japheth, the descendants of Ham were founding empires, building immense and popu- lous cities, whilst the sons of the younger brother, with the exception of the Mediterranean or Javanic line, were roaming the dense wilds of Middle and Northern Europe, or the steppes of Centi-al Asia, ever sinking lower and lower into barbarism, as each wave of migration was driven farther on by those that followed. The more abject race, as some would hold them, were the pioneers of the world's civilization, advancing rajjidly in agriculture and the arts, organ- izing governments admirable for their order though despotic in form, digging canals and lakes to fertilize the desert, everywhere turning the arid earth into a luxuriant garden, whilst the early Gomerites, and those who followed them in their wilderness march to the extreme west of Europe, were falling from iron to copper, from copper to stone, from the im- plements of Lamech, and of the ark and tower- builders, to the rude flint axes and bone knives that some have regarded as remains of pre-adamite men. 1'he Hamites go down to Egypt, or ascend the Euphrates, and how soon uprise the pyramids, the immense structures of Thebes, the palaces of Baby- lon and Nineveh, whilst the other wretched wander- ers of the wild woods and marshes were building rude huts on piles, over lakes and fens, to protect themselves fi-om the wild bea.-. way, God is to be glorified in him, a fact which Noa'. can only express in the form of a doxology. In thij way Shem has it as his task : 1. to rule over Canaan, and to educate him as the master the servant ; 2. to receive Japheth as a paternal guest who returns after a long wandering, and to exchange with him good for good — the goods of cullM and the goods of culture. 14. The number of Noah's sons is three, the num- ber of the Spirit. The Spirit will get the victory in the post-diluvian humanity that has been baptized in the flood. HOMILETIOAL AND PEACTICAI,. See the Doctrinal and Ethical. The form of life in Noah: 1. Wherein sunilar to that of Adam? 2. wherein similar to that of Christ ? 3. wherein it possesses something peculiar, that lies between them both. Noah's wine-culture — the sign of a new step in progress in the life of humanity. — The vine in its significance : 1. In its perilous import ; 2. in its higher significance. — God hath provided not merely for our necessity, but also for our refreshment and festive exhilaration. The more refined his gifts, so much the more ought they to draw us, and make ua feel the obligation of a more refined life. .Noah's weakness ; its connection with his freedom, his strug- gle and inquiry. The watchfulne.ss and discipline of the Spirit is the only thing that can protect us again.at the intoxication of the sense. — How one sensual ex- cess is connected with another. — How the sins of the old have for their consequence the sins of the young. Impiety (irreverence, want of a pious fear), a root of every evil, especially those of an impure tendency. — Piety a root of everything nolile. It has two branches: 1 . devoutness ; 2. moral cultivation. The harmony of Shem and Japheth. O, that it were so in our times. How they should mutually feel the obli- gation to cover their father's nakedness ; that is, in tliis ca.se, the harm of the earUer time and tiadition. What glorious effects would come from the harmony of Christendoni and civilization ? Shem, Ham, and Japheth: 1. All three distinct characters and types; 2. regarded as two parts, they are two sons of bless- ing, one child of the curse; 3. as one group. Ca- naan the servant of Shem and Japheth. Jaiihcth the guest and the domestic inmate of Shem. — The blessing of Noah : 1. Its most universal significance; 2. its Messianic significance. — Noah's joy, .sorrow and consolation after the flood : 1 . Ti:.e exjiandin^ race ; 2. the new development of evil ; 3. the pre- signal of the patriarchal faith. Stauke : Jncliriatiis e-it, ■ion quod viliosua (ssel CHAP. IX. 18-jy. 34? ^d quod inexpertus meniturce asstimeruke. Basil. — yoak ad unius horte ebriftatem nudnvit femornJia y!ia, 'iwe per spxrenfos aiwos contejrerat. Ilieron. — Qu'-tn iantie moles aquarum non viceranty a inodu'o vitin viclus est. Epiiraem (X.italis Alexiinder i. p. 228 ; Etrictas htcc non xolum innoxia xed et mi/stica /i,it Hieronymus interprets the planting of the Tine of the planting of tlie Church ; Noah oxposcil, he iiittrpreta of Christ on the cross ; Ham, of the Jews, ami so on. In a similar manner Augustine). (As it happens to people ii; sleep, when they become warm; they uncovei' themselves uaconsciously to get air; and so it happened to Noah.) The sin of ex- cess cannot be excused by the example of Noah. This transgression did not, however, cast him out of the grace of God; for we see that in the prophetic spirit he announces the future destiny of his sons, which certainly could never have happened if the Spirit of God had departed from him. But none the less holds true in this respect what Lutlier says, namely, that they who go too far in excusing the patriarch thiow away the consolation which the Holy Spirit has deemed it necessary to give the Church in the fact that the greatest saints do some- times stumble and fall (Ps. xxxiv. 9). — The nobler the gift, the worse the abuse (1 Cor. ix. 7 ; Sirach xxxi. 35 ; 1 Tim. v. 23). — Ham : Sic in sacro Dei asi/lo ititer tatn patwos diabohia unun servahis est. Calvin. — Hkdinger: The spreading of sin is just as much an evil as the perpetration of sin. — Lant.e : The curse went not forth properly, against the spiritual in men, as though beforehand they had been declared to have forfeited eternal life, but properly against the corporeal only. So it was, that among the Canaan- ites there were some who were actually blest (there •re cited as examples the cases of Melchisedek and the Gibeonites). Even :\t this day, it is true that Japheth dwells in the tents ol Shem, since the prom- ised land has come into the hands of the Turk in- stead of the Egyptian sultan. This appears also in a more spiritual manner, since in the New Testament ! heathen and Jews have become one in their conver- sion to Christ. (Noah's long life after the flood is represented as designed to instruct his posterity in the knowledge of God.) Gkrlach : It is worthy of remark, that the father of Prometheus in the Grecian fable, and who was a giant, bears the name of Japetus. — litJNSES: Ver. 18 is the introduction to an old family tradition con- cerning the irreverence and dissoluteness in the fam- ily of Ham, with special reference to Canaan. C.vLWER Handbuch : Noah's human sin regarded as excusable, gives occasion to Ham's inexcusable ein. The curse comes mainly upon Canaan, since it was just in his race that the most shameless and uu- oatural abominations prevailed. At the present day the last trace of this people, together with their ^u^me, haa disappeared from the earth. The highest distinction is that which God hath appointed foi Shem. It is the propagation of the kingdom of God by means of his descendants (John x. 16). Ldther- And 30 there was a real scandal in the case, in thai when Ham stumbled upon his father's drunkennesa. he judged him wrongly, and even took safisfacti->» in his sin. Schrouf.r: Valer. Herbergf.r ■ Here vill th» reviler say, this is the text for me ; Noah behaved himself in a sottish and unseemly way, and there- fore may I do the same. Hold, brother. Noah't example serves not at all your turn. Only once in his life had Noah overshot the mark ; but how oft hast thou already done as much ? Noah did not do it purposely or wittingly. The lesson thou art to learn from Noah is not drunkenness, but to guard thyself from drimkenness, that thou mayest not, through his example, come to mischief, and cause a scandal. Wouldst thou be joyful, so let it joy re- main. Pleasant drink, and wholesome food God grudges not to thee. Drink and eat, only forget not God and thine hour of death. Neither forget the death of Christ; on this account it w.as, that formerly the image of the cross was made in the bottom of the tankard. Let a man come to the table as to an altar, says Bernhard. In the weakness of Noah there is enkindled the wickedness of Ham. '' Then saw Ham." Love covers; he (Ham), instead of veiling his father's nakedness, only the more openly exposes what he had left uncovered. As a son he trans- gresses against his father ; so, as a brother, would he become the seducer of his brother. — Calvin : Hi? age did not excuse him. He was no merely mis chievous boy, who, in his inconsiderate sport be trayed his own thoughtlessness, for he had alrendj gone beyond his hundredth year. Luther; Whilst, in other cases, the servant has only one master, Ca- naan here is the servant of two lords, therefore doubly a servant. (In this w-ay, indeed, it is, that by Shem he is drawn to piety, whilst by Japheth he is educated to a human civilization.) — The sins of Ham, as the deep stain of the Hamitic race in gen eral. Farther on the writer speaks of the corruption of Canaan, and the evil reputation of the Phtpniciana and Carthaginians. Caltin : Shem holds the highest grade of honor. Therefore it is that Noah, in blessing him, expresses him.self in praise of God, and dwells not upon the person. Whenever the declaration relates to soma unusual and important pre-eminency, the Hebrews thus ever ascend to the praise of God (Luke i. HS). — > Japheth: God gives cnl.argement to the enlarged. — Ldthek : Since Abraham, in his fiftieth year, had so good and excellent a teacher in Noah, he must have had quite a growth in doctrine and religion. — Her berger: Fear not the cross, since here thou hast before thee one wfio bore it for nioe hundred ani fifty years. 344 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. THIRD SECTION. The Ethnological Table. Chapter X. 1-32. 1 Now these are the generations [genealogies] of the sons of Noah; [theywere] Shein, Ham, and Japheth ; and unto them were sons born after the flood. 1. The Japhethites (vers. 2-6). 2 The sons of Japheth ; Gomer [the Cimmerians, in the Taurlan Chereonesns ; Crimea], and MagOB Soythians], and Madai [Medes], and Javan [lonians], and Tubal [Tiberenl], and Meschech 3 Mosohi], and Tiras [Thracians]. And the SOUS of Gomer ' ; Ashkenaz' [Germans, Asen], and 4 Riphatli [Celts, Papiilagonians], and Togarmah [Armenians]. And the sons of Javan"; EH- shah' [Elis, aiolians], and Tarshish [Tartessus; Kuobel: Etruscans], Kittim [Oypnans, Carians], and 5 Dodanira [Dardanians], B_7 these were the isles [dwellers on the islands and the coasts] of the Gentiles [the heathen] divided ° in their lands; everyone after his tongue, after their fami- lies, m their nations. 2. Tlie Hamites (vers. 6-20). 6 And the sons of Ham ; Gush [Ethiopians], and Mizraim ' [Egyptians], and Phut 7 [Lybians], and Canaan I Canaanites, Lowlanders]. And the SOUS of Cusll ; Seba [Meroe and Havilah [Abysslnians], and Sabtah [^ihiopians in Sabotha], and Raaniah [Eastern Arabians , and Sabtecha [Ethiopian Caramanians] : and the sons of Raamah ; Sheba and Dedan 8 [SabEean and Dadanic CuBhites, on the Persian Gulf]. And Cush begat Niuirod [we will rebel] : he 9 began to be a mighty one in the eartli. He was [he became] a mighty hunter before the Lord'; wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod [is he] the mighty hunter before the Lord. 10 And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel [Babylon, see ch. xi. 9], and Erech [Orehoe], 11 and Accad, and Calneh [Ktesiphon], in the land of Shinar [Babylonia]. Out of that land went forth Asshur' [Assyrians], and builded Nineveli [city ofNinus], and the city Rehoboth 12 [city markets], and Calah [Kelach and Chalach ; completion]. And ReseU [bri-dle] between Nine- 13 veh and Calah; the same is a great city. And Mizraim begat Ludim [Berbers? Maurita- nian races], and Anamim [inhabitants of the Delta], and Lehabim [Libyans of Egypt], and Naph- 14 tuhim [middle or lower Egyptians], And Pathrusim [upper Egyptians], and Casluhiui [Cholcians , out of whom came Philistim [emigrants, newcomers], and Caphtorim [Cappadocians! CretansT . 15 And Canaan begat Sidon [sidonkms, fishers] his firstborn, and Heth [Hittites, terror , 16 And the Jebusite [Jebus, Jerusalem, threshing-floor], and the AmoritS [inhaliitants of the hills , 17 and the Girgasite [clay, or marshy soil], And the Hivite [paganus?], and tlie Arkite [inhabit- 18 antsofArka, at the foot of Lebanon], and the Sinite [in Sinna, upon Lebanon], And the Arvadite Arabians on the island Arados, north of Ti-ipolis], and the Zeniarite [inhabitants of Simyra, on the western foot of Lebanon], and the Hamatllitii [riamath, on the northern border of Palestine] : ami afterwards 19 were the families of the Canaanites spread abroad. And tlip border of tlie Canaanitea was from Sidon as thou comest to Gerar [city of the Philistines], unto Gaza [city of Philistines, stronghold] ; as thoii goest unto Sodom [city of burning |, and Gomorrali [city of the wood], and Admah [in the territory of Sodom, Adanmh 1], and Zeboini | city of gazelles or hyenas], even tintO 20 Lasha [on the east of the Dead Sen, earth cleft]. These are the SOUS of Ham, after their &mi- lies, after their tongues, in their countries, and in their nations. 3. The Shemites (vers. 21-31). 21 Unto Shein also, tlic father of all tiie children of Eber [on the other side], the brother of Japheth tiie elder [Lange, more correctly, translates, elder brother of Japheth], even tO him were 22 children born The children of Sham ; Elam [Elymmans, Persians], and Assiiur [Assyrian!^ CHAP. X. 1-32. 345 and Arphaxad [Arrapachltis, in Northern Assyria, fortress, or territory of the Chaldeeansj, and Lur 23 [Lydians in Asia Minor], and Aram [Aramteans in Syna, highlanders]. And the children of Aram , Uz [Aisites? native country of Job], and Hul [Celo-Syria], and Gether [Arabians], and Mash 24 [Mesheg, Syrians], And Arphaxad begat Salah [sent forth]; and Salah begat Eber [fromthi 25 other Bide, emigrant, pilgrim]. And unto Eber were bom two sons : the name of the one wae Peleg [division] ; for in his days was the earth divided ; and his brother^s naaae wa» 26 Joktan [diminished; by the Arabians called Kachtan, ancestor of all the Arabian tribes]. And JoktaD begat Almodad [measured], and Sheleph [Satapenians, old Arabian tribe ofYemen,drawer»iofthesvrord J, and llazarmaveth [Hadramath, in S. E. Arabia, court of death], and Jerah [worshipper of the raocntOL 27 the Red Sea], and Hadoram [Atramites, on the south coast of Arabia], and Uzal [Sana, a city in Yemen], 28 and Diklah [adistrictin Arabia, place of palm-trees]j And Obal [in Arabia, stnpped of leaves], and Abimael [in Arabia, father ofMael, the Minseans?], and Shcba [Sabseans, with their capital city, Saba]. 29 And Ophir [in Arabia, probably on the Persian Gulfl, and HaVllah [probably Chaulan, a ditttnct between Sanse and Mecca, or the ChanlotBB, on the border of stony Arabia], and Jobab I all these were SOns of 30 Joktan. And their dwelling was from Mesha [according to Gesenius, Mesene, on the Perman Gulf], as thou goest unto Sephar [mmyaric royal city in the Indian Sea, Zhafar]. a inount of thf 31 east. These are the sons of Shem, after their families, after their tongues, in their lands, 32 after their nations. These are the families of the sons of Noah, after their generations [genealogies], in their nations : and by these were the nations divided in the earth after the flood. t* Ver. 3. — "ITDS, Gomer (G M R). These radical letters are found extensively combined in the history and geography of Europe ; as though some early, rovins people had left the mark of their name from the Pontus, or Black Sea, to Ir^ land: GMR., KMR.. X y M MeRii (0/m7neWa/is), by metathesis, K R M., CRiMea, QUU., 3ermani, CyMRI, Cymri, Cimbri, Cumbri, Cumberland, Humberland^ Nfirthumberland, Cambria^ etc. They may not be aU ety mi 'logically connected, but there is every probability that they were left by the same old people, ever driven on Westward by suc- cessive "waves of migration. T3311'K , Ashkenaz, by metathesis T3U.'3K , Aksenaz, Axenas, may be the old name for the Black Sea, or the country lying upon it. The Greeks called it aferoj, for which they accordingly found a meaning in their own language — the inhospitable — afterwards euphemized to eufetfos— the Euxiue.— T. L.] [2 Ver. 4. — 'p^, Jwan, Javnn, hoan, Ion. There can be no doubt that this is Greece. Compare Joel iv. 6; Ezek. xxvii. 13 ; Dan. viil 21. It is the name or patrial epithet of Greece in the cognate languages, as given to it iu historical - p 7 ' I r * terms : Syriac, (.aJo.^ , Chald. ""DT^ , Ai-ab. .Lj^J ^ and also by the Greeks themselves, when they would present the name in its old. Oriental form; as in the Perste of -iEschylus, when the mother of Xerxes is made to call them laocc?, and theii' land yijv 'laorw;' (line 175), and in another place, 563, Sia 5" 'laorwc x^P"5. See also, Heeod., i. 56, 58. nir"'bi{ , 'EAAa?. C^DnT , in some Hebrew copies D^:"!"! , which the LXX read, and rendered PdSiot.— T. L.] [3 Ver. 5. — ^I'lSS , were parted. Maimonides says this term was applied to the Japhethites because of their &t roving, which parted them from each other in separate isles and coasts ; whereas it is not said of Ham's descendajit^ because they were near to each other, forming dense and contiguous populations. — T. L.] [* Ver. 6.— D'^lS'G . This dual name has been supposed to denote the political division of Upper and Lower Egypt. It would seem more likely to have a geographical significance : The N^arrows— the two narrows, or the double narrows — the straits. What could be more descriptive of this long and very narrow strip of territory, lying on both sides of the Nile, many hundred miles in length, and averaging only a dozen or so in breadth. It is strange th:it Rosenmullcr should Bay of this name, that it is uncertain whether it is Hebrew or Egj-ptlan. It is purely Hebrew, and no other j^roper name in the language t'ver had a clearer significance. This appearance of extreme narrowness, with mountains or deserts on each side, must have suggested itself at the earliest date, whereas, the other idea must have had a later origin. The son of Ham, who first settled Egypt with his children, must have been at once struck with this tenitorial peculiarity, so diSerent from anythme; in the Northern or Eastern regions, whence he came. The name which he cave to it afterwards came back to him as its settler and proprietor. There is reason to suppose that Mitzraim was not his earliest name. It was rather a territorial designation, afterwards genealogically and historically adopted. The origiial name of this first settler may Iiave been Gupl, Copt, or Cupht, from which came the other popular designation, Al-yuirr-o?, Egypt. — T. L.] [* Ver. 9.—" Mighty hunter (whether of men or beasts) mrf "^izh before the Lord," to express his notoriety foi boldness and wickedness, as something ever before the divine presence ; so bad, that God could not take his eyes from it Compaxe with it Gen. vi. 10, the whole earth corrupt, C^H'^X ^3Sb .— T. L.] . [• Ver. 11.— "l^lSJX N^" . In support of the view that "lITlJX here denotes the place whither^ mstead of being thi ■ti5jer(ofthe verbXS^, Maimonidesrefersto Numb, xxsdv. 4, 5, riDiaSi' "13^1 irix nsn N3^1 . "and it went ou (to Hazar-addar, and passed over (to) Azmonah ;'* also to Numb. xxi. 33, ^SIIS ^lysri ~bl3 an" XS^I , " And Og king of Bashan, went out (to) Edrei ; " in neither of which cases is there a preposition'. He' refers alac' tc Uicah v. 3k irhere " Asshur and the land of Nimrod " are mentioned together.— T. L.] GENERAL REMARKS ON THE ETHNOLOGICAL TABLE, OR THE GENEALOGICAL TREE OF THE NATIONS. 1. 77ie Liter aiure. - '^ee Matthew, p. 19; the present work, p. 119; Kurtz : "History of the Old Testament," p. 88 ; Knorel, p. 107; Keil, p. 108; t full and w »ll-a'^anged survey see in Delitzsch, p. 287 ; also the notes in Delitzsch, p. 629. 9ee also the articles, Babe!, Babylon, Nineveh, and Meso- potamia, in Herzog's Real-Encyclopedia. Layard> account of *' Excavations at Nineveh," togethei with the "Description of a Visit to the Chaldasac Christians in Kurdistan, and to the Jezidi or Wor shippers of Satan." German of Meissner, Leipsic 346 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. 1862. Here belong also the " Ethnographical Works, or the National Characteristics," etc : Laza- rus and Steinthal. " Journal of Popular Psycho- logy." Berlin : Dumler, 18.t9. Berghaus, Friedrich von Raumer, VorlanJer, nnd others. 2. Tlie basis of the genealogical table. -Accord- ing to Iliivemik and Keil, tliis document was ground- ed on very old tradition, and had its origin in tlie time of Aljraham. According to Knobfl, the knnwl- edge of the nations that is represented in it, liail its origin, in great part, in the connection of the He- brews with the Phoenician Canaanites. Di'litzsch assigns its composition to the days of Joshua. The eigns of a high antiquity for this table present them- selves unmistakably in its ground features. There jelong here: 1. The small development of the Ja- phethan line ; on which it may be remarked, that they were the people with whom the Phoenicians maintained the most special intercourse ; 2. the jiosi- tion of the .j^thio] >ians at the head of the Hamites, the historical notices of Nimrod, as also the supposi- tion that Sodora and Gomorrah were then existing; 3. the discontinuance of the Jewish line with Peleg, as well as the accurate familiarity with the branch- ing of the Arnbian Joktanites, who have as much space assigned to them alone as to all the Japheth- ites, when for the commercial Phoenicians they would be of least significance. The table indicates various circles of tradition — more universal and more spe- cial. The Japhethan groups appear least develojied. Besides the seven sons, the grandchildren of Japheth are given only in the descendants of (iomer and Ja- van, in the people of anterior Asia, and in the inhab- itants of the coasts and islands of the Mediterranean Sea. Magog, Madai, Thubal, Meshech, and Tiras are carried no farther. The table certifies a very copious tradition of tlie Hamites. First, there are mentioned the four sons of Ham, then five sons of his firstborn, Cush, then tlie two sons of Raamah, the fourth son of Cush. These two are, therefore, great-grandchildren of Ham. Nimrod is next presented as a specially prominent son of Cush. Then follows the second son of Ham, Mizraim, with six sons. The sixth, Caslu- hiin, is again presented in the mention of the Philis- tini and Cafihtorim, who are, therefore, also great- grandchildren of Ham. Phut, the fourth son of Ham, is the only one who is carried no farther. The fifth, Canaan, appears with eleven sons ; namely, Sidon, the ancestor of the Phoenicians, and the heads of the other t'anaanitish tribes. Shera, finally, has five sons, of whom, again, Elam, Asslmr, and Lud, are no liirther deveUipid. The liin' of his son, Aram, afipcars in four .sons, grandchildren of Shi-m. Of ihf sons of Sheni, Arphaxad is treated as most important. The line goes from .^hem through .\ri»haxaii and Sa- lah, even to the great-grandchild, Eber. Eber tbrnis the most important jioint of connection in the Slienii- tic line. Willi his son Pidcg tlie earth is ilivided ; that is, tliere is fornicd the strong monotheistic, Abra- hamic line, in contrast with the line of liis brother Joktan and the Arabian Joktanites. Joktaii is devel- oped in thirtc'-n sons, great-grandchildren of Sliem. From this survey it appears: I. Tliat the table has a clear and full view of the three ground-types Or points of di-[)arture of the Noachian humanity — Bbem, Ham, Japlictli. It however, inverts the order of the iiairies, because Shem, a.s the ancestor of the people of the promise, is the peculiar point of aim in the rejiresentation. Japheth, however, conies 6r8t, because, since the history of Israel stands in oeareet recifrocal connection with that of the Ham- ites, the Japhethites in this respect take the back ground. 2. The table has, in like manner, a cleai view of the nearest descendants of the three soni of No.ah, of the seven sons of Japheth, of the fouj eons of Ham, and the five sons of Shem. It pr© sents us, therefore, the sixteen ground-forms of com mencing national formations. 3. In the case of five sons of Japheth, one son of Ham, and three sons of Shem, the genealogy is not carried beyond the grand- children. 4. In respect to the Japhethites, it doei not, generally, go beyond the grandchildren ; among the Hamites it passes through the grandchild, Raamali, to the great-grandchildren ; so, likewise, through the grandchildren, the Casluhim ; among the Shemites, through Aiphaxad, it proceeds to the great-great-grandchildreu, and these, tlirough th( great-great-grandchild, Joktan, are carried one step farther. 5. The table occupies itself least with the Japhethans; beyond the Medes, the people of Mid die .\s!a and the eastern nations generally come tit farther into the account. It appears, however, t( have little familiarity with the Phoenicians proper since it only makes mention of Sidon, .^ liilst it ex- hibits a full acquaintance with the Egyptians, with tht inhabitants of Canaan, and with the Araliian tribes. In this peeuUar form of the table lies the mark of itf very high antiquity. 6. It contains three fundamen- tal geographical outlines, one political, and besides this, an important theocratic-ethnou'raphic notice. Geographical: 1. The mention of the spreading of the Javanites (lonians) over the isles and coasts of the Mediterranean; •!. the spreading of the Canaan- ites in Canaan ; 3. the extension of the Joktanites ir Arabia. Political: The first founding of cities (ot states) by Nimrod. Theocratic: The division of the world in the time of Peleg, the ancestor of Abraht, at a much later day, by the Southern and Mediten-anean streams of civilization carry- ing with it the Christian cuUus. Even the Javanites, thfl Greeks — not the earliest Pelasgi, merely, but the later Hel- lenes and Dorians — were, for a long time, the Barbarians, is compared with the Egyptians and the Phoenicians. Se« how Homer everywhere speaks of these older and more civ- ilized peoples, aji compared with his own countrvmen. Tha ancieot stream of light has s nc« turned nortiiward, as it may again be deflected to the south ; but all the boasting about Caucasian supremacy is m the face of history. It is a carrying of the most modem ideas, and the most irrational of modern prejudices, into our estimate of the ancient world, or of the huiiian race, during much the greater part of it^ existence.— T. I*] o48 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK Of MOSES. Christ must be reckoned at 20,000 vears, — namely, to the flood, 10,000, and from the flood to Abraham, 7,000 (see, on the contrary, Delitzsch, [i. 2',)1). Taking these 20,000 years, the ante-Christian human- ity loses itself in a Thohu Vahobu running through many thousand years of an unhistorical, beastly ex- istence, wherein the liumau spirit fails to find any recognition of its nobility. Dehtzsch, in his admirable section on the ethno- logical table, remarks, p 286 : " The line of the promise with its chosen race, must be distinguished from the confusion of the Oentiles ; such is the aim of this great genealogical chart, and in accordance with which it is constructed. It is a fundamental characteristic of Israel, that it is to embrace all na- tions as partakers of a like salvation in a participa- tion of hope and love, — an idea unheard of in all antiquity beside.* The whole ancient world has nothing to show of like universaUty with this table. The earth-describing sections of the Epic poems of the Hindoos, and some of the Puranas, go greatly astray, even in respect to India, whilst the nearest lands are lost in the wild and monstrous account that is given of them. Their system of the seven world islands (tlvipax) that lay around the Meru, seems oc- cupied with the worlds of gods and genii rather than with the world of man. (Lassen, in the "Journal of Oriental Knowledge," i. p, 341 ; Wilson, TOc Vishnu Piiranit). Nowliere is there to be found so unique a derivation of the national masses, or so universal a survey of the national connections. A tinge of hopeful green winds through the arid desert of this ethnological register. It presents in perspective the prospect that these far-sundered ways of the nations shall, at the last, ccme together at the goal which Jehovah has marked. Therefore does Baumgarten complete the saying of Johannes von Miiller, "that history has its bi-ginning in this ethnological table," with a second equally true, "that in it also, as Its closing limit, sliall history hud its eud." We may undervalue this table if we overlook the fact that, in its actual historical and ethnological ground- features it presents, symbolically, a universid image of the one humanity in its genealogical divisions. We may overvalue it, or rather, set a false value upcin it, when we attempt to trace back to it, with full confiilence, all the known nations now u[ion the earth. Even the number 70, as the universal sym- bol of national existences, can only be deduced from it by an artificial method ; as, for example, in Dk- LiTzscH, p. 289. It is only in the symbolical sense that th<' catalogue may be regarded as amounting to this number. Neither can we derive this subdividing the na- tions to such a inuitiplic'ty of national life, from the IMufusion cjf languages at Babel, The natural sub- divi.sion of the peojile has something of an ideal aspect; the increased impulse given to it at Babel had its origin in sin. We regard it, therefore, as a • [The most secluded people in ancient times, the only one posKeHvSini?, a nd carrymRwilh them in their historv, a Korla^idca, and thiti datint? from the very eajiiest pi-n'od ! Bee Gen. xxviii, 11, and still earlier, Gen. iii, 1.^ : "in tlioc ftcd in thy si-ed 'iliall all the fiimilics of the earth ho hlessed," This certjiinly prcHi-nts the JewiHli n.itirm in a most remark- able liKlit, dvmaTidiiiK the (itiention ni all who talk ahout tjie nliilN-oi)liv of liiHloiy, iinrl e.jn-cially nf tliose who arc rm or Thorko- matsi. — Sons of Javan : Elisa is referred to Ehs and to the ^Eolians, Tarshish to Tartessus, and also to the Etruscans, whom, nevertheless, Delitzsch holds to have been Shemites ; Kittim is referred to the Cyprians and the Carians ; Dodanim to the Darda- nians. 2. Vers. 6-20.— TVic Hawiten. The three firsi sons of Ham settled in Northern Africa. 1, The .(Ethiopians of the upper Nile; 2. the Egyptians ol the lower Nile ; S. the Libyans, west of the Egyp- tians, in the east of Northern Africa. The Cushites appear to have removed from the high northeast (Cossce), passing over India, Babylonia, and .\rabia, in their course towards the south; for "iu these lands the ancients recognized a dark-colored people, who were designated by them as Jitliinjiians, and who have since, in part, j^erished, whilst a few have kept their place to this day," Kudbel, — Mizraim. — The name denotes narvowintj^ cjiclosinii ; its dual form ni (Puni), allied to ((joi-dv, blood, and (poii'iiv, blonii-red, denotes the Pho'nieiiins in theil original Hamitic color. — Sons of Cush. Seba. — Meroe, which, at one time, aeeoiding lo .foseiihns was called Seba. — Chavila. — In the Se|ituagint, EiiiAa. The Macrobiaus (or long living), .Ethiopians of the modern Abyssinia. — Sabta. — Sabbata, a capi tal city in Southern Arabia. " To this daj there i» CHAP. X. 1-32. 34£ in Yemen and Iladramaut a dark race of men who •re distinct from tlie light-colored Arabians. So it is also in Oman on tlie Persian (iulf." Knobel. — Raamah. — Septuagint: 'P€7iua, in Southeast era Araliia — Oman. There, too, there are obscine imli- cations of Raamah's sons Sheba and Dedan. — Sab- techa,' — Dark-colored men on the east side of the Persian Gulf, in Caramania. — Aside from these, Nuyirod \a also made prominent as a son of Cush, vers. 8-12. Knobel regards this section as a Jeho- ristic interpolation, and so does Delitzseh. The name Jehovah, however, as occurring here, is no proof of such a fact ; it comes naturally out of the accompanying thoughts. The only thing remarka- ble is, that Nimrod Is not named in immediate con- nection with the other sons of Ciish, but that the two sons of Raamah go before him. It is, however, easy enough to be understood, that the narrator wished first to dispose of this lesser reference.* Interrup- tions similar to it are of repeated occurrence in the table, as is the case also in other genealogies (1 C'hr. ii. 7 ; xxiii. 4, 22). — He was a mighty hunter. — '• The author presents Nimrod as the son of Cush, putting him far back before the time of Abraham, and as.^igns him to the ^Ethiopian race. In fact, the classical writers recognize .(Ethiopians in Babylonia in the earliest times. They speak, especially, of an ..Ethiopian king, Cepheus, who belongs to the mythi- cal time, and there is mention of a trace of the Cephe- nians as existing to the north of Babylon." Knobel. In the expression, " he began to be a hero, or a mighty one upon the earth," there is no occasion for caUing him a ''postdiluvian Lamech" (Delitzseh). He began the unfolding of an extraordinary power of will and deed, in the fact mentioned, that he be- came a mighty hunter in the presence of Jehovah. The hunting of ravenous beasts was in the early time a beneficent act for the human race. Powerful huntsmen appear as the pioneers of civilization ; a fact which clearly proclaims itself in the myth of Hercules. And so the expression, " Nimrod was a mighty hunter before Jehovah," may mean, that he was one who broke the way for the future institu- tions of worship and culture which Jehovah intend- ed in the midst of a wild and uncultivated nature. There is iinother interpretation : he was so mighty a himter, that even by Jehovah, to whom, in other re- spect.s, nothing is distinguished, he was recognized as such (Knobel ; Delitzseh) ; but this seems to us to have little or no meaning. Keil holds fast to the traditional interpretation : in defiance of Jehovah, and, at the same time, takes th: literal sense of auimal-lmnting in connection with the tropical sense of hunting men, so that he explains it, with Herder, as meaning an ensnarer of men by fraud and force. Neither the expression itself, nor the proverb : " like Nimrod, a mighty hunter before the Lord," justifies this view. By such a proverb, there may be denoted 1 praiseworthy, Herculean pioneer of culture, as well as a blameworthy and violent despot. In truth, the chase of the animals was, for Nimrod, a preparatory exercise for the subjugation of men. " For him anil [* Maimonides seems to give a better explanation of this. He says : "These, Seba and Havilah, were heads of peoples, and the sons of Raamah became two peoples : but Nimrod did not become a people (genealogically), wherefore the Scripture saith t-imply, and ' Cush begat Nimrod,' and not, the 'sons of Cush were Nimrod, and Seba, and Havilah.' " That if, Nimrod does not come in the ethnological register of peoples, though he L'* mentioned afterwards as a histori- •al person. He applies the same principle of interpretation A other similar cases. — T. L.l his companions, the chase was a training for war, ai we are told by Xexopho.n [Kiineffete, C. i.), the oW heroes were pupils of Ciiiron, and so, /ia^rtrai kuvti- yeuiuy, disciples of the chase." Di'litzsch. — And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel,— • K.NOBEL; " His yz'r.s^ kingdunj in contrast with hij seecuid." This, however, is not necessarily involved in the expression, " the beginning." It denote* rather the basis. In thus playing the hero, Nimroa established, in the first place, a kingdom that em^ l)raced Babel, that is, Babylon, Erech, or Orech, in the southwest of Babylonia, Akkad (in respect to situation 'Akktittj), in a northern direction, and ir tlie .Northeast, Calueh, in respect to territory corre- sponding to Chalonitis, or Ktisiphon, on the east shore of the Tigris. This establishment of an em- pire transforming the patriarchal clan-govenmienta into one monarchy is not to be thought of as hap- pening without force. The hunter becomes a subju- gator of men, in other words, a contjueror. — Out of that land went forth Asshur. [Lange translates: Out of that land went he forth towards Asshur.j — The Septuagint, Vulgate, and many interpreters (Luther, Calvin) regard Asshur as the grammatical subject, and give it the sense : Asshur went forth from Shinar. On the contrary, the Targum of Onke- los, Targum of Jonathan, and many other authorities, (Baumgarten, Delitzseh. Knobel) have rightly recog- nized Nimrod as the subject. Still, it does not seem clear, when Knobel supposes that Nimrod had lefi his first kingdom for the sake of founding a sec ond. Moreover, it is not to be supposed that hi barely extended his rule over an uninhabited terri tory for the purpose of colonizing it. It was ratbei characteristic of Nimrod, that he should seek still more strongly to appropriate to himself the occupied district of Assyria by the establishment of cities. The first city was Nineveh (at this day the ruin- district called Nimrud), above the place where the Lycus flows into the Tigris ; the second was Reho- both, probably east of Nineveh ; the third Calah, northward in the district of Kalachan, in which there is fouml the place of ruins called Khorsabad the fourth was Resen, between Nineveh and Calah — The same is a great city. — The first suggested sense would seem to denote Resen as the great city, or as the greater city in relation to the others named with it. On the contrary, remarks Knobel : Reser is nowhere else mentioned as known to antiquity and could not possibly have been so distinguished as to be called in this short way l?ie great city. Rath' er does the expression denote the four cities taken together, as making Nineveh in the wider sense, and which, both by Htbrews and Assyrians, was thus briefly called the great city." According to Ktesias, it had a circumference of four hundred and eighty stadia (twenty-four leagues), with which there well agrees the three days' journey of Jonah iii. .3 ; it em- braced the quarter founded by Nimrod, out of which it grew in the times that followed Nimrod, whin the Assyrian kings gradually combined the four places into one whole; thus the whole city was named Nin- eveh after its most southern part. The ancient assertions respecting the circuit of the city are con- firmed by the excavations. " These four cities cor- respond, probably, to the extensive ruins on the east of the Tigris, that have lately been made known bj Layard and Botta, namely, Xebi-Junus and Kujund schik, opposite Mosul, Khorsabad, five leagues north icnd N'imrud, eight leagues north of Mosul." Keil See also the note (p. 112) on the agreement of Raw s&o GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. liiison, Grote, Niebuhr, and others, as opposed by the ooiijeetures of Hilzis and Bunsen. — The sons of Mizraim: 1. Ludim. As distinguished from clio Sheniiiic Ludira, ver. ii ; Movers regards it as the old Berber race of Levatah that settled bv the Svrtis, — so o;Uled after tin; manner of other collect- ive names of the Mauritauiaii races. According to Knobel it was the Shemitic Ludim, who, after the Egyptian invasion, were called Uyksos. This is in the face of tlie text. 2. Anamim. This is n-f.'rred by Knobel to the Egyptian Delta. 3. Lehabim. .Egyptian Libyans, not to be confounded with -'S. tlie Libyans proper. 4. Naphtuhim. According to Knobel, the people of Phthah, the god of Mem- phis, in Middle Egypt; according to Bochart, it agrees with Ne what follows, see the next chapter. DOCTKINAL AND ETHICAL. See the Esegetical. 1. The religious significance of the ethnologica table : 1. Personal characters form the basis of the human world ; the relation of God to humanity is conditioned by the personal relation of God to per- sonal being. The revelation of salvation, therefore, tends also to take upon itself a genealogical form. The ethnological table is the extended ground-outline of the relation between God and humanity, and ol those that men bear to one another. The genealo- gies are trees of human life that God has planted. 2. In tlie christological point of view, the genealogi- cal table is the prefiguration of the universality of the gospel, corresponding to the universality of the divine love, grace and compassion. 3. It gives us a clear idea of the regular gravitation of humanity to its centre in Shem, Eber, Abraham, Christ ; that is, the genealogy of Christ. 4. As the branching of the three principal races places them in contrast, so, iu a special manner, is this the case with the branching of the Hamitic race into the better lines, and in the Canaanites; and so also the branching of the Shem- ites, or that of the sons of Eber in the line of the deseendantsof Joktan, and iu the line of the promise. 5. The signs of preparation for the later calling of Abraham are already contained in the names of his ancestors from Salah and Eber onward. '1. On the names Babel and Nineveh, compare the Theological dictionaries ; on the history of Babel and Nineveh, see the historical works. We must be careful here, not to confound the beginning of tliis very old city, including in it the Babylonian tower, with its later world-historical developtnent, and its falling into ruin. Nevertheless, even the ruins of that city are still a speaking witness, not only for the fulfilling of the dirine predictions and threaten- ings, by the prophets, but .also of the historical con- sistency and truthfulness of these very narrations in Genesis. Concerning the geographical relations, especially the situation of Babylon on the Euphrates, and of Nineveh on the Tigris, compare the maps of the old world in the Bible-atlas of Wellaiid and Ack- erman ; the Historico-Geographical Atlas of the Old World, by Kiepert; the Atlas of Kutscheit, and oth ers. Already, in Xenophon's lime, Nineveh lay in ruins ; according to Strabo, it perished with the As- syrian Empire (see in Ueiszog's "Real-Encyclopedia'' tiie article on the Ruins of Nineveh). Babylon waj much broken by the Persian kings, especially by Xerxes ; Alexander the (ireat would have restored it, but contributed only the more to its destruction ; the founding of Seleucia laid it in ruins. As Seleu- cia lies opposite to the ruins of Babylon, so doea Mosul to those of Nineveh. 3. Starke : In this chapter we see the origin of many nations in all parts of the world, and therefore, the power of the blessing which God, after the flood, had renewed to men in respect to their mnltiplyuig and propagation ; and so, finally, we learn the fathers from whom Christ was born according to the tiesh. Neither Noah nor his sons begat any offspring during the time of the flood. The same may be conjectured to be true of the animals which were shut up with lii™ 352 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. in a dark dungeon, and as it were in the midst of death. — Ljxge: Many readers, when they come to >his tenth chapter, are wont to regard it as of little talue ; some really think it to be superfluous, or of ittle use, on account of su many unknown names But. in truth, we ought to regard it as a right noble eem in the crown of Holy Writ, the like of which las never been, or can be shown, from any writings of the old heathenism that yet remain to us.* — Gerlach : There is no account of antiquity wliich gives us so full and so general a survey of the an- cient nations, as this ethnological table ; as appears om the fact, that the exactness and truth of the national divisions as presented in the same, are ever more and more confii-med. The heathen had no other relations to people who were foreign to them, than those of war and trade, with the addition, per- haps, of a certain community of religious legends, Knowledge, and culture ; irrespective of this, how- ever, each nation remained shut up within itself. In the history of revelation, on the. other hand, be- fore the narrative of the dispersion of the nations stands the promise that Japheth shnll find a home in he tents of Shera. — Bu.sses : So much is now clear, jiat the races of Shem are the Shemites of philology, this is not clear at all ; just as little, in fact, as that the Gallic Franks must be of Romanic origin. Com- pare in other places the learned explanation of the ethnological table by Bunsen. Says the same author- .ty (vol. i. part 2, p. 63): " The ethnological table is the most learned among all the ancient documents, and the most ancient among the learned. For tra- Jition predominates far above research, though the itter is not wanting. In its core it must be regard- ed as earlier than the time of Abraham ; but this ,y no means excludes the idea that Moses may nave made investigations respecting it." So says Schroder : " Frocii this chapter must the whole uni- versal history of the world take its beginning." To tlie same effect Job. von Muller. Citation of the Historical catalogues of Heathen nations, as they are found in the palace of Kamak, a ruin of the old city Thebes, in Bendidad, and on the monuments of Per- •epohs. These have throughout a national charac- ter. Ninii'od's chase of the beasts was the bridge of transition to the hunting of men (Jer. xvi. 16 ; Lam. iii. 52 : iv. 18 ; Matt. iv. 19 ; Luke v. 10). 4. On the numbering of the seventy nations, which the Rabbins make out of this table, as De- Utzsch farther constructs it, see Keil, p. 116. De- litzsch traces a rcl-.ition between the seventy peoples, and the seventy disciples, Luke x. 1, and designates the number as that of the divinely-ordained multi- plicity of the human. Probably, also, the name of the Septuagint has reference to the heathen na- tions for whom the Alexandrian translation of the Old Testament was designed. Keil objects, tliat the numbering cim only cotne out clean and round when we assign the name of naiions to Salah and Eber. ButSalah might have actually had more sons. And, besides, it is not necessary that the symbolical num- oers should always literally correspond to the histor- ical. This frei|uent appearance of the number sev- enty resolves itself into some early symbolizing. Beven is the number of God's work, including his • [Itinafl CRMntlal to an imderetandinpr of the Bible, •ad of bUtory In [foncral, as is ilomcr'a ciitalopiu, in thu laoond book of ttic Tliful. to a true knowledge of the flo- neiic poems and ttie Homeric times. The Bll)lic:il fltutlent MB no more uudervalaetbeone than tbeclatisica] student btothPT.-T. LI holy day of rest ; ten is the number of the perfect human development ; the seventy nations were, therelbre, the entire outspreading of God's host, un der his rule. 5. Nimrod's despotic power, at least if we judge from the name, w.as denoted as a rebellion, as a rev- olution. It partook of both forms of revolution against the divine ordinance: 1. From above down- wards ; 2. from below upwards ; of which the first seems, in truth, to have been the oldest. HOMILETICAI, AOTD PRACTICAL. In the homiletical treatment of the ethnological table, we must, of all things, avoid giving way to un- certain and etymological and histoiical ctmjectures. It contains, however, enough points of certainty to make it a page of Holy Writ rich in life and instruc- tion. Thereto belongs the threefold division of the nations according to the names Japheth, Ham, and Shem, the wide, wide, world-wandering of Japheth, in which the grandchildren and great-great-grand- children disappear from the horizon of the theocratic consciousness ; the early ripe, yet most ancient de- velopment of the Hamitic culture, with its corrup- tions, in which the ungodly Cainitic culture once more mirrors itself; the reciprocal intercourse of the Shemites and the Hamites in the early time ; finally, the gradual, yet authentically historical preparation for the calling of Abraham, and for the Messianic theocracy in the line of Shem. If the sermon is designed with reference to the ethnological table, the best ground will be furnished by taking directly ch. X. 1, or Deut. xxxii. 8 ; or better still, some New Testament text most appropriate for the purpose, as Matt, xxviii. 19 ; John x. 16 ; Acts xiv. 16, 17 ; sv. 18; xvii. 26; Rom. xi. X2; Eph. iii. 6; 1 Pet. iv. 6, Rev. xxi. 24. — The baptism of the flood a forerun- ning emblematic baptism of the whole human race As God kuows the name of the stars (that is, theii most interior being, Isaiah xl.), so does he likewise know the name of all men and of all races (Matt. xxii. 32). The theocratic, believing consciousness hath ever proved itself to be tdso a humanitarian consciousness, or one that embraces all humanity- — The higher significance of historical tradition. — Ths commendation of the world's history in the history of tiod's kingdom. — The relation between the history of God's kingdom and the world-history: 1. The contrast; 2. the connection; 3. the unity (in its wider sense is the whole world's history a history of the kingdom of God). — Shem's history, the last in the world, the first in the kingdom of God. — The elect and their appointment to be salvation for all. — The distinction: 1. Among the sons of Noah ; 2. of Japheth ; 3. of Ham ; 4. of Shem — Nimrod's three- fold position: 1. As the pioneer of civihzation ; 2. as oppressor of the p.atriarchal Uberties; 3. as the instru- ment of God tor the development of the world. — Pe- leg, or the dividing and the uniting again of humanity. ScBRciDER: Al' these sons, the white posterity of Japheth, the yellow and dark sons of Ham, how- ever they may live in temporal separation, are all still God's children, and brothers to one another. [Excursus on the Hebrew Cbronoloqt — TBI STATE of the PRIMITIVE MeN THE RaPID BeOIN- NiNOS OF History. The brief Hebrew chronology is urged as an objection to the Scriptures. Hence the tendency, even among believeis, to prjfer th» CHAP. X 1-32. 3.=>:i numbers given in the Septuagint. There is hardly time enouffh, it is thought, for the great liistorical commencements, and the scale on which they ap- pear, so soon after the flood. Others, like Lepsius and Bunsen, wonld go very far beyond the LXX., carrying up ihe human chronology, and that of the Egyptian monarchy along with it, twenty thousand years before tlie time of Christ, and twelve or fifteen thousand ^•ears before the flood. The main ground of this theory is not so much the monuments, though Bunsen has much to say .about them, as an assump- tion respecting the earliest condition and slow prog- ress of the hmnan race. With regard to the monu- ments, on which so much reliance is placed, there is not space, nor occasion, to say mucli here. Those who refer to them with most confidence have to ad- mit that there is great dilliculty in determining their meaning as well as their historical authority, even if rightly interpreted. It is made a question, too, whether, in many cases, they represent successive or cotemporaneous dynasties. Their barrenness in respect to almost everything else but names, detracts Uso from their clironological testimony. Like the Chaldean, Hindoo, and Chinese statements, they are hardly anything else but numbers. There is Utile or no filling up of these blank statisticstl spaces with anything like a veritable life-like history. Had much that is on these monuments been found in the early Scriptures, it would have made them the scoff of the infidel and tlie rationalist. There is. however, one concise argument, which, if rightly considered, ought to dispose of the whole matter. Egypt was visited, two thousand three hundred years ago, by a most intelligent Greek, whose v;iluable history has come down to us entire. In faithful narrative of what he saw, as he saw it, and of what he heard, as he heard it, Herodotus is excelled by no writer, an- cient or modern. His pains and fidelity are attested by those immense journeys, whoso extent would be deemed a wonder, even with all the facilities of modern travel. Now this most credible witness saw these monuments in their freshness, and when they were as intelligible to the Egvptian priests, as would be to us the contents of a modern census. They de- cipher for him these hieroglyphics, now so puzzling, and give him, as deduced therefrom, what they un- derstand to be the Egyptian history. It if. contained in his second book. Can we ever e-xpect a better in- terpretation than the one made under such circum- stances, and under the direction of such competent guides? They had every motive to present their nation in its most antique and imposing aspect, knowing, as they doubtless did, that the inquirer was collecting materials for a history of the world, as then known. If they erred at all, it would most likely have been on the side of an exees-sive anti- quity. And yet, the chronology of Herodotus * may. • (The Egyptian chronology here intended is that which ean be made out, though in a very general way, from the outlines of actual hi>tory as derived by Ilcrodoliis fi-om the Biormnients, and the priests' interpretation of them, togeth- er with otlier accounts, traditional or otherwise, which they give to him. Mcnes was the first king, who stands away hack at the beginnine of Egyptian history. The next one of any historical note is Mau-is. who had not been dead 900 year-* when Herodotus was in Egypt, and must have been, therefore, about 1,350 years before the time of Christ. All that the priests had between these two wjis conLiined in a papyrus roll, haviUL' the bare namf.s of 330 monarchs, whom, if real, a thousand yeai-s, or so, would easily dispose of, on the supposition of cotemporaneous dynasties, or frequent revolutioDS, such as Egypt must have had as well as other bfttions. reducing reigns to one or two years, and many of 2;i without any great difficulty, be made to agiee with that of the Bible — certainly with that of the Septua- gint. In regard to the monuments, such a view should be deemed conclusive. Herodotus is, aftei all, the great historical authority in respect to the antiquity of the Egyptian monarchy ; and he is likely to remain so, since we have no reason to expect any interpretation of these hieroglyphics that escaped hia eager search, or the intelligence of his well-informed and zealous instructors. The other ground, that is, the necessity of a veiy long time to bring about such results in the slow progress of mankind, is a sheer assumption, inai may at once be met by arguments drawn from the intrinsic aspects of the case. It all depends upon the hypothesis with which we start in respect to the condition of the primitive men ; end this in- volves, first of all, an inquiry as to the primitive m«7i, or the primus hmno^ or whether there ever really was such a distinct individual, tlie head of a distinct race, having a supernatural beginning at a distinct moment of time. Some, who favor the view of the low primitive condition of man, from which he struggled slowly up into language and a distinct human consciousness, making his appearance in his- tory only after he had been many ages upon the earth, may still hold to something like a creation of the species ; but logically it is very difficult to sepa- rate such a doctrine from that eternal-development theory, which, in op]iosition to the axiom de nihilo nihil, or, what is equivalent to it, that more cannot come out of less, would bring the highest life out of the lowest forms of matter, and make God himself (supposing it to acknowledge something under that name) the end instead of the beginning of nature. On the contrary, the admission of a creation, in any intelligible sense of the word, is the admissioii of a distinct time, a distinct moment of time, when the thing created began to be, which a moment before was not. Tliis, however, does not demand the idea of an instantaneous coming from noiuii.g, or even de novo, of everything belonging to, or connected with the new existence, but only the new and dis- tinct beginnning of that which especially makes ii wh'it it hy a new, peculiar entity, separate from everything else. To apply this to man, the origin of his physical, his earthly, may have been as re- mote as any geological theory of life-periods, or any biblical interpretation supposed to be in accordance with it, may allow. If we admit the idea of growth, or succession in creation, as perfectly consistent with supernatural starts regarded as intervening and ori- f'\ lating its successive processes, then man may have been long coming from the earth, from the deepest them to months. Let the reader call to mind how rapidly emperors succeed each other during some paits of the later lloman history. These other kings, the priests tell him, were ^^ persons of no account,^^ with the exception of Mosris, before mentioned, thus ^howing, that with all their parada of rolls and dynasties, Mones and Moens were the only two conspicuous points m the Egyptian antiquity, until 1,400 years before Chrif. Such are the only data for chronol- ogy, though the Egyptian priests pretend to fill up this empty, unhistorical space, with 341 generations, makii.^ about 10,000 years (see Herod., li. 100, 142); but this ia evidently due to that national pride which elsewhere led to the same extravagant reckoning. They found little or nothing of record or monument to confirm it, or they cer- tainly would have civen it to the historian. What they tell him, that durng this period of 300 genera«)ion8, the sun had twace ris<'n where he uow sets, and twice srt where he now rises, is enough to show what historical value belongs to the empty numbers with which they would fill up this waste extent of time. See Rawlinson's Herodotus.- T. L.1 354 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. p»rts of the eartli, as is said Ps. cxxxix. 15 The formation of the human physicsl may have begun in the eurliest stages of the KTian, or world-building. The words is? "|'2, "from the du^t," may denote a process comparati%'ely quick or slow. The essential faith is satisfied either way; since it only demands two things — a dual derivation of the completed hu- manity, and an order, that is, a succession, whether in nature or in time (or in both), rather than any precise duration. Even the common notion of an outward plastic formation of the body implies the use of a previous nature in a previous material or materials — that is, a use of them according to such natures. There is essentially the same idea in the employment of previous growths and processes, as in that of previous material, although with the con- ception of such successions there necessarily cornea that of time, longer or shorter. How many steps there were we cannot know ; but in tlius bringing up the human physical through lower structural forms, there may have been outwardly approximations to the human, long before there was reached that hu- manity proper in which nature and spirit unite. Without scientific comparison and deduction, the simplest inspection of nature is sufficient to suggest the thought that man is built upon types from below him, even as he is formed in the image of that which is above him. If then such a view of successive evolutions from the dust, instead of an immediate outward plastic formation of the human earthly, be not inconsistent with the comprehensive language of Scripture, we should not be startled at the thought of there having been anthropoidal forms* of various degrees of approximation, some of them, perhaps, larger than any now fbtmd upon earth, and which may have perished, like some of the larger or mam- moth species of mammaUa. If the explorations of Bcience liave brought to light any such rem;iins, our faith need not be disturbed by the question of their pre-historicalness. The interpreter of Scripture is little concerned, either in affirming or denying such discoveries. Whatever be their date, we have not yet come to the humanity proper, the Adamic hu- manity, that humanity which Christ assumed and raises to a still higher sphere- The animal world is not yet surpassed. But there is n moment when the human race now upon the earth had its distinct be- ginning, and that, too, in a. primus liomn, — the "first Adam " — even as there is a " new man," a new hu- manity, that is to have its finish or compleiion in a second .\uani, or last Adam (f.rxaToi A5an), as the apostle calls him. This beginning of hunnuiiiy upon earlh was not a physical act merely, or the mere completion of a pliy.sical progress. It took place in the spiritual sphere. The true creation of man was not merely a. formation, or an animation, but an iimpi- ration, a direct, divine inspiration (Gen. ii. 7); and now there is what before was not, a nx^~3, a new • [There in bo much of caricature and Krotesquencss in the appoaraoc^ nf the simia triljc of animala, that we revolt at the thiiaRDt of any conni'ctinn with them, even a« a link In the mere phyBioril. Theii- actions are so aiisurd, thoy are such a mere mimicry of reason, ludicrous, yet actually lower than the- sober instinct of other kimls, that the out- ward rc-embliinw! makes us the more diKdain the idea of •Ten a phyMic;d relationship. It is thus that t he ape-iuit are plao^js itself in stronKcr contrast to the human than that of other animals h:ivinf; less outward likeness, either in form >T in actioi;. And yet such reseralihmco, in some dcjrrci', ut very (Tcnerul. There is homothinK in the most ccrainou *nimal-?:ices around us, that wouhl startle us liy its human ^X)li if we had seen nothing of the kind bofTC. — T. L.I thing upon earth, not simply something higher phy» ically (though e^vn that would require a divine in terveniioti), but an entity distinct as connected with a higher or supernatural world. This .\damie man thus divinely raised out of nature, and lifted above the pure animality, is the one of whom tlie Bible gives us so particular an account. He was the one who first awoke to a true rational human conscious" ness. Thus man "became a Uving soul." The em phasis is in the manner of the inbreathing ; but to distinguish it wholly from the animntion of other kinds who are also called riTi ITEJ, the wondrous event is described in other language as a sealing, a forming into a higher type, pattern, idea, or image, — not physically, but spiritually. The all-important article of faith is the dual succession, whether re- garded as an order in time, or as an order of consti- tution without reference to time : " first the nalurak (to \|', the animal), afterwards that which is spiritual" (ri irj/Eufiarind^). First that which coined from nature (tJi 4k 77)5 x"'*"'')) " '''o™ the eartlr, earthy," second, that " which bore the image of the heavenly," * or of " the Lord from heaven." Corresponding to this is the specific designation by which man is distinguished among the created orders. The animals and plants are made each injirb, after its T'O, eiSos, species, form, denoting difference in organic structure, and therefore some- thing ultimately outward as exhibited in its last analy sis, however hidden it may seem to the primary ob servatiou of the sense. It is not to be thought that the Scripture writers, in their simplicity, intended to speak scientifically or philosophically, but a deeper term was wanted in the case of man, and we have it in a remarkable change of language. Man is nowher* said to be in3"'nb, juxta genus siium, or secundum speciem siiam, but when this new entity is to be brought into tlie kosmos, God is represented as say- ing to himself, or as though addressing some higher associate than nature, " Let us make man IS'obsa * [There is a vei-y great difficulty iu confining this lan- guage of the apostle, 1 Cor- xv. ■!(», 47, to the historical in- carnation, or to the effect of the coming of Chiist at the beginning of the Christian era. It must refer to something constitutive of humanity in the beginning, before the fall, and in the very process of the oecoming man. Otherwise it would follow, that before such iiistorical advent, man was an animal merely, wholly eai-thly and sensu d, i|*u;(i«6s, XoiKof. If the iTvevfjLa ^wottoioDc, the "life-giving sjarit," iu distinction from the i|/ux»] C^aaAhc soul of life, or merely " living Boul," was not in our humanity at its fii-st consti- tution, then not only Ad.am, but Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Isaiah, were only natural tiieii, animal men, having nothing, in a true sense, spii-itiial about tlu*m. If we would avoid this very strange consequence, the language rofci-red to must have something of a creative or constitu- tive sense, and the jrfeii/Aa ^taoTToiovv, mu^t bo regaided as the ^iOt^ littari^ov -navra avdptawoi', "the Light that lighteth every man coming into the world" of John i. 9, making, u. the beginning, that peculiar constitution wliicli wo may call the completed man, and which was never wholly lost as a high spiritual power, however muL^h it may have been mar- red in ils ethical aspect. Christianity is indeed leon-ij ktiVis, "a new creation,' 2 Cor. v. 17, or the malciig of a "new man," but this rs not inconsistent with the idea of a resto- ration, a rc-creatiou, a renewed spirituality, or even the bringing back to a higher state than that fiom which man fell. 'I'he second Adam was not absent from the cieation of the first. In the spititual image of Him who is himself styled the express image, or hypostatic iiiiage, vapaitTija vrroaTaatm, lleb. i. 3, was man spiritu.illy foi'med- Through It ho Ijoearae man, and therefore it is truly said of the incar- nate Logos, that " he came to bis own ; " and thus also is lie trilh- bar-nashn, sou of man, the Hebrew ,nnd Ryi-iac teiTB for the generic Aomo. In his etoruity, and io his historic^ Inoaniation, he la "the root as well as the otispring" of humanity. — T. L.1 CHAP. X. 1-82. S5i .» our imar/e." The D^S , therefore, in the case of bumanity, may be said to malie the "|"'a, or lo come ui place of it. fn other words, it is the spiritual •mage here, and not the physical organization, that makes the species ; and most important is the dis- tinction in all our reasonings about the essential oneness of humanity, and what most truly consti- tutes it. From this primus homo, thus inspired, thus •ealed, comes all of human kind that erer has been, or is now upon the earth. To apply what has been eaid to the more direct subject of this note, there is here the decisive answer to that view which would represent man as commencing in the savage state regarded as barely and imperceptibly rising above the animal. This inspiration is a great and glorious beginning. It is a new divine force in the earth. The fall does not at once destroy it, though giving a tendency to spiritual death, and spiritual degeneracy, carrying with it a physical decline. Even with ihis, however, the primitive divine impulse in the first man, and in the first men, makes them something very dilferent from what is now called tiie savage state, and which is everywhere found to be the dregs of a once higher condition, the setting instead of the rising sun, the dying embers fa.^t going out, instead of the kindling and growing flHme. All past and present history may be confidently challenged to present the contrary case. Among human tribes, wholly left to themselves, the higher man never comes out of the lower. .Apparent exceptions do ever, on closer examination, confirm the univcrsaliiy of the rule in regard to particular peoples, whilst the claim that is made for the world's general progress can ouly be urged in opposition by ignoring the supernal aids of revelation that have ever shone somewhere, directly or collaterally, on the human path. The high creative impulse manifested itself in the Antediluvian period in its resistance to the death- principle, which, through the spiritual, the fall had introduced into the human physical organization. It showed itself in a rapidly developed, though a suicidal or self-corrupting civilization, in the line of Cain, and in an extreme longevity in the holier line of Seth. With a branch of the latter it, passed the flood, impaireil, it may be, but unspent. The pre- served race, tending again to a sensual gregarious- ne.s3. received a new divine impulse, which may al- most be regarded as resembling a second subordinate creation. It was not the renewal of holiness, but of spiritual vigor, making humanity sublime even in its wickedness. It was the spirit of discovery, sending men over the face of the before unknown earth. It was the pioneering spirit, ever leading then on to make new settlements, to overcome new difficulties, to engage in great works, all the more astounding when we consider the little they possessed of what may be called science. What a grand conception w.as that of building a tower that should reach unto the skies, and make them independent of the muta- tions they beheld in nature ! How has such a thought, though taking far more scientific forms, ever swayed mankind, showing itself still in the pre- tentious claims of our present knowleilge, so boast- ing, yet so small in comparison with the great un- known, and so little able to relieve the deep-seated evils of our fallen race. " Go to," said they, " let na build a city and a tower," as a defence against ^eaven. It was the same language that was after- wards re-echoed in the Promethean boast,* and thai we still sometimes hear fV<)m a godless scitoca vaunting that it "has annihilated space and tiioe. that it has disarmed the lightning : Eripuit ccelo fulmen — that it will yet deprive the ocean of its terrors, and introduce, at last, that millennium of liuman achievo nient which will make man independent of any power above or without him. It was but a short time after the flood, when there appears this new heroic spirit, this vast ambi tion, in the very opening of the wcji'ld's history. Scripture gives us but few points in the picture, but these are most impressive : Nimrod, " the mighty hunter before the Lord," beginning the kingdom of Babylon ; settlements rapidly following it on the upper Euphrates; the descendants of Ham already upon the Nile; the sons of Javan wending their way by the islands and coasts of the Mediterranean ; Tyro and Sidon taking their place " at the entry of tha sea," as though already looking out to become "the merchant of the people for many isles." It was the time of the tower-builders, the pyramid-builders, the great city-builders, the empire-founders. Along wiih the pioneering and colonizing spirit, there was also the associative tendency, so different from any thing we now see iu any modern savagism. There was, also, in vigorous exercise, the government idea, or the government instinct, if any prefer thus to name it, leading men to tbrm great polities, and to recognize in government something of a divine or supernatural nature. We may call it hero-worship, but it was something very different from anything now known in savage tribes, and led to results ut- terlv unknown as ever following froiti such a state. Such were the primitive men as the Bible pre- sents them to us, although their mere worldly great- ness was to the Scripture writers a wholly subordin- ate subject. Secular history confirms the account. This it does in two wa>s : 1st, by its silence as to aU before. If men had been so many ages on the earth, what were they doing all this time ? What traces have they left of their existence ? At the most, onlj a few ambiguous bones here and thei'e discovered, after the keenest search, and in respect to whose real antiquity men of science are still contending. We ask in vain for the marks of progress, or of any transition state. A speaking silence, like that which seems to come from the blank chamber of the great pyramid, proclaims that man, the Adaniic or Noachic man, is not much older than the pyramids, — two thousand years, perhaps, a little more or a little less. If we pay no attention to this striking fact, of the almost total absence of any human remains, it might, perhaps, be said, that history only commences after the emergence from the long savage state, and, therefore, gives no testimony to the many ages of human existence that might have be n before it. This, hortever, supposes a sudden emergence, such as would seem to demand some new power, some' thing like a divine or ah extra impulse, unfelt in the ages before, and which would not greatly differ — at least in the inarvellousncss and apparent supernatu ralness of it — from what the Bible tells us of a now creation of humanity. It would imply someth'.ag * Totoi' Tra\at(T'n}v vvv napaUKeva^fTai *0s 6i) K^pavvov KpsiiTtTov' tupjjtrei i^Aoya, ©oAao'CTiat' re yrig TLvaKTeipav t'oaov Tpiaivav, aixi^t}v rfv HoaeiS'itvoi; aKiSa. Alsc iylp..;. Prom, Find. 913 356 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. coming into the human movement, greatly accelerat- ing it, at least, if not wholly originating. It woulii be something undeveloped, or very suddenly and strangely developed, from what went before. And this brings us to the second or positive evidence of history. If it testifies by its silence, still more im- pressive is it when it begins to speak, and this is at the time when something in human action deemed notable, or worthy of remembrjince, demands its voice. The strong self-consciousness which is the result of awakened action immediatelv seeks its record. The observation of passing times, or chro- nology, begins with it. It is this commencement of movement that creates history, whether in writing of some kind — which there is good reason to believe was among the very earliest things, and called out by this very demand for a recording medium — or in the measured language of song, or in formal tradi- tions, which, however vague and exaggerated, pie- sent an expressive contrast to an utterly unrecording Bilence. The history that thus begins to speak has not the exactness of modern annals, but, as compared with ■what might have been expected on the other theory, its voice is loud and clear. It comes not with mut- tered tones, inarticulate and unintelligible. Its ut- terance is more emphatic in the very beginning than in some of the lapsed ages that follow it. How much more distinctly stand out the first Pharaohs, whether of sacred or secular history (see Herod., ii. 100, 101), than the later shadows upon the monu- ments ! The earliest history bursts upon us, as it were. It begins with men doing great things, raising pyramids, building cities," founding states. It opens with the Egyptian and Babylonian empires, and that, too, as new powers in fullest vigor, and pre- senting every appearance of youthful greatness. The proper names given to us, whether of men or places, have nothing of the cloudy, mythical aspect, but stand out with all the distinctness of veritable life. Le.^s is known of the most early East, of India and China, but sufficient to warrant the belief, that by the Ganges, as «ell as by the Nile and the • [Four preat cities are started in the very "beginning of Nimrod's kingdom. Babe!, and Ereoh, and Accad, and Oalneh in the land of Shinar," Gen. x. 10. This is cnn- firmed by Herodotus. He speaks of it as a remarkable peculiarity of Assyria in his day — the number and great- Bess of its cities. They roust have lieen founded in the earliest times, and by .a people who had a passion for great structures — -ee Herod., i. 178. Rawlinson regards this large number of important cities as one of *' the most strik- ing features of the Assyrian greatness.*' He shows, too, how icmrokahly it is confirmed by the modem discoveries am-'ng the vast As-^yrinn i-uins: "Grouped around Nine- veh were Calah (JV/mrwrf), Scripture Ctilneli ; Dur Sagina (Khor.-abad) \ Tarbi-^a (.S7(«rj//.7(rtn) ; Ar\ic\ {ArhH) ; Kha- zeh iSliaTiiamek); and Ae^hur (.S/iirf/uf). Lower down, the banks of th'* Tigris exhibit an almost unbroken lint^ of rnins from Tekrit to Bavrhdad, while Babylonia and Chaldea are throughout studded with mounds from north to soutli, the remains of the gre:it Ciijntals of u liicli \vc read in tltc inscriptions. Again, in upper Me8i'pt)tomia, lietweeii the Tigris and the Khahour, Mr. Layard found the whole coun- try covered with mounds, the remnanfcj of cities belonging to the early Assyrian period." Uawmnson's Herodotus, vol. i p. 243. Those go back tn the very beginnings of his- tory. They make history. There is none before thorn, as there iB n'» historical place for them in later annals, when tbuBe empires began to cnimtde, as Ihev did at a very early period. S(. everything confirms (he idea, that the pyra- midH and the gieat structures of Thebes and Memphis bc- .ong to the very beginnines of Egyptian history. '1 hey are Bonuments of the priman'ol nieii. From those ruins Ibi'V yet speak to us of a period of great tietion, of a vast ambi- tion suddenly manifesting itself, and before which silence velicDed ov«r all th« earth.— T. L.I Euphrates, a young humanity was giving e\ideDO« of mighty bodily powers and high spiiitual ene'gy , different, indeed, from the present, and presenting some aspects strange to our modern conceptions, ycl veiy unlike the savage state, or a rise from such i state, had such a rise been ever shown in any ea..y or later history of the world. In brief — the first his- torical appearances of men upon the earth are at wf.* with this theory of savagism. Such independent emergings as are contended for do not now take place, and never have tali en place within the tiiues of known hivtory. The savage comlition, as has been said, and cannot he deniel, is one ever sinking lower and lower, until aid is brought to it from without; and at the early time referred to there was no such aid except from a supernal and supernatural source. On either view, we are compelled to admit tlie fact of a great beginning of humaidty on the earth. The primitive man was a spletidid being— not seien tific, nor civilized, in ourmotlern sense of tlie words but possessing great power, both of body and soul He had all to learn, yet learned most rapidly. Re searches among the earliest monuments sometimes astonish us by the suggestions they offer of a knowl- edge supposed to belong only to modern times, oi to which, in some cases, modern discovery has not yet reacheti. There is brought out evidence of re suits in the arts, in manufactures, and in the em ployment of mechanical aids, that we find it ver^ difficult to account for. If we cannot believe them to have come from processes of investigation strictly scientific, then must we ascribe them to other pow- ers of a high order, and in which we fail to surpass tlictn — such as keen observation awake to every out- ward application of natural forces, most acute senses, and imrivalled manual skill. If it was the greatness of force and magnitude, it was greatness still, such as was never attained to by any savage people ia historical times. These early men had great aims, they attempted great things, and they accomplished them rapidly. We have oidy to take this view, forti- fied .as it is by Scripture and the early profane his- tory, to ticcount for what seems so wonderful to some writers, and which has drawn them to their long chronologies. As remarked elsewhere (p. 317), the history of human progress has ever been one of starts and impulses. As in the geological ages, so also within historical times, there are periods in which more has been done in a few generations, than, under other eircutnstances, has been accom- plished in many centuries. Thus the time that in- tervetied between the Scriptural flood and the first mention of the Egyptian motuarcliy, even as reckoned by the shorter chronology, may have brought on the world*s history faster than ages of cotnparativc tor- ]ior, such as have appeared in the varied annals of mankind. Again, there is an intrinsic difficulty in such views as that of Bunsen, which, when closely exam- ined, jiresents a gi'eater incredibilitv than anything of whicli it professes to give the explanation. Ad- mitting such idea of emeigence after ages of unliis- torical savagism, still the questions arise: Why wan not this more universal after it had commenced? Why did it not appear in other jiarts of *he eartli? Why iliil the early light confine itself to jnc jicople for so long a time, inaliing Mihrnjrn historicalli what it is geographically and etytiiologically, the narrnwM, a line immense iti length with the scanfiesi brcailth? During these fifteen thmtsand years, oi more, of motnitnetital history, all the rest of the CHAP. XI. 1-tf. ^F,' •»»th was in comparative night. Established insti- tutions, a regular nionarcliy for ten thousand years, at least, king inheriting; from king, or dynasty suc- ceeding dynasty, a political state unbroken for a period three times as long as the whole series of Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, Roman, Mongolian, and Turkish empires — social orders uninterruptedly transmitted, records of all this preserved, monu- ments attesting it ! It is incredible in itself — much more so when we consider the condition of the rest of the earth, even the nearest parts. In Egypt, ten thousand years of govsmment, of civihzatiun, of advanced agriculture, of social order, and all this time Greece, Italy, and even Asia Minor, in total darkness — uninhabit'-d, or in the lowest unhistorical savagism ! It is very hard to believe this. It pre- sents a marvel greater than anything recorded in Genesis about the origin and early condition of man- kind— gre.iter for the imagination, far j;reatep for the reason. Egyptian history would be like an Egyptian obelisk standing in the tiesert, spindling np to a vast height, whilst all around was desolation in the view that height presented. Such an antiquity in this one peoplt', should we reason from it a priori, and con- nect with it the modern claim of progress, would throw out of proportion all the other chapters of history. It would bring the Roman empire before 'he days of Abraham, and make our nineteenth cen- lUry antedate the Trojan war. These considerations do not only support the Sible chronology as prolonged in the LXX., but fur- lish an argument in favor of the still shorter Hebrew •eckoning. Taking the primitive men as the Bible ■epresents them, aiid the latter gives ample time for Ul that is recorded. Connected with this there is another thought. How came this Hehiew chrono: ogv to present such an example of modesty as com pared with the extravagant claims to antii|uity mad; by all other nations ? The Jews, doubtless, had, at men, similar national pride, leading them to magnifj their age upon the earth, and run it up to thousands and myriads of years. How is it, that the people whose actual records go back the farthest ha^e the briefest reckoning of all ? The only answer to this is, that wliilst others were left to their unrestrained fancies, this strange nation of Israel were under a providential guidance in the matter. A divine check held them back from this folly. A holy reserve, coming from a constant sense of the divine pupilage, made rhem feel that " we are but of yesterday," whilst the inspiration tl.at controlled their historians directly taught them that man had been but a short time upon the earth. They liad the same motive as others to swell out their national years ; that they have not done so, is one of the strongest evidences of the divine authority of their Scriptures. And how fair is their representation ! Egypt, Babylon, Assyria, Tyre, the early Javanic settlements, all starting about the same time, and from the same quarter of a late inh ibited earth ; this is credible probable, making harmonious sacred and profane history. The other view of the long and lonely Egyptian dynasties is monstrous, out of all propor tion — incredible. Had the Bible given such a long, narrow, solitary antiquity of twenty thousand, oi even ten thousand, years, to the people whose his- tory it mainly assumes to set forth, it would, doubt- less, have called out the scoff of those whose sceptical creduhty so easily receives the fabulous chronology of other nations. — ^T. L.) FOURTH SECTION. The Tower of Babel, the Confusion of Languages, and the Dispemon oj xht Natioti* ,7hapter XI. 1-9. 1 2 And the wliole earth was of one language [lip], and of one speech.' And it came to pass, as they journeyed^ from the east', that they found a plain in the land of Shinar, 3 and they dwelt there. And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly [literaUy, to a burning]. And they had brick for stone, and shiue had i tliey for mortar [cement]. And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name [a signal, sign of renown], lest we be 5 scattered abroad upon the face of tlie whole earth. And the Lord came down to see 6 the city and the tower which the children of men had builded. And the Lord said, Belioki, the people is one, and they have one language ; and this they begin to do : and 7 now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have in igined to do, Go to, let us go down, and there confoimd their language [on the very spot], that they m.ay not under- 8 stand one another's speech. So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the 9 face of all the earth ; and they left off to build the city. Therefore is the name of it called Babel' [forbsba. division of speecli, confusion ; other explanations : ba 23. gate of Belus, S3""13 castle of Beius], because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the Lord scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth S56 " GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. (- Ver. 1. — Z"TnX C^"lZ^^ PnX rtBTU one Up and one words, as near as our English can come to it. T.XX »«tAo< el Kat i^wfi} fi-La iraat ; Vulg., labii unttu et sermonum eorumdem; the Syriac, ^ww ^ Vkxi^^y-. ^^ f ^ *^ > one tongTie and one speech ; and eo the Targmn of Oukelos, "in ^^^"C^I in ■ttj'^b . So Greek writers desciibr thos" i who speak the same lan^age as o^oyAcDrroi and ojno^wroi. Kashi interprets C^"i j1 as referring to tbe thoufjbts anqi eouQSels rather than to language, regar.ling tliat as expressed by HEC : " They came to an understanding," or *' iiit# one counsel." Pnx H^r 1X^ ; in which Vitringa agrees with him. Kaulen makes a labored diitinction betwcin TEB (Ui J C^~— 1 . the first of which he refers to the subjective element in speech, producing the grammatical form, the titha to the objective, or the words as the matter of language. In proof, he cites such passages as Ps. xii. 3, pipbn TStt! Hp ofJlaUerits ; Esod. vi. 12, unctrcumcised lip ; Prov. xii. 19, lips of truth, etc. ; Is. sssiii. 19, nS'C ^p"'S" , detp fif'hp But these examples only show that, when there is no contrast intended, nSO , lip, may be taken generally for lanrtag (Lke lingua, the tongue ; see ver. 9, below), including not only words and pronunciation, but all of thought and e^ref- iioii that belongs to it. To show that D'^""T and HEIU are not tautological here, he quotes Ps. lix. 13,'l?;"'rEiU*ia^ the xcord of their lips But this is needless. It is clear that thev are not tautoloi^ical. They express two distinot ideaf: , and yet we may doubt whether there is intended such a philosophical antithesis as K;iulen wou'd bricL' out, though most true in itself, and most important to be considered in the science of language. The first though'i. would be the other way, namely, that IZT (Adyo?) denoted the subjective, and HBC lip, the outward or objective in language ; since the first it used of a thought, thing, subject, that which is expressed, as well mb the word or expression. The terms liere are neither tautological, nor antithetical, hut supplemental and intensive. It is the unity of language described in the most compre- liensive manner : one lip, that is, one pronunciation, and the same words (C^inx 0^"t!n , every one of them (the plnrei taken distributively), that is, one name for each thing, and one way of speaking it. When they are put in, direct ocn- trast, then HDC , instead of the subjective element, as Kaulen maintains, would denote mere sound in distinction from oense. as in the phrase CTlSb ^^"H , Is. xxxvi. 5; 2 Kings, xviii. 20 ; Prov. xiv. 23— speech of the lips, that is, mere eiLpty boasting, sound without sense. — T. L.] ['■* Ver. 2.— DS*D33 , literally, in their pulling up. It is used of the taking up the stakes of a tent (see it in its primary aeLse, Is. xxxvlii' l2>," and is thus pictorially descriptive of a nomadic life, like the Arabic ^_^. . n jg usod ol the marching in tbe wilderness, and suggests here the idea of an encampment. The descendants of Noah had hitherto kept v.;;ctherin tbeirrovings.— T. L.] ■ ^ CTp'O —Tendered from the East. Armenia, the supposed landing-place of tbe ark, was northwest of Shinar. Tbia has .ed s-ime to suppose, that the early human race made a detour through Persia, and so were travelling (}ast when they came to Shinar. t)tberB have regarded the ark-niountain as situated to tbe east, a view which c-in onlj; be maintained by supposing the naming of the Armenian Ararat to belong to a later period, as a transfer fromau older and more east- erly region (see text, note p. 308). The original Scripture does not, of itself, determine tlie location as either east or west ; so that the Samaritan version, that makes it Serendib (in Ceylon) is not to be rejected, as in itself false or absurd, any more than tbe Vulgate location in Armenia, or the Targum and Syriac mountains of Kardu, or the Arabian Mount Judi wherever that may have been. Rashi seems thus to have regarded it when he interprets DIISTD as a journeying from Cip in (mountainof the East), mentioned just above, ch. x. 30. Others would render n"li5 13 eastTfvard, or to the east, refer- ring to such paf^sages as Gen. xiii. 11 ; Numb, xxxiv. 11 ; Josh. vii. 2 ; Judg. viii. 11, etc., in all of which, except the first, the term denotes position instead of moving direction, and may, therefore, be regarded as determined from the standpoint, real or assumed, of the narrator or describer. Bochart regards -"|P. ^^ a name given to all the country beyond thq Euphrates and Tigris, independent of the position of some parts ofit in respect to other parts or to regions on the other Bide. This would seem the best way, if we must render -"jl?^ from the east. But there is an older sense to the root, which may well be regarded as intended here. This primary sen-, i-^ ante, before, or in front of. Hence its application tc time as well as to space. The old country is afterwards called the Kast, and so ni2lp' becomes a word of local direction This primary sense of anteriority gives the idea here demanded, which is not so nnch any particular direction (the geography not being the thing chiefly in view), as it is the general idea of progress As they journeyed onward, CTpT3 right ahead, in their nomadic roviug— from one b^ore to another, or from the pl>»ce before them to one still farther on— they found a n3.'p3 , or plain country. Gen xiii. 12 seems to be like this, and .nay be rendered in the same way : Abra- ham and Lot parted ; the former settled ( Z^^ ) in tli.- hmd where they were , or Abraham stopped, as we say in famiUar English, but Ixtt J^rumti/ed on, Clj^ia 2r©»V Compare xi- 2, C12; 1p-'.}^» and they stopped there (in Shinar), where ZW'i is in a similar contrast to the nomadic word "D"^ . Or it may ^"o taken as a word of position : he pitched his tent eastward. In this place the Targum of Onkclos has fiOnp%, in (he East, regarding it as denoting position. So also the Arabic , k W-»-M A • The LXX., the Vulgate; and'the Syriac render it /ram the East.—T. L.] r« Ver. 9.— 533 nr\i; S"ip called its name Babel, hhz Dl^ ""a , because there be confounded (b:del = balbel) the language, etc. There is'difficulty, somotimes, in the elymologjes given in the Hebrew Bible, but this seems to be a re- markablv clear and consistent one. It seoma strange that Dr. Lange sliould sh-.w himself inclined to the other far-fetched derivation, which would make it mean either the "gate of Bel," or *' the gate of Kl." Naming cities from the gate is not the most early way, thoigh It came in afterwards, from the gntc becoming the important place of commercial, judicial, and political procedure. ScLell ng is right in Baying that 3X3 . ^^b , *"«»^ 6^*^, is confined alone to the Arabic, of all tbe Shemitic tongues It Ib e't.rely unknown to the Hebrew, and if it is ever found in any very late Syriac, it comes from the cctmparatively nodem Arabic use. ITiOt is reason, too, to regard bs • notwithstanding a doubt expressed by Kawlinson niAWLiNSON : Herod., i. p. 247), as the sanu- with br3 , the deified power, or personage, that appears all over the East — Banl, Lord, Master, and which becomes a g.neral name for monarchs, like Pharaoh in Etrvpt. In the iJaby. binian it becomes Hel or Uelus ; and in addition to ibc Fhoonician lljtal, or Bal, (appearing in many Ph7,fiaJ^rivipxatov. Thougii with a singular adjective, It can U nothing less than ■|"'^T3 (.Baaliv). or, »8 the whole would bo oxprefised in the later Hebrew, T^SiSll^n 7^53 Tomakothis very ancientai. d memorahlnn:imc'b33(Hab.l)equiv:ilent to the Arabic Jo tw»U , ^Z 3X3 orbr3 3a. ^te of Bet or Baal, would be greatly straining etymology as well as history. Had such a derivation been found in thi CHAP. XI. 1-9. 8Sl Blblet it would donbtleea have been contemptuously rejected, by some who go so far from the Bible to (fet it. Nothing «an lie more direct and consistent than the etymology given in Genesis. The verb 35D is the same with the intenaivi form ^353 , baUial, from which 5"* is softened after becoming a fixed and oft-pronouuci-'d name. 33b" , balbel, its nr onoraatope, exactly like our word babble, and its sense of confusion is probably secondary, coming from this early onoma- topic use. The letters L and R are cognate and interchangeable, in the Greek as well as in the Shemitic tongues. Henc< balbal and fiapfiap are the same. Barbarian did not, originally, mean savage, but one who speaks a ditfcreut language or who seems to the hearer to babble. It was the place where men first became barbarians to each other (see 1 Cor. xi^ U), though the name, as an onomatope, would seem still to belong to them all. — T. L.J GENERAL PRELIMINARY DISCUSSION. 1. The literature: Bibelwerk, Matthew, p. 19. The present work, p. 119, where the title of Nie- buhr*3 work should be more correctly given : " His- tory of Assur and Babel." Berlin, 1858. KtJRTz: "History of the Old Testament." Haug, on the " Writing and Language of the Second Kind of Cu- aeifonn Inscriptions." Gottingen, 18.55. J. Brandis, on the " Historical Results from the Deciphering of the Assyrian Inscriptions." Berlin, 1856. Fabbi : " The Origin of Heathendom and the Problem of its Mission." Barmen, 1859. Tbelatest: Kaulen: "The Confusion of Languages at Babel." Mainz, 1861. Explorers of the ruins of Babylon, especially Rich, Ker-Porter, Layard, Rawlinson, Oppert. 2. TTie histori/ of the building the tower at Babel forma the limit to tlie history of the primitive tiini'. It may be regarded as the genesis of the history of the human striving after a false outward unity, of the doom of confusion that God therefore imposed upon it, of the dispersion of the nations into all the " oild, and of the formation of heathendom as directly con- nected therewith. In the proper treatment of this there comes into consideration : 1. the relation of the historical fact-consistency of the representation to its universal symbolical significance for the history of the world, and to its special symbolical significance for the kingdom of Goil ; 2. the relation of the fact itself to the common historical knowledge, as well as to the history of the kingdom of God ; 3. the relation of the confounding, therein represented, to the original unity of the human race in its language, as well as to the multiplicity that originally lay in human speech ; 4. the historical and archfeologieal testimonies; 5. the reflection of the historical fact in the mythical stories. 3. Kurtz correctly maintains (History of the Ola Testament, p. 95) against H. A. Hahn, that this place forms the boundary between the history of the primitive time and the history of the Old Testament. Evidently is the history of pruncval religion distin- guished from the general history of the Old Testa- ment by definite monuments, namely, by the charac- teristic feature of the faith in promise, as presented in the genealogies, through which faith Abraham, as the type of the patriarchal religion, stands in contrast with Melchidezek, the type of the primitive reUgion, — even as the morning twilight of the new time stands in contrast with the evening twilight of the old. And so, too, according to Gal. iii. and Rom. iv., it is not Moses who is the beginning of the covenant religion, but Abraham. Moreover, in the history of the tower-building there is brought out not only the grounl form for the historical configuration the world is to assume, but also the contrast between heathetiism and the beginnings of the theocracy. For the sake of this contrast, according to our view, the section may still be regarded as belongmg to the first period from the beginnings of the Shemitic pa- tnarehalism ; although when regarded in itself alone, tad under the hi.'torical form of view of the Old Tes- tament, it appears as an introduction to the historj of Abraham. 4. The genesis of the human striving after • false outward unity, or uniformity and confortnity. As in the history of Cain, the first beginnings of cul- ture in the building of cities, in the discoveries and inventions of the means of living, of art, and of weapons of defence, were buried in tlieir owu cor- ruption (since the germs of culture, however law- ful in themselves, are overwhelmed in their ungodly worthlessness), and as in the history of Nimrod tha post-diluvian beginnings of civilization, and of out- ward political institutions, were darkened by the in- dications of despotic violence, so also, in the history of the tower-building, must we distinguish the natu- ral striving of the human race after an essential unity, from their aberration in a bold and violent eflbrt to obtain an outward consistency, an outward uniformity (or conformity rather) to be established at the cost of the inward unity. Delitzsch says cor- rectly (p. 3101 : " the unity which bad hitherto bound together the human family was the community of one God, and of one divine worship. This unity did not satisfy them ; inwardly they had already lost it ; and therefore it was that they strove for another. There is, therefore, an ungodly unity, which they sought to reach through such self-invented, sensual, outward means, whilst the very thing they feared they predicted as their punishment. In its essence, therefore, it was a Titanic heaven-defying undertak- ing." * The inward unity of faith ought to have been the centre of gravity, the rule and the measure of their outward unity. The historical form of their true unity was the religion of Shem ; its concrete middle point was Shem himself. It sounds, therefore, like a derisive allusion to the despised blessing of Shem, when they say: Go to, let us build a tower for us, and make unto ourselves a name (a Shem). When, therefore, the tower-building, the false out- ward idea of unity is frustrated, then it is that Abraham must appear upon the stage as the effective middle point of humanity, and the preparer of the way for the unity that was to come. Abraham forms • |The more carefully the peculiar language of this Ba- bel history is considered, and especially its heaven-defying look, the more probable will appear the view supported by Bryant, which regards it as the origin of the heathen fable of the war of tlie giants against the gods. The war of th« Titans was proliably the same, though it appears as a dupli- cate of the event in the Greek mythology. The latter, how- ever, being set forth as the more ancient event, may, with some reason, be referred to the antediluvian rebellion de- scribed in Gen. vith. Both of these myths must have had some historical foundation in actual Human history ; for nothing can be more wild in itself, or more inconsistent with what we know, or may conceive, of the earliest thinking, than those representations of allegorical wars of which some writers are so fond. In the first period of human life, men were too muirh occupied with the great actual, and this ij shown by the verj" exaggerations of the form which it •*»• sumed in histoi-y. Myth-making and allegorizing cam^- in afterwards. The w.ar of ideas, of which some talk, showi a previous philosophizir)g, however crude. The sight of gi eat physical convulsions may have suggested some of thes^ stories ; but the actual occurrence of great events in humaz history was their more probable source — T T- 1 >60 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. the tht 5cratic contrast to the heathen tower-building. Since iliat time, however, the striving of human na- ture has ever taken the other direction, namely, to establish by force the outward unity of humanity at the expense of the inward, and in contradiction to it ; this has appeared as well in the history of the world monarchies as in that of the hierarchies. The his- tory of Babel had its prusignal in the city of Cain, its symbol in the building of the tower, its beginning in the Babylonian world-monarchy ; but its end, «ccording to Rev. xvi. 17, falls in the "last time." ■ The contrast to this history of an outward forcc- nnity is formed by Shem, Abraham, Zion, Christ, the Church of believers, the bride of Christ, according to Rev. xxi. 2, 9. 5. Tke gtiiesis of the confounding to which it teas doomed bi/ God. The germinal multiplicity, as con- tained in the unity of the human race, is to be re- garded as the natural basis of the event. We can- not, as has been attempted by Origen and others, derive au organic division of the nations in their manifold contrasts (and just as little the varied multi- plicity of life in the world) from the fall merely, or from human corruption. To this effect it is well ob- served by Delitzsch, that "even without that divine and miraculous interposition, the one original lan- guage, by virtue of tlie abundance of gifts and powers that belong to humanity, would have run through an advancing process of enrichment, spiritualization. and diversity." This germinal multiplicity forms, there- fore, the other side, or the higher, spiritual side, in the confusion of languages ; but this, too, we must distinguish in its genesis and in its world-historical consequences. Since the Babylonian tower-building denotes the genesis of the national separations as the genesis of heathendom (but not the monstrous development of heathendom which goes on (lirough the ages), so, in like manner, does it denote the genesis of the speech-confounding, but not its great development in the course of time. This genesis, however, is to be considered in reference to the fol- lowing points : 1. With the violent striving after an outward unity there is connected the crushing of the diversity. 2. This violent suppression calls out, by way of reaction, the effort and intensity of the diver- sifying tendency, or the conflict of spirits. 3. With this conflict of spirits there develops itself, also, the contrast of varying views and modes of exjiression. 4. The disordered and broken unity becomes dis- solved into partial unities, which form themselves around the middle points of tribal affinity, and so form their watchwords. Thus far goes on the pro- cess of di-^solution, in the sin and guilt of the strife after an outward unity. But here comes in the divine judgment in its miraculous impo.sition: the Bpirits, the modes of conception, the modes of ex- pression, the tongues themselves, are all so confound- ed, that tliere becotnes a perfect breach of unity, and more than this, a hostile springing apart of unfet- tered elements that had been boimd up in a forced •nity. So ilid the divine doom establish a genois In the confusion of languages — a genesis which after- wards, in the course of time, came to its full develop- ment. 6. Tfie ffenenig of the dinperition of the peoples in all the vjorld, and of the formation of heathendom. thai from thence beijan. In opposition to the ci-n- tripetal force of humanity, im|iaired by its own BUpe;'»en8ion and the outward alienating tendency, come* n(»w the reaction of the m(n'))id ceotrifugal pownr set free by the sentence of Ciod. So com- mence the national emigrations of antiquity, seti.ng away from the centre of community, forming in thii a contrast to the migrations of the Christian time, which maintain their connection with the centre of humanity, the host of the Christian church. Id greater and smaller waves of migration do the na- tions scatter abroad, and grow widely diverse in their scfiarate lands, and in the midst of the views which they awaken ; and this to such a degree that cvery- wliere they lose themselves in a peculiarly paganistic autoclithonic consciousness, or, as it may be generally styled, a servile life of nature. The line of Shem is least affected by the drawing of this centrifugal power. It extends itself slowly from Babylon, in a small degree to the east, and in great part to the southwest. The main stream of the Ilamites takes a southwestern direction towards Canaan and Africa; another stream appears to have turned itself east- wardly over Persia and towards India. The great stream of the Japhethites goe.s first northward, in or- der to divide itself into a western and an eastern euirent ; a part, however, in all probability, taking a still more northern direction, until, through upper Asia, it reaches the New World. The most evident division of the Shemites is into three parts, which still reflect themselves in the three main Shemitic languages. The fundamental separation has gone on into wider separations ; for example, into the division of the Indian and the Persian Arians. These divisions are, again, in a great degree, eftaced by combinations which proceeded from the contrasi between earlier and later migrations in the same di- rection. So, for example, in eastern Asia, the Ja- phethites appear to have supervened upon the Ilam- ites, in Asia Minor and Persia upon the Shemit'^s; and so, in many ways, have the earlier Japhethite features been overlaid and set aside by the later. In Canaan, on the other hand, the Haraites appear to have supervened upon the original Shemitic inhabit- ants ; and then, again, at a later date, the Israelites supervened upon the Hamitic Canaaiutes. The most direct consequence of this dispersion of the nations was the formation of races, in which different factors cooperated : 1. The family type ; 2. tha spiritual direction ; 3. the climate in its strong effect upon the physical ground-forms which were ■,et in their state of childlike flexibility. A further consequence was the formation of ethnographical contrasts in civilization. In reference to this there must be distinguished : 1) The contrast between the savage nations who had become utterly unhistorical, or perfectly sepa- rated from the central humanity, and the historical nations. 2) The contrast of barbarian nations who for u long time preserved a state of negative indift'erence as compared with the nations that were within the community of culture. :',) The contrast presented by the nations and tribes of isolated culture, as compared with the cen trali/cd culture, or that of the world monarchies as it api>eared in its latest form, the Graico-Roman- hunianilarian sphere of culture. ■1) The ctmtrast presented by the nationa of this centialized culture, or as it finally appeared in the Gneco-Ronian-humanitariau culture, as compared with the central theocratic people of cultua or re- ligion. The last contrasts reveal, as the second conse- quence, a double counterworking against tiie pagan ietic isolization : the first is a tendencv to the outei CHAl". XI. 1-9. 36, jnity (irorld-monarchy), the other a tendency to the inner uuitv (tlieocracy). A third consequence was the war lietweeu them. 7. 2'he relation of the historical fact-consixteririi of the Biblical representation to its si/mbolical si(/jd/i- tance for the universal hhtory of the world. It is difiScult to determine tlie chronological order of the tower-building in the Biblical history ; it is still more difficult to fix its place in the universal secular his- tory. It is, however, more easy to do this wlnn we assume that the history of the tower-building was that of a gradually elapsing event, which is here all comprehended in its germinal transition-point (as the commencing turning-point), conformably to the rep- reaentiition of the religious historico-symbolical his- toriography. Following the indications of the Bible itself, we must di-stinguish two periods: first, the founding of Babel, in consequence of an ungodly centralization fancy of the first human race, and the catastrophe of the commencing dissolution that thereby came in ; secondly, the despotic founding of the kingdom of Babel by Nimrod, as connected with it. Add to tliis a third, which is in like manner at- tested by the BiOle, namely, the further development of Babel as it continued on in spite of the disper- sion, and to whose greatness the stories of Ninus and Semiramis, as well as the world-historical ruins of Babylon bear testimony. It is in perfect accord- ance with the theocratic historiography, that events which occupy periods are comprehended in the ger- minal points of their peculiar epochs. As this is tlie ease with the tower-building, so does it also hold true of the confusion of languages, and the dispersion of the nations. In regard now to this germinal point especially, it has been wrongly placed in the days of Peleg, in supposed accordance with what was said, ch. X. 25, concerning the meaning of the name Peleg. Keil computes that Peleg was born one hundred years after the flood, and draws from thence the wider Conclusion, that " in the course of one hundred and fifty to one hundred and eighty years, and in the rapid succession of births, the descendants of the three sons of Noah, who were already married and a hundred years old at the time of the flood, must have already so greatly multiplied as to render cred- ible their proceeding to build such a tower " (p. 120). In respect to the third designated period of the tower- building, Delitzsch thus remarks in relation to the Biblical interpretation of the name Babel (for Balbel, a pilpel form in which the first Lamed has fallen out) : " The name Babel denotes the world city where men became dispersed into nations, as the name Je- rusalem denotes the city of God, where they are again brought together as one family. As the name Jerusalem obtains this sense in the light of prophecy, so is the name given to Babel, no matter whetlier ivith or without the design of the first nainer, a sig- lificant hiero-glyph of that judgment of God which ffas interwoven in the very origin of this world-city, ind of that tendency to an ungodly unity which it nas ev2r manifested. That the name, in the sense »f the world-city itself, may denote something else, is not opposed to this. The Etymologicum Magnum derives it inh toC S'iAou, and so, according to Masu- di, do the learned Persians and Nabatseans. It has, accordingly, been explained as the fiate or the hottse, or, according to Knobel, the castk of Belus (2 etpial to 33 or n^3 , or 13 for n-1^3). SeheUin'g's re- mark that hab in the sense of gate is peculiar to the Arabian dialect, is without ground ; it is just as much Aramaic as Arabic. The verb 33 , intrare, liks dS ascendere, is a very old derivative from X2 , inire But Kawlinson and Oppert have shown, on the au tliority of the inscriptions, that the name of tlie god is not S2 , but bs (the Babylonian Phoeniciac Kronos), and baa , therefore, denotes the gate of El." If the development of heathenism, in a relig- ious sense, and, therefore, the development of idol- atry, is regarded as a gradual process, the heathen ish tendency at the tiiue of Ximrod could not have been far advanced. Its more distant beginning ia probably to be placed in the very time of :he cata»' trophe ; for the confusion of fundamenial religious views may, in general, furnish of itself an essentia) factor in the confusion of languages. On the situation of the land of Shinar and Baby- lon this side of the Euphrates, compare the Manuals tor the old geography by Forbiger and others. Concernmg the ruins of the old Babel, and Babei itself, compare VViskr's "Real Lexicon," the " Dic- tionary for Christian People," and Herzog's " Real Encyclopedia," under the article " Babel." In like manner Delitzsch, p. 212; Kxobel, p. 127, and the catalogue of literature there given. 8. 71i£ special symbolic sijniflcance of Babel for the Hni/dom of God. Here iliei e are to be distin- guished the following stages : 1. The significance of the tower-building ; 2, the Babel of Ximrod, or the despotic form of empire, and its tendency to con- quest ; 3. the significance of the world-monarchy of Nebuchadnezzar ; 4. the Old Testament symbolic interpretation of Babel (Ps. cxxxvii. ; Is. xiv. ; Jer. 1. ; Dan. ii. 37 ; vii. 4 ; Habakuk) ; 6. The New-Tea- tament apocalyptic Babylon (Rev. xiv., xvi., xvii.). Throughout Holy Scripture, Babel forms a world- historical antithesis to Zion. 9. The relation of the confounding, as presented, to the original unity of the human race, as also to tht original multiplicity as lying at the foundation of human speech. The two poles by which the catas- trophe of the speech-confounding are limited, are the following : In the first place, even alter the con- fusion of languages, there exists a fundamental unity ; there is the logical unity of the ground-forms of lan- guage (verb, substantive, etc.), the rhetorical unity of figurative modes of expression, the lexical unity of kindred fundamental sounds, the grammatical unity of kindred linguistic families, such as the Sheiuitic, the Indo-Germanic, and the historical miity in the blending of diflFerent idioms ; as, for example, in the Kotvii, or common dialect, there are blended the most diverse dialects of the Greek ; so in the New-Testament Greek, to a certain extent, the Hebrew and old Greek ; in the Roman languages, Latin, German, and Celtic dialects ; so, also, in the English; in the Lutheran High German, too, there are diflferent dialects of Germany. Science takes for its reconciling medium an ideal unity from the beginning of the separations ; faith supposes a rea! unity, and so, finally, Christendom and the Bible. In the second place, however, it must be acknowl- edged that in the original manifoldness of human power and views there was already indicated a mani- foldness of different modes of exprcssiuii. " In- deed," says Delitzsch, " even if this wonderful divine interposition had not taken place, the one primitive speech would not have remained in stagnant immo- bility. By reason of the richness of tlie gifts thai are stored in humanity, it would have run through i process of progressive self-enrichment, spirittializo S62 GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. tion, development, and manifold diversity ; but now, when the linguistic unity of humanity was lost, to- gether with its unity in God, and with it, also, the unity of an ali-detining consciousness, there came, in the place of this multiplicity in unity, a breaking up, a cleaving asunder, where all connection seems lost, but which, nevertheless, through a thousand indices, points back to the fact of an original oneness. For, OS Schelling says, confusion of language only origi- nates wherever discordant elements which cannot attain to unity can just a< little come from one an- other. In every developing speech the original unity works on, even as the affinity partially shows ; a taking away of all unity would be the taking away of language itself; and, thereby, of everything hu- man,— a limit to which, according to Schelling's judg- ment, the South American Indians are approacliing, as tribes that can never become nations, and which are yet a hving witness of a complete and inevitable disorganization " (Delitzsch, p. 114, 116). In ac- cordance with tlie religious character of Holy Scrip- ture, we must, before all things, regard the confusion of languages as a confusion of the religious under- standing. Languages expressive mainly of the sub- jective, languages of the objective, those of an ingenuous directness, and those of acute or ingen- ious accommodation, must very soon present great contrasts. In regard to the original language, which pre- ceded the confusion, and formed its ground, the learned men of the Jewish Synagogue, and after them, the church fathers, as well as many oithodox theologians (among the moderns with some limita- tion, Pareau, Havernik, Von (ierlach, Baumgarten), have expressed the opinion that the Hebrew was the language of the primitive time and of Paradise, and that it was propagated after the flood by the race of Eber. On the contrary, however, it is observed that Abraham himself did not origiiiiilly speak He- brew, but Aramaic* "On tids account," says De- litzsch, " we must legard as better grounded the po- sition of the Syriac, .^.ramaie, and Persian writers, that ihe Syriac, or the N'al)atiBan, was the primitive speech, and that in the confusion of tongues it was still retained as the language of Babylon. But, moreover, the Sheniitic in its general acceptation," He continues, " cannot lay claim to that perfection which must have belonged to the primitive speech. We find nothing to urge against the supposition that the original language, as .such, may have become lost in those that are historically known" (Delitzsch, p. S16 ; Keil, p. 119). Nevertheless, we do not be- lieve that this supposition receives any strength from what is a mere prejudice, namely, that in respect to its structure the paradise language must have been s very perfect one. The speech of holy innocence has no iiceiXKEN, p 278; EusEiiins, Praparalio, ix OHAP. XI. 1-9. 303 14. Abtdencs: " Some say tbat the men who first came forth from the earth, being confident in their greatness and strength, and despising tlie gods in their fancied estimation of their own powers, under- '.ools to buUd a high toiver in the place wliere Baby- lon now is. They would already have made a near approach to the Heavens, had not the winds come to he help of the gods and overturned their tower. 1 s ruins have received the name of Babylon. Men bad hitherto spoken but one language, but uow, in the purpose of the gods, their speech became di- verse ; to this belongs the war that broke out be- •ween Kronos and Titan. EXEGETIOAL AND CRITICAL. 1. Vers. 1 and 2. The settling in the land of Sbinar. — The whole earth, that is, the whole hu- man race. — One language and one speech (Lange more literally, one lip and one kind of words). The form and the mateiial of language were the same for all. — Prom the East (Lange renders, towards the East. Our margin. Eastward). — From the land of Ararat, southeast (cp^a as one word: the land of, or from the East). — A plane. — For them, as they came from the highlands, the plane was the low country, a valley plane (njp3). — Shinar, the same as Babylonia, thongli extending farther northward. — And they dwelt there. — The preference for the hill country does not api)ear to have belonged to the young humanity. Under the most obvious points of view, convenience, fertility, and easier capabihty of cultivation, seem to have given to these children of nature a preference for the plain. Even at this day do the uncultivated in- habitants of the hUls sometimes manifest the sume choice. In this respect Babylon had for them the charm of extraordinary fruitfulness. Zahn ("King- dom of God," p. 86) gives extracts from Hippocrates and Herodotus in proof of the singular productive- ness of this land of the palm, where the grain yields from two hundred to three hundred fold. Thence came luxury, which was followed by the cultivation of the paradisaical gardens (Gardens of Semiramis) and a life of sensuality, together with a sensual re- ligious worship. , '2. Vers. 3 and 4. 2(^e building of the tower. - -They said one to another, Go to. — Expressive of an animated, decided imdertaking. — Let us make brick. — The plain was deficient in stones, whereas, on the contrary, it abounded in a clayey soil which would serve for making bricks, and as- phaltum, which was good for mortar. They burnt them to stone instead of merely hardening them in the sun, which otherwise was the more obvious prac- tice.— And they said (again) Go to. — Their suc- cess in preparhig bricks for their dwellings enccur- »ged them to go farther. They resolved upon the building of a city, and a tower whose top may reach, etc. At the ground of this there evidently lies the impression of immensity as derived from the Baby- lonian plane, which actually, in its great extent, as nome travellers have described it, gives the concep- tion of the sublime. The visible middle point of ihe same must have been the tower, standing up as a sign of unity for the whole human race. Accord- ing to the representation, therefore, the words, " even to the heaven," would mean that the heaven was regarded as something that could be reached ; al- though at a later period such language occurs u' i hyperboUcal sense. — And let us make us a name — The expression CB lb nias denotes the appoint, ing or establishing for one's self a signal of renown (Is. Ixiii. 12, 14 ; Jer. xxxii. 2ii) The sign of secu rity shall be for them, at the same time, a sign of their fame, and thus, doubtless, would they give themselves a name as a people. — Lest we be scat- tered abroad. — Not only as a visible signal, but bj the glory ol' its fame shall the tower hold them to gether. Tliis is the exi)ression of the political and popular feeling of antiquity ; in the pride of tlie na tional spirit the individual is lost with his strength and Ills conscience. Such is the characteristic fea- ture of Babel everywhere, whether upon the Euphra- tes, the Tiber, or the Seine. The individual with his convictions, his freedom, his personality, must ba wholly sacrificed to the name of uniformity, whethei it be worldly or ecclesiastical. What is said here relates not merely to an ungodly, arbitrary, ambi- tious, individually titanic undertaking, but to the first introduction of that atheistical and antichristian principle which would not merely promote the pros- perity and authority of the whole in connection with the well-being and the freedom of the individual per- son, but also make the individual an involuntary saciifice to a unity, which becomes, in that way, a false unity, as well as a false idol placed on the throne of the living God, — and this whether it be called Babel, Kome, the Church, or " la grande nation." Goethe : '* Be it truth, or be it fable, Tbat in thousand books is shown, All is but a tower of Babel, Unless love shall make them one." Or we may adopt as a various reading, When love of glory makes them one. The question here relates to the destruction, in their very principles, of the Shemitic call to religion, and the Japhethio tendency to civilization, by a Hamitic confounding of reUgion and culture, to the obstruc- tion of the true progress of the world and of the state, by resolving the constitution of human history into an immovable Hamitic naturalism. According to Knobel, the whole significance of the fact becomes resolved into one view. "This view (he says) the author imputes to them after the event, siuce Baby- lon, that most splendid city, as the Greeks regarded it (Herod, i. 178), did, indeed, redound to the fame of its builders, but, at the same time, would thereby furnish a proof of their im()ious pride." And yet, even in Knobel, the world-historical substratum in the representation very clearly appears, when he says, that " according to Berosus and Eupolemus, there wtre stories among thi- Chaldasans that those who weie saved in the flood, when they came to Babylonia, again restored the place, and especially built there a higli tower. For that purpose theie met together in Babylonia liverse masses of people, etc." He proceeds to say, moreover, that Batylon in later times became the central point of the na- tions, that it was, besides, a very ancient city, tha*. two thousand years before Semiramis it was built for the son of Belus, and that, by reason of its huge magnitude, its temple of Belus, its high tower and its dissolute morals giving it the appearance o!' the very home of sin (Curtius, v. 1, .S6), as well as OD account of its name, it had a peculiar fitness for th« Scriptural author's narration. The symboljcai slg 3t>4 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. J^ nifioaiice, however, of the appearance of Babylon, as matter of fuut, is, in this way, wholly eftaced. 3. Vers. 5-8. TIce intervention of Jehovah^ his eourtsel and his act. Without the thought of any Jehovistio document, it would be readily conceived that the frustration of such an undertaking must proceed f:~om liod as Jehovah, the founder aiid pro- tectoi of the divine kingdom. The coming down * ♦ ;Yer. 5.— mn^ nn'T , And God came down. The Tar- paxLof Onkelos reniers thia ■'^ '^ 7 d'TMi* , and Jehovah was manifested, or revealed hi^mself. So most of the other Jew- ish authoriiies. They derived tlie idea, prohably, Irom such passages as Hosea v. 15, where ihe oppotsite expression seems to represent God as retiring, and leaving the world tu itself : •"^aipiC bx nnnrXT Tl^l<. I win go and return to my place. So in the seventh verse, Onkelos renders it, Come, let us be revealed. The Arabic follows the Turgum, and has \j IkUtJ'- Compaie also Micah i. 3, nSfl "3 Tn"1 "i^SlpTQTQ X:iV nin^, "For lo, Jehovah goes forth from'his place, and comes down and walks upon the hifih places of the earth." There is a spirituality in Rabbi Schelomo's interpretation of this which is lacking in most Christian commentators. *'It represents God," he says, "as coming do\sTi from his throne of mercies, D^T3n"i XOD , to his throne of judgment," ■,''nn NOD , as though the one were in the serene upper heavens (comp. Ps. cxiii. 6), and the other nearer to the sphere of this turbulent earth, — im- plying also that the divine mercy is more retired^ le&s visi- ble to the sense, because more general and ditfused, though eeen by the eye of faith as sending rain upon the just and the unjust, whilst God's judgments in the world are more manifest, more extraordinary, more palpable to the sense. It is ^^hisstrange work," mcy ?3 "iT , Is.xxviii. 21 ; imH" iT'^DD , " his extraordinary doing." The commentary of Aben'Ezra on T^"", Gen. si. 5, is very noteworthy: "This is thus said, because every thing that takes place in the world 6e?oni defends from the powers that are above; as is seen in whatis said (1 Sam. ii. 3) mb^b?. =132r* C'Taii-'niG. from the Heavens events are arranged (in our English Ver- sion it is given very poorly, actions are weighed). "Where- fore God is said to ride upon the /ieai";?is CC^^^TI "311. Deut. xsxiii. 2R) ; for thus the Scripture speaks with the tongue of men." With thi& citation of Aben Kzra, comp. Ps. Ixviii. 5, " Praise him that rideth on the Heavens by his name Jah," although many modern commentators ditfer from the Jewish in their rendering of n'i3"iy . The riding on the Heavens is explained, by the commentator on Aben Ezra, as referring to the outer sphere (according to the astro- logical technics), in wliich there are inherent the higher or ultimate causalities, as Rabbi Tanchum says nib">b!? should be rendered in the verse above quoted, 1 Sam. ii. 3 (see Tanchum: "Comment." Lam. i. 12), or mSD, de- Jlecting or turning causalities, as it is explained by him (see 1 Kings xii. 15). Similar interjireiations are given by the Jewish commentaters of such words as nZTl , ver. 7, Oo to now, Let us po down. They are used to express the most direct opposition between the ways and thoughts of men and tlioso of God. Says Rabbi Shelomo: "It is niia "1333 n'H'Q, measure for measure (^ar ;>ari.'). Let us buid up, say they, and scale the heavens ; let us go down. Bays God, and deieat their impi.'us thought." Other llab- biiiM, and Jewish grammarians, have a method of explain- ing such pus>Hugc8 by a very concise yet most signifii ant phraso. Thif* mode of representing things, more huviano, they call "IS^iH ]1irb , the language or " tongue of the ftvonl," or the action speaking. Thus Rabbi Tanchum characterizes the words HXI xb '^D^X , the Lord not sec it, Lam. iii. 30, lis (Jl,^f ,.%L-w*Jj the tonguo or speech of ate condition (the supposed lan^'ungr of the wicked actions juiit liofoie dcschljcd), wht'ther rogardfd as actually uttered or not. I'hjH here, God speaks in what he doe.i, inmost di- rect contrariety to the ways and thoughts of men. The arent to be narrated by the saiTcd historian is tlie divino intervention in counteraction of humau wickedncHs and f'diy. To \m intelligible, it necesnanly includcK some Btatcuu.'nt of khe divine thoughts or purpoHCH, as inKoparabb^ iiaits "f tin* of Jehovah forms a grand contrast to the rebeUioii ^iprisiug of the Babylonians with their tower, Th« higher they build, so much deeper, tu speak anthro popathically, must he descend that he may rightlj look into the matter. Moreover, the expression g we think, and even knowing, in the sense of any particular recognition of anything finite as finite, are as truly anthropopathic ex- ercises as remembering and speaking. It is truly pitiable, therefoie, when KosenmuUer, and other commentators like him, indulge in their usual apologizing and patronizing talk about the simple belief of the early agc^, deos descetidere, atque, ut ex ontiqua persuasione credebatur, ad humanmn movent consiUa agitare, dclibtrare^ rebus er ojnni parte per- pensis, deccrnere, — "that the gods actually come down to see, etc," How far have we got, in these respects, beyond these simple "early people!" "What advantage has tbe most rationalizing commentator over tliem in the use of any language that will enable him to think of God, or talk of God, without denying the divini- personality on the one hand, or bringing in something implieilly and essentially anthropopathic on the other. This language is as much for one age as for anotlier ; since here all ages, and all human minds, are very much on a par. Uut why, it may be asked, could there not have been used terms more general, and which would not have suggested such crude conceptions I It might have been simply said, God intenened to prevent the accomplishment of evil purposes, orhe_pro(»i(i£rfmeansin the course of his general providence, or government of nature and the world, tor such an end. This, it may be thought, would have sounded better, and better preserved the dignity of the Sciipture. But what is an intervention, but a coming betweeii, and a. prevention but a going before, and b. provid- ing, or a prooidenci', Imt a looking into, a coming down to see what the chddi-en of men are doing? We gain nothing by them. Instead of helping the matter, oiu- most philosoph- ical language would only be the substituting of worn-out terms, whose early primary imagtshad faded uut, or ceased to artect us conceptually, for oilier language equally lepre- sentativo of the idea, whilst exci-Umg in that piitorial vivid- ness in which truly dwells that which wf must neud. Thia ifi the suggestive and emotive power, making words some- thing mui-e than arbitrary signs of unknown quantities, like the xy z of the algebraist, wheio the tljings signified are mere notions, hav ug no meaning or value except as they preserve the cquililnium "f n logical equation. We would nave the Bible talk to us nhilosophically : " the infinite in- telligence condition-* the hnile ; th<-- divine power i.s the con- serving i)rintiplc ever immanent in nature." But hear liow much better the Scripture says this : "the (Jod of old is tin dwelling-place, and underneath are the everlasting arms," cbl3? m;*Sl , the anas of eternity, (he arms that hold uj the world. The divine wisdam has adopted this style. Il is a mode of diction ever fi-esh, yet equal to any other as ■ representative of that wliicli is strictly inofl'able, that is, un CHAP. XI. 1-9. HK turns it against them.— This they begin to do, and now nothing Tvill be restrained from them. — This reminds us of the deolanition : Adam u become like one of ns. Under the form of apprehen- sion Ihere lies an ironical expression of the conscious certainty of the divine rule. — And the Lord came down. — Delitzseh here again reminds us that (ac- cording to Hoifman) Jehovah, after tlie judgment of the flood, had transferred his tlirone to tlie heaven. Keil, however, correctly finds, at least in this place, only the anthropopathic expression of the divine interposition — Behold, the people is one. — • D3, connection^ cotmnunity. The people, as a com- munity, physically self-unfolding, is called "'13 (from mj, probably in the sense of mound-like, extending, tweJling *)'^ the people, as an ethical community, a State, as constituted by an idea, is called C", from car (to bind together, to associate). — They begin to do. — An indication of the future Habel in the world's history: — And now nothing will be restrziined from them. — In truth, if God interpose not, the prospect is opened, that the pride and confidence of men will advance with extreme rapidity towards the destrnction of freedom, of the personal life, of the divine seed and kingdom. — Let ns go down and there confound their language. — Upon the descent of Jehovah in his beholding, there fol- lows his descent in his counsel. — Let us. — And here, again, according to Delitzseh, does Jehovah include with himself bis angels, the executors of his penal justice. Here, as elsewhere, an inappropriate idea. — Let us confound. — Knobel would understand by 3 5" to separate, and accordingly translates IJabel as meaning separation. But thereby is the conception Df the act carried into the unmeaning. What is said does not refer properly to a separation merely of hu- man speech. The manne- in which it is confounded is not described. According to Koppen, the miracle must have consisted wholly in an inward process, that is, a taking away of the old associations of ideas con- nected with woids, and an immediate implanting of new and diverse modes of expression.f According to Lilienthal, Hoffman (A. Feldhoff and others) \l uttera'ole in any of those sense-forms in wliich all hum.an LiDguase must terminate, though still bclonpinfr to tlie spir- itual intelligence, and linown tiv it as something that truly IS. Paul oni-e heard the di\-ine ideas expressed in thr ir ow-n ^.roper words (2 Cor. sii. 4), but he could not translate these appjTTa fttftiaTa into the speech of the lower sphere. The lan- ^age of the Bible is the best that could be given us. It may present stumbling-blocks to the careless i-i-ader, or to those who wish to stumble, but still is it true, that the more we study the Holy Scriptures, even in their earliest parts, the more reason do we tind to thank God that they are written just as they are. — T. L ] * [The senses oiHoicing together v\\idh Gesenius gives, or of exlending, swelling, as here presented, are not found in an\ use of the root M or n"a , but are .accommodated, as supposed primary senses, to the meaning required. It is better, however, to deduce t from the sense of inlerlority, inclusion (implying, exclusion, seclusion, separateness), which is common in the Chaldaean and Syriac. Thus re- prded, it would be the political, rather than any physical idea — a nation as a political unity by itself, separate fixjm all others— whilst CS would denote association. A com- muuity within itself in its two .aspects, of outward exclusion, KQd inner binding.— T. L.] t [How easily this is done, whether by a power purelv physical or divine, is seen in the cases of paraivtics, where, the mind remaining clear, the connection between it and the vocal organs is suddenly changed ; so that though sp»*eeh is not lost. Its utterances are misplaced, the n.ame of one thing .8 given to another, or the connection between the usual *crd and the usual idea seems almost wholly broken up. must have been wholly an ontwai'd process, a con fusion of the Ups, of pronunciation, of dialects ; whils' Scdliger holds that differing meanings were connectec with like words or sounds. The historical symbolica expression, however, may mean, perhaps, th.it thi process of inward alienation and variation, the groun<3 of which lay in the manifoldness of dispositions, and the reciprocity of spiritual tendencies, became fixed in diverse forms of speech aud modes of expression, by reason of a sudden catastrophe brouglit upoti them by God. The heathenish Babylonian tendency i'& fleets itself still in the enigmatical, capriciously vary, ing dialects of the same people, which is sometimes to be remarked in different quarters of the same city, or in the different peasantry of the same commimity, but which must have especially had place in the earlier times, when isolization became jjredominant. The first germ of the speech confounding must, ac- cordingly, have shown itself as a diseased action which the fall introduced into the original innate germ of speech development. For a long time it re^ mained naturally latent in the family of Noah, but manifested its full power in the time of the tower building ; and then the effect of that epoch piolonga itself through the whole history of the world. In like manner, however, was there a counter influence, too, from the days of Abraham onward. According to Kaclex (p. 2*20), the miracle consists in this, " that at that time, and in that region, there was in- troduced a linguistic change which, although it would have naturally come in in the course of things, would nevertheless have required for its full development other conditions of space and time than those pre- sented." If there is meant by this only a wonderful acceleration of a natural development, the view does notsatisfy. Rightly says Kabki (p. 31); "A confound- ing of languages presupposes a confusion of the con- sciousness, a separation of the original speech into many, a disorder and a breach in the original com- mon consciousness in respect to God and the world. — The history of the tower-building is the history of the origin of heathenism." — So the Lord scattered them abroad, — (_)ut of their purpose comes its di- rect opposite. — And they left off to build. — That is, as a community of the human race with that dis- tinct tendency. The idea, however, is not excluded, that the Babylonians who remained behind kept on building Babel. The success of the enterprise was frustrated, but not analogous and limited undertak- ings of the same tendency ; it appears, for example, in the great world monarchies. Tiiis first disap- pointment, however, was a type of all others, as they successively become apparent in the catastrophes of these world monarchies, and the last fulfilling will be found in the fall of Babylon, as mentioned in the Apocalypse. " That the structure itself was laid in ruins by an exercise of divine power which after- wards took place, is told us. Indeed, by the sibyl, but not by the Scripture." Delitzseh. 4. Wherefore is the name of it called BabeL — In deriving the name from bab, gate, gate of Bel, The individual derangement is a very mysterious thing, as inexplicable now as in the earliest ages of the world. Na- tional and popular derangements are more rare, but history records strange movements, that su.'gest the thought, as the truest, if not the only possible, explanation. Ourknowledga of man, of the immeasurable deep within him, of the infi- nite unknown around and above him, is too small to war- rant any positive denial of such statements, or the possibil- itv of such events, whether i egarded as supematuiai, or ai falling within those natural causalities of whieh we talk 81 much, and yet, comparatively, know so little.— T. L.i 566 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. }T El, the authority of the religious interpretation is oot excluded, as Keil supposes in his second note p. 119. "Only we must distinguish between the Crustra- tion of the tower-building and the destruction of the later Babel that was still built on, and which, probably, for the first after the dispersion of the nations, came to be the seat of a heathenish worship." Concerning the siffnifieance and the building material of Baby- lon, the classical writers agree with the Old Testa- tament, — for example : Herod, i. ch. 178 ; Stiubo, 16; DioDORUS, ii. 7; Arrian, A/ex. vii. 17; Ccrt. Alex. 5, 1, 2.5; Ecstath. ad Dynnys. Periey. 1005. According to them the huge walls of Babylon were made of burnt brick, as were also the magnificent structure of the temple of Belus, and the hanging gardens. According to one, the circumference of the city amounted to 480 stadia, or 60,000 paces; ac- cording to others, 3S5 or 360 stadia (furlongs), mak- ing, therefore, a journey of from 18 to 24 hours. The building of most importance was the (|uad- rangular temple of Belus, each side of which was two furlongs in length ; out of this there arose, by eight terraces, a strong, msissive tower, which, according to Herodotus, was one furlong in length and breadth, and, according to Strabo, one stadium (that is tiOO feet) high. The accounts of modem travellers amoimt to a confirmation of tlie ancient statements. The re- mains of the tem.ple of Belus tliat was overthrown by Xerxes, and now called Birs Nimrod, form a huge mound of ruins, consisting of burnt and unburnt bricks, cemented partly with lime and partly with bitumen. The whole plain of Babylon is covered with mounds of rubbish from the same materials (see Kee-Porteu ; " Travels," vol. ii. p. 301 ; Buckingham : "Travels in Mesopotamia," p. 472 ; Layard: "Nine- veh and B.ibylori," p. 374 ; and Ritter's " Geography," xi. p. 876). "The ancients, for the most part, ascribe the building of Babylon to Semiramis, but this can only be true of its extension and fortification. According to the ancient inscriptions, the city was older than this (Knobel on the (ienealogical Table, p. 346), and, according to cli. x. 10, it must have been already in existence at the time of Nimrod." Knobel. In re- spect to the city, see also Herzog's Keal-Encyclopw- die, article "Babel." On the ruins of Babylon, see Delitzscii. p. 312, with reference to the account of the traveller, James Rich. The Arabians regard the ruins of Birs Nimrod as the Babylonian tower that was destroyed by fire from heaven. Delitzsch, who at first regarded Birs Nimrod as the temple of Belus (as Rawliiison, too, .supposes), remarks now, on the contrary, that the temple of Belus stood in the mid- dle ot the city, but that Birs Ninirotl was situated in the suburb Bor.sippa, two miles south. But now, according to Oppert's supposition, Borsippa riienns tov:er of lanj^uayex^ and, therefore, the opinion has much in its favor that tljc Birs Nimrod had been already in the very ancient tinie, the observatory of the Chaida-'au astrologers, with which tlie lower of tlie epecch-coufounding stands in liistorieal connection. I* seemg difficult to suppose that the tower, whicli was to denote the centre of the earth, should be Dluccd at a mile's distance outside of the city whicli was distinctly regarded as the cajutal of the earlli. Moreover, this tower might, at a later diay, have be- come the tower of Beliis. Bun.sen, nuverlhelcss, de- cides for Birs .Xiinrrjil (with rcfcicncc U) Rawlin.son), and the name supports the conclusion that the iradi- tion speaks lor this place. Of Hpecial importance, besides, is the inscription of Borsippa, as given by Oppert, which introduces Ncbuchadneszar as speak- ing, and according to which the first building >f Bin Nimrod is carried back, in its antiquity, 42 genem tions. 8ee Fabri, p. 49. DOCTRINAL A2fD ETHICAL. 1. See the preliminary discussion. Analogous to this gigantic undertaking of the young humanity are the later monumental buildings of the Egyptians, of the Indians, of Greece, and of other lands. Like the mythological systems of the civilized nations of antiquity, thev present an historical contradiction of a favorite modern view, according to which the whole human race had only gradually worked itself out of an animal (»r beastly state. 2. The character and the teleology of heathenism. The essence of heathenism is strikingly characterized in our narration as a diseased oscillation between the attraction of humanity to unity, on the one hand, and to multiplicity and unrestrained dismemberment on the other. From the Babylonish striving after an outward unity proceeds the first dispersion of the nations. This afterwards takes the form of a dis- memlierment of the same in a peculiar sense; it be- comes, in otiier words, a heatlienish, national, or local consciousness, an idolatrous, antochthonic consciousness, growing wild srith the notions of a national earth and a national heavens, whilst, in its utter disorder, it sinks down to the mere prejudice which regards every stranger as an enemy {hosfis)y and proceeds, at last, to that absolute exclusiveness which causes the inhabitant of the island to put to death any one from abr(.»ad, and the Bushman to threaten every new comer with his poisoned arrows. In the same manner, from a religious striving after a pantheistic world-view, there originates the first de- clining of the spirit into polytheism. And then, too, the (lifl'erent world-monaichies furnish a proof that the diseased centripetal drawing in the world ever works in interchange with that centrifugal tendency. Upon the downfall of any such world-monarchy, there follows again, in vaiious ways, a dissolution and a dispersion of elements. Even in the history of the Church do we find a shadowy outhne of tli same process ; and yet it is just the task and the dai!y work of the essential Church to mediate more and more the true development and appearance, both of unitv and variety, among the nations ; tliougli in tiutli it does this tlirougli the light and law of the Gospel as it goes out Irom the spiritual Zion, or that tiue kingdom of God which has its organization in the Church. The true reciprocity between uuity and division constitutes the life of humanity. The false, feverish, exaggerated reciprocity, which tends to the overstraining, and, at the same time, the division and dissolution of both these influences, is its disease ami its death. The striving of the "orhl-monarcliies breaks down agaiiLst tlie power of the national indi- vidualities. Again, the national isolations are inter- riiiiteil and broken up by the world-monarchies. But di.spersion has the special ell'ect to distribute the evil, to dismember, to send one people as a judgment upon another, until tliere is awakened in all a feeling of the need of deliverance and uniiy. Here belong the cthiiognipliic and the mUliologic systems. In res])ect to the fir.si, compare 1..\Nge',^ " Miscella'ieous Writings, "i, p. 74. On tlie last, see Laiige's treatise entitled. Die Oeaetzlich-Catholuche Kirche als tiinii- hild. 3. As thi- myth of the Titans reflects itself in th( CHAP. XI. 1-9. 361 erestive periods, so does it also in the Babylonish ! tower-buililing. I 4. Fabki, p. 44 : " In a manner more or less dis- tinctly marked, since the time of Babel, has every nation, and every group of nations, had spread over \ it its peculiar veil (Is. xxv. 7) which has impregnated and penetrated the whole national consciousness. Even in the present age of the world docs this re- | mfun, not yet broken through, morally and spiritually, ; by whole nations, but only by individuals out of every nation, who in Christ have attained to the participa- tion of a new and divine birth, — these, however, being the very core and heart of such nations, and forming with one another a people in a people. For In Christ alone does man awake to a universal thean- thropic consciousness." [True ii.deed, but Christ, according to Matt, xiii., works aftei the manner of leaven ; and in fact, as a principle ol new life for the whole humanity (Rom. v. 12), and the veils of the nations are gradually lifted up lefore they are wholly removed or torn away. It is not the individ- Hals and the nations that form the contrast in the present course of the world, but the grain (the elect) and the chaff in the nations, — in other words, the contrast between the believing and the unbelieving — between people and people.] 5. The ironical element in the rule of the divine righteousness (see ch. iii. 22) appears again in the liistory of the tower-building, after its grandest dis- play in the primitive time. It is just from the false striving after the idol of an outward national unity, that God suffers to go forth the dispersing of the na- tions. Without doubt, too, is there an ironical force in the words : " and now nothing will be restrained from tliem " (ver. 7). 6. In this demonical effort of the Babylonians to build a tower that should reach to heaven, there still remains an element of good. By means of it, in later times, they appeared .as the oldest explorers of the stars, who discovered the zodiac and many other astronomical phenomena, — as astronomers, in fact, with their searching gaze raised to heaven, although their science was covered under an astrological veil. The unfinished tower was transformed into an obser- vatory ; and how vast the benefit that from thence has come to man ! 7. The heathenish yet Titanic energy of the ' Babylonian spirit proves itself in the fact, that whilst in the one direction their worship went to the ex- treme of offering human sacriBces, it became, on the other, a service of revolting licentiousness. 8. " Let us build us a tower and make xis a name." The antithetic relation which this watch- word of theirs bore to Shem (the name), and the des- tination that God had given to him that he should be the potential central point of humanity, may also be indicated by the name Nimrod (Tir: , come on, now let us rebel). And so, according to the view of Roos, may the race of Ham have become engaged with special zeal in this tower-building, for the very purpose of weakening the prophecy. But, then, that would lead to the conclusion of a variance with the Shemites, and an overpowering of them, whereas aur history represents it as a universal underst ind- ing. Moreover, in ch. x. 10, Nimrod appears, not as the builder of Babel, but as the founder of the king- dom of that name ; whereas ch. xi. relates to the building of the city itself. We must, therefore, sup- pose that in the understanding raeutioned, eh. xi., the Shemites were either infatuated, or that they were silenced. Tbe text, however, supposas an un- derstanding of the races. We may, perhaps, assumt that, in the designation of the tower, Shem's priority was symbolically indicated, and that on this account his race would be satisfied. There would result, then, a distinct consequence. Upon this free federal co operation of the patriarchal races, there followed the despotic exaltation of Nimrod, which contributed, moreover, to hasten the Babylonio dissolution. We make more difficult the view we take ol' the transac- tion when we measure the greatness of the tower before the dispersion by the later magnitude of the tower of Belus, or of the Bris Nimrod. " Mesopo tamia," says Bunsen, " is covered from noi-th t» south with ruins and localities with which the name of Nimrod is everywhere connected ; as in Babylonia so also in Nineveh, lying farther off £nd ea.stward from upper Mesopotamia; even the country of the RiphiEan mountains, at the source of the Tigris, and so the part of Armenia which lies north from Nine- veh, and west of the lake Van, has its Mount Niro rod." HOSirLETICAl A^H PEACTICAL. The tower of Babel in its historical and figurative significance: a gigantic undertaking, an apparent suc- cess, a frustrated purpose, an eternal sign of warn- ing. 2. The repeating of the same history in the political and ecclesiastical spheres. — The spiritual history of Babylon to its latest fulfilling according to the Apocalypse. The confusion of languages at Babel, and the scene of the Pentecost at Jerusalem. — Babel and Zion. — Babel, confusion ; Jerusalem, peace. Christianity, God's descent to earth, to unite again the discordant languages. Christianity, in what way it makes the languages one : 1. In that from all spirits it makes one spirit of life ; 2. from all peoples one people ; 3. from all witnessings, one confession of faith, one doxology, one salutation of love. Starke ; Supposition, that first after the flood men drew from Armenia towards Persia, then east- ward towards Babylon. Hedi.n'gek : Pride aims ever at the highest. Avarice and ambition have no bounde (Jer. xxiii. 23 ; Luke i. 51). Lisco : The design of the tower-buildmg is three- fold : 1. To gratify the passion for glory which would make itself a name ; 2. defiance of God, reaching even to the heaven, his seat of habitation ; 3. that the tower might be a point of union and of rendez- vous for the whole human race. Selfishness ever separates ; so was it here ; love and humility alone constitute the true and enduring bond ; but this is found only in the kingdom of God, never in the king- dom of the world. As here, so evermore, is Babtl the name of pride, of show, of vain glory, of na- tional subjugation, of fraud and tyranny upon the earth. As in this place, so is it always the emblem of 'ns-'.ence towards God, of soaring to heiveu, of " making its throne among the stars,' and, at the same time, of confusion, of desolation, of God's de- risive irony in view of the giant projects of men (comp. Is. xiv. ; Rev. xviii.). — Gerlach : There are now formed the sharply separated fimilies of the nations, each confined to itself alone, and standing to others in an essentially hostile relation ; each must now use and develop its own peculiar power. The whole heathen world knows no more any unity of the human race, until finally, through the Gospel, men again recognize the fact that they are all of one •J88 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOR Ut Ml»J!.h. stood, that they have all one great cominon want, and have for their father one God, — until, in short, the languages which the pride of Babel separated become again united in the love and humility of Zion. Calwee Handbcch : It is worthy of remark that the modern researches into language have lecognized the original affinity of most known languages to one common original speech. The sundering and part- ing of the nations is God's own work. As labor was the penalty for the sin of paradise, so is separation the punishment for this sin of pride. In both cases, however, was the punishment at the same time a blessing. Schroder : It is the spirit of Nimrod that in- flates humanity in the plane of Babylon. The tower, as historical fact, is to form the apotheosis of hu- manity. Luther : They have no concern that God's name be hallowed, but all their care and planning turns to this, that their own name may become great and celebrated on the earth. Thi« city and tower of mei is fundamentally nothing else than an outward arti ficial sub.stitute for the inner union before God, and in God. — Roos : It is credible that Ham and his son Canaan should have been especially zealous to hinder this counsel of God, according to which a hard des- tiny was to befall them — that is, that ihere should be a separation of the nations, so tliat Canaan slicild become the servant of Sliem and Japheth, — Li'thkr : God comes down, that is, he gives special heed to tliem, he ceases to be forbcii ring. His coming down denotes his revelation of himsclt, his appearing in a new and great act, whether taken in the sense of mildness or severity. " 0 that thou wouldst rend the heavens and come down " (Is. Ixiv.). — -Ver. '7. The salvation of men is a matter of deep concern to our Lord ; the boundary he would set to them is the barrier of grace and compassion. — G. D. Kromma- CHER : Human plans are confounded that the divine order may proceed from them. Such is the coui se of the world's history. FIFTH SECTION. 'V race of Shem. The Commenced and fti/ernipted Migration of Terah to Canaan. of the Contrast between Heathendom and the gertninaX Patriarchitliam^ The Genesii Chapter XI. 10-32. 1. Genealogy of Shem — to Terah. 10 These are the generations of Sliem : Shem was a hundred years old and begat 11 Arphaxad' [Knobel: protabiy, highland of Chaldaea] two years after the flood. And Sliem 12 lived after he begat Arpliaxad five hundred 3'ears, and begat sons and daughters. And 13 Arphaxad lived five and thirty year.s, and begat Salah [sending]: And Arphaxad lived after he begat Salah four hundred and three years, and begat sons and daughters. 14 And Salah lived thirty years and begat Eber^ [one from the other side, pilBrim, emigrant]. 15 And Salah lived after he begat Eber four hundred and three years, and begat sons 16 and daughters. And Eber lived four and thirty year.s, and begat Peleg [division]: 17 And Eber lived after he begat Peleg four hundred and thirty years, and liegiit sons 18 and daughters. And Peleg lived thirty years, and begat Reu [friendship, friend] : 19 And Peleg lived after he begat Ren two hundred and nine years, and begat sona 20 and daughters. And Reu lived two and thirty years, and begat Serug' [vine-branch] : 21 And Reu lived after he begat Serug two hundred and seven years, and begat sons 22 and daughters. And Serug lived thirty years, and begat Nahor [GeseniuB : panting] : 23 And Serug lived after he begat Nahor two hundred years, and begat sons and daugh- 24 ters. And Nahor lived nine and twenty years, and begat Terah [tnming, tarrying] : 25 And Nahor lived after he begat Terah a hundred and nineteen years, and begot sons 26 and daughters. And Terah lived seventy years, and begat Abram [nigh father], Nahci [see ver. 2], and Haran [Ocscniup : MontanusJ. 2. Terah, his Race and Emigration (vers. 27-82). 27 Now these are the generations of Terah : Terah bagat Abram, Nahor, and Haran, 28 and Haran begat Lot [veil, concealed]. And Haran died before [thefacoof] his father 29 Terah, in the lend of his nativity, in Ur [light ; flame] of the Chaldees (o^iit's). And Abram and Nalior took them wives: the name of Abram's wife was Sarai [princess]: and the name of Nahoi-'s wife, Milcah [Queenl, the daughter of Haran, the father of CHAP. XI. 10-32. 369 30 Milcah, and the father of Iscah * [spier, seeress]. But Sarai was barren ; she had no ciiild. 31 And Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran, his son's son, and Sarai his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife ; and they went forth witli them from Ur of the Chaldees to go unto the land of Canaan ; and they came unto Haran and dwelt thero 32 And the day.'s of Terah were two hundred and five years; and Terah died in Haran. ri Ver. 1.— I^'DQ^X. Arpbaxad.— pronunciation derived from the LXX., Ap4^a|a£ ; according to the Hebrew pointing, Arpakshai it is a com|iound, evidently, of which the principal part is Ti'3 , from which the later D''ni23S . Chaldffians. It would appear, on thetie accounts, to be the name of a people transferred to their ancestor, as in many other cases. Among the early nations names were not fixed, as they are wilh us in modem times. The birth name waa changed for something else — some deed the man had done, or some land he had settled, and that becomes his appellation in history. Sometimes the early personal name is given to the country, ami then comes back in a changed form as a designation of the ancestor. Tlius Josephus speaks of the five primitive " Shemitic people, the Elaviiles (or Persians), the Assyrians^ the Aramites (or Syrians), the Lydlans (from Lud), and the Arphaxadites, now called Chaldaeans." — T. L.? ja Ver 14.— "33? . The Ime of Shem in Arphasad seems to have remained a long time after the flood in the uppei country ; and it may be doubted whether this branch of the Shemites, from whom Abraham was directly descended, were with the great multitude of the human race in the plain of Shinar, or had much, if any thing, to do with building the tower of Babel (see rem:irks of Lange, p. 367). Eber'a descef.dants came over the river, and began the first migrations to the south- The word ISS may mean over in respect to eitl er side, and so it might be applied to one that went over, or to one that remained. This passing over being a memorable event , the naming would come very naturally from it, whether as given to the ancestor who stayed, or to the descendants who left the old country. Each side would be trans- euphralensian to the other, and so truly "^laS C''"I3S , or Hebrews. It would be very much as we speak, or used to speak, of the old countries as transatlantic, on the' other side of, or over the Atlantic ; the Hebrew "t:5 having every appearance of being etymologically the same with the Greek un-ep, German Hber, and our Saxon orer. Compare Gen. xiv. 13, where •^nSZjrt D"1"S< , Ahram the Hebrew, is rendered 'Afipap. 6 ir«paT»^, Abram the passenger.— T, L.] '[J Ver.'sO.— 5a"lij) . Some would resort to the primary sense of JIB or J1D to get the meaning entangled (verwick- kelter), to make it correspond to some other derivations which are fancied here as denoting either the advance, or the retarding, of this early Shemitic movement. But besides the faintness and uncertainty of such derivations, the names they seem to indicate could only have been given long afterwards, when the facts on which they are supposed to be grounded had acquired a historical importance. Qesenins would render it pafmei, a young ri'ne-sftoot (from JIUJ , to wind, tvtist). No name-giving could be more natural and easy than this. Compare C'^ii^^C' , Gen. xl. 10, 12 ; Joel i. 7 ; and what is said in the blessing of Joseph, Gen. xlix. 22, n^B }^ "Ol"' ^^S > fruitfiilness Joseph, son of fruitfulness— our translation, a very fruitful bough. — T. L.) [* Ver. 29. — HSD^ , Iscah. The Jewish interpreters, generally, say that Iscah and Sarah were the same. Thtis Rashi —" Iscah, that is, Sarah, so called because she was a seeress (riD'D) by the Holy Spirit, and because all gazed upon her beauty," for which he refers to Gen. lii. 14. The root HDD (see. gaze upon) is quite common in the Syriac, the oldest branch of the Shemitic, though it does not come in the Hebrew. It is revived, and becomes frequent, in the Rabbinical It is equivalent to the Hebrew ilTin , Prophet or Seer. Aben Ezra has the same interpretation. —T. L.] THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE GENEAI,OGICAL TA- BLE OF TEIE SHEMITES. This genealogy of the Shemites is really an ap- pendage to that of the Sethites, ch. v., and in this way forms a genealogical series extending from Adam to Abraham. It is continued on the litie of Nahor (ch. xxii. 2i)-24), on that of Keturah (ch. xxv. 1-4), of Ishmael (ch. xxv. 12, etc.), of Esau (ch. xxxvi. 1, etc.), on the line of Jacob (ch. xlvi. 8-27), etc. (See the article: "Genealogical Register," in Her- zog's Real Encydoptedu.) According to Knobel this table has the character of an element of fundamental Scripture (p. 129); we are satisfied to designate it as elohistic universalistic, since it embraces not only Abraham's race, but also the nearest branches of it that at a later period became heathen. The table of the Shemites embraces ten generations, as does the table of the Sethites. The first (conformably to the nimiber ten) denotes a perfect development, which nins out in Abraham, the " father of the faithful," representing, as he does, a numberless race of tlie believing out of all humanity. Abraham must be reckoned here with the tenth, as Noah in ch. v. It b clear, too, that this table is designed to indicate the growth, or establishment of the patriarchal faith, together with its previous history. Most distinctly '.s this expressed in the migrations of Terah, — and in the individual names of the patriarchs. In the son of Arphaxad, Salah, there is announced a send- ing., or nxission, in Eber the emigration., in Peleg the 24 division of the theocratic line from the untheocratic, in Reu the divine friendship, in Serug the entangling or the restraint of the development, in Nahor a core- Jlict or a striving, in Terah a setting out from the heathen world which in his tarrying comes to a stop. And so is the way prepared for Abraham's departure. We cannot maintain, with Knobel, tiiat these Shem- itic patriarchs must have been all of them fir.-;t-born. They are, throughout, the first-born only in the sense of tlie promise Buusen interprets the name Eber as one who comes over the Tigris. But in a wider sense Eber may also mean pilgrim. The names Reu and Serug he interprets of Odessa and Osroene. As coming, however, in the midst of personal names, these also must have been expressed as personal names, from which, indeed, the names of couiitriea may have been derived. On the interpolation of Cainan in the Septuagint, and which is followed Ht Luke (ch. iii. 36), compare Knobel, as also on the varying dates of the age's, as given in the Samaritan text and in the Septuagint. The numbers we have here are 600, 438, 433, 464, 239, 239, 230, 148, 205, and 175 years. Here, too, as in the ca-^e of the Sethites, we can get no symbolical significance from the respective numbers, although Knobel is unwilling to recognize their historical character. It^ connec- tion, however, with the general gradual diminutioL of the power of life, there is clearly reflected the in- dividual difference ; Eber lives to a greater age than both his forefathers, Arphaxad and Salah. Nahor, the panting (the impetuous), dies earliest. According 370 GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. to Knobel, the genealogical table advances from the mythical to the legendary period ; at least we have no sufficient grouids, he thinks, to deny to Abraham and his brothers an historical existence. The same must liold true, also, of his fathers, whose names, with their theocratic characteristics, must liave be- longed, without doubt, to the most lasting theocratic reminiscences. The table before us is distinguished from the Sethitic by being less full, in that it divides «he life-time of each ancestor into two parts, by the date of the theocratic tirst-bom, whilst it leaves the summing up of both numbers to th" reader. " In ver. 26 this genealogy, just like the one in ch. v 32, concludes with the naming of three sons of Terali, since all these have a significance for the historv to come : namely, Abram as the ancestor of the elect race, Nahor as the grandfather of Rebecca (comp. ver. 29 with ch. xxii. 20-23), and Haran as the father of Lot (ver. 27)." Keil. The table in Dklitzsch gives us a good view of the series of Shemitic families (p. 324). According to Bertheau the Septuagint is right in its interpolation of Cainan. Delitzsch disputes this ; comp. p. 322. " The Alexandrian translators insert- ed tills name because the Oriental traditions have so much to say of him as the founder of astronomical science ; and, therefore, they were unwilling to leave out so famous a name. There may have been a brother of Salah, through whom the main line was not propagated." Lisco. Delitzsch gives a reason for its not being called the tholedoth, or generations of Abraham, from the fact that the author makes the history of Abraham himself a large and principal part. That, however, would not have prevented the setting forth of Abral'Tin's genealogical history. But in such a representation there might have been, per- haps, an joscuring of the idea that the seed of Alira- ham in the natural sense goes through the whole Old Testament, whiLst, in a spiritual sense, it pervades the New (see Rom. iv. cf. Gen. 15). EXEGETICAi AND CRITICAL. 1. Ch. xi. 10-2fi ■ — Shem'nras a hundred years old. — See the computations of Knobel and Keil. — Two years after the flood. — This must be under- etooil of the bi'ginning of the flood. — And begat sons and daughters. — See the ethnological table ; »lso, ver. 17. "For the sake of tracitig the Hue of the Joktanides the author had already given, in ch. X. 21-2.'), the patriarchal series from Shorn to Peleg; he repeats it here, where he would lay down fully the line from Shem to Abraham, with the addition of the ages." — Arphaxad. — Arrapachitis, " in north- em Assyria, the original seat of the collective Chal- dseaii family." Knobel. " It was the home of the i XaASaToi and KapSovxoi mentioned by Xenophon anil | Strabo, as well as of the modern Kurds." The same [ writer refers the names tliat follow to cities or terii- lories. to which we attach no 8[)ccial importance, since in any case the districts here woidd be them- Bclves derived from the names of persons. 2. Vers. 27-32. The famihi line of Terah, Ac- cording to Keil, this superscription must embrace the history of Abraham, so that the tholedoth of Ishmael ch. xxv. 12, and of Isaac, ch. xxv. lit, cor- respond with it. But then, in the spiritual ivliillon, Abrahani wonlcl he sulKniliiiatt; to Terah, which can- not be Bii])[io.sed. — And Haran begat. — " Aecor.l ing to the con.stant plan of (iene.sis, it is hern related of Haran, the youngest son of Terah, that he begat Lot, because Lot went with Abraham to Canaan (cb xii. 4), and Haran died before his father Terah, whereby '.he band which would have retained Lot in his father-land was loosed." Keil. — Before hia father Terah. — Properly, in his presence, so that he must have seen it ; it does not, therefore, mean simply in his life-time. The first ease of a natural death of a son before the death of his father, is 4 new sign of increasing mortality. — Ur of the Chal dees. — This must either be sought in the name Ur which Ammianus calls Persicunt Castellum, between Patra and Nisibis, not far from Arr.apachitis, or in Orhoi (Armenian, Urrliai), the old name of Edessa, now called Urfa (see Kiepert and Weissenborn : 'Nmeveh and its Territory,' p. 7)." Keil. Delitzsch, correctly perhaps, decides for the castle Ur men- tioned by Ammianus, although, doubtless, the Ur in our text has a more general, territorial, and, at the same time, symbolical meaning. " The old Jew- ish and ecclesiastical interpretation reads 'out of "nx' (fire), meaning that Abraham, as an acknowl- edger of the one God, and a denier of the gods of Nimrod, was east into the fire, but was rairacidously preserved by God." Delitzsch. The same writer finds therein the idea that Abraham was plucked as a brand from the fire of heathendom, or from its heathenish fury. We would rather suppose, on the contrary, that by Ur is meant a region in Chaldaja, wheie the ancient monotheistic symbolical view of the heavenly lights and flames had jiassed over into a mythical heathenish worship of the stars, as a wor- ship of Light and Fire ; wherefore it is that the starry heaven was shown to Abraham as a symbol of his believing progeny (ch. xv.), whilst, for the hea- then Chaldseans, it was a region of divine (or deified) forces. Knobel explains the word as meaning J/o!in.i of the Chaldaans. Rawlinson holds to the reading IIS as equivalent to 1"? (city). The interpreting it of light and fire is both etymologicallv atui ac- tually the more correct. " The family of Terah had its home to the north of Nimrod's kingdom (in north- eastern Mesopotamia), and worshipped strange gods; as is clear from Josh. xxiv. 2," Delitzsch. — Iskah. — By Joseplius, the Talmud, the Tiirgum of Jona- than, and others, this name is held to be one with Sarah. On the other haml, Knobel properly remarks that according to ch. xx. 12, Sarah was the daughter of Terah, and, according to ch. xvii. 17, onlv ten years younger than Abraham ; she coidd not, there- fore, have been a daughter of Abraham's younger brother. It is probably the case that the Jews, in deference to their later law, sought by means of this hypothesis to weaken as much as possible .\braham's kiiismanship to Sarah. Delitzsch assumes the possi- bility that Haran was a much older half-brother of Abraham, and that Abraham, as also Nahor, had married one of his ilanghters. According to a con- jecture of Ewald, Iscah is mentiimed because she became Lot's wife. But it may be that Isciih was thought worthy to be incorporated in the theocratic tradition because she was a woman of eminence, a seeress like Miriam, according to the signification of her name. Knobel alludes to the fact tlitit Abra- ham had his sister to wife, without calling to mind that she was a half-si.ster (ch. xx. 12), or might evei; have been his adopted sister. So also he says that Nahor married his niece, and that in like manner Isaiie and Jacob did not many strangers, but theii owi) kindred. He accounts foi this im the ground ol a peculiar family atlection in the hous* of Terab CHAP. XI. 10-32. 371 (ch. xriv. 3, 4 ; xxvi. 35 ; Txvii. 46 ; ixviii. ' ) ; just «8 at the present day niiiny Arabian families ever marry in tlieir own, and do not permit one to 'ake a wife from any other (Skbtzen : " Travels," iii. p. 22). The ground, however, of such kindred marriage in the house of Terah and Abraham, is a theocratic one, and thus far are the children of Abraham placed in a conditiim similar to that of the children of Adam. As for the latter, there were, in general, no " daughters of men," out of their own immediate kindred, so for the sons of the theocracy there were no spiritual daughters of like birth with tliemselves, tha: is, of raoTiotheistic or theocratic faith, out of the circle of nearest natural affinity. In this respect, however, they did not venture to tread in the foot- steps of the Sethites (Gen. vi.); for it was theirs to propagate a believing race through consecrated mar- riage.— But Sarah was barren. — .i^ prelude to the history that follows. — And Terah took Abram his son. — Without doubt has this removal a reli- gious theocratic importance. At all events, this di- vinely accomplished withdrawal from Ur of the Chal- dees mast mean more than a mere providential guid- ance, as Keil supposes. — And they went forth with them. — The word cns« (rendered, with them) makes a difficulty. It may be easiest understood as meaning with one another. On the other hand, De- litzsch reminds us that the suffix may liave a reflex sense, instead of a reciprocal (ch. xxii. 3). This is the very question, as otherwise the sentence would be indefinite ; the expression, therefore, must mean not only wit.li one another, but by themselves ; that is, they withdrew as one united, exclusive commu- nity. Besides this, there are two modes of taking it. Keil understands only Lot and Sarah as the sub- ject of the verb, and, therefore, refers cns to Terah and Abraham. There are three tilings in the way of this : 1. The withdrawing (or going forth) would be separated from the previous introductory expres- sion ; Terah look Abraham, etc., which will not do ; 2. it would be a withdrawing from that which leads, md the accompanying would become the principal persons ; 3. Abraham would have to be regarded as a co-leader, which is contrary to what is said : Terah took Abraham. Moreover, Abraham, regarded as aii independent leader, would have been bound in duty , to go furtlier on when Terali broke off from his pil- grimage in Mesopotamia. Delitzsch, on the other hand, together with Jarchi, Rosenmiiller, and others, refers the words tJiey went forth to the members of the family who are not named, namely, they went forth with those named ; but this is clearly against the context. By tlie expression with them, it would be more correct to understand, with those, namely, with the tirst-named (Terah, etc.), went forth those just previously mentioned, or named immediately after them. Later, is Haran denoted as the city of Nahor (ch. xxiv. 10 as compared with ch. xxvii. 43 ; xxix. 4 and xxxi. .t3). For other interpretations see Knobel. — And they came unto Haran. — Terah intended to go from Ur to Canaan, but he stops in Qaran, wherefore he also retains his people there. According to Knobel, the mention of Canaan is an anticipation of the history that follows. — Haran. — Carra, Charran, lay in northwestern Mesopotamia fPadan Aram, xxv. 20), ten leagues southeast from Gdesaa, in a feitile region, though not abounding in »ater. The city now lies in ruins. It was the capi- •ti of the Gabians, who had here a temple of the Uoon goddess, which thev referred back to the time of Abraham. In its neighborhood Crassus was slain by the Parthians. More fully on the subjeC, see in SciiRiiliER, p. 52ii; also in Knobel and Delitzsch. — And Terah died in Haran. — Terah was two hun. dred and five years old. If .\br;diam, therefore, waa seventy-five years old when he migrated from Meso- potamia, and Terah was seventy years old at hi> birth, tlien must Abrahiin have set Ibrth sixty year* before the death of Terah. And this is very imp.jr- tant. The emigration had a religious motive which would not allow liim to wait till the death of bit father. As Delitzsch remarks, the manner of repre- sentation in Genesis disposes of the history of the less important personages, before relating the maiL history. The Samaritan text has set the age of Terah at one hundred and forty-five, under the idea that Abraham did not set out on hia migration until after the death of Haran. The representation of Stephen, Acts vii. 4, connects itself with the general course of the narration. DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL. See above : The significance of the genealogical table of the Shemites. 1. The decrease in the extent of human life. In the manifold weakenings of the highest life endur- ance, in the genealogy of Shem, there are, neverthe less, distinctly observable a number of abrupt breaks : 1. From Shem to Arphaxad, or from 6oO years to 438; 2. from Eber to Peleg, or from 4(54 years to 239 ; 3. from Serug to Nahor, or from 230 years to 148 ; be- yond which last, again, there extend the lives of Terah with his 20.5, and of Abraham with his 175 years. Farther on we have Isaac with 180 yean, Jacob 147, and Joseph 110. So gradually does tla human term of life approach the limit set by the Psalmist, Ps. xc. 10. Moses reached the age of 120 years. The deadly efficacy goes on still in the bodily sphere, although the counter-working of salvation has commenced in the spiritual. KeiL, with others, finds the causes of this decrease in the catastrophe of the flood, and in the separation of humanity into various nations. 2. OhalJwa and the ChaJdaans. — See the Theo- logical Real Lexicons, especially Herzog's Encijclo- poedie. The Fragments of the Chaldsean Author, Berosus, as found ir the Chronicon of Eusebius, and the Chronographia of Syncellus. This people seem to have been early, and, in an especial sense, a wandering tribe. The priestly castes of Chaldseans in Babylonia must have come out of Egypt. Strabo and others transfer the land of the Chaldaeans to a region in lower Babylonia, in tlie marshy district of the Euphrates near the Persian Gulf; the same author, however, finds also, as others have done, the seat of the Chaldaeans in the Chaldtean Mountains, very near to Armenia and the Black Sea. The proper home of the Chaldaeans was, therefore, at the head waters of the Tigris. 3. Ur in Chaldaea. See above. 4. On the indication of a great yet gradu;,; pro vision foi' the variance that was to take p'ace betw.> ii the race of Eber and the heathen, see tht -^xo':e*...cal and Critical. The later Biblical accounts of Terah and the forefathers of Abraham appear, in general, to one their form to the reciprocal influence of Israelitish tradition and the Israelitish e.fegesis o' the passage before us. According to the languagi of Stephen. At^ts vii. 2, Abraham was already called 872 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. at Ur in Chaldsea. We must, therefore, resrani him »s the proper author of the migration of his father, Terah. The passage, Josh. xxiv. 2, according to which Abraham's forefathers, and Terali especially, dwelt beyond the river (the Euphrates), and served other gods, has special relation to this fact of Terah's suffering himself to be detained in Haran. — This, then, is to be so understood, that in consequence of the universal infection, idolatry began to take up its abode very near to the adoration of the one God, as still maintained in Terah's family (see ch. xxix. 82, 33, 35 ; xxx. 24, 27 ; and to this belongs what is said, ch. xxxi. 34, about the teraphim of Laban). We may well suppose that Joshua, from his stem, legal stand-point, judged and condemned that ming- ling of worships, or that image worship, as strongly as Moses did the setting up of the golden c ilf The little group of wanderers, ver. 31, appears to have originated from a similarity of feeling which, after long conflicts in the line of Eber, was finally to tear itself away from this conjectural capital of the Light and Fire worship in Chaldfea, and, in that way, from heathenism altogether. Their aim was Canaan, be- cause there, partly from their decidedly foreign »tate, partly by reason of iheir antagonism to the Hamitic race, they would be protected from the contagion. But Terah cannot get beyond Haran, and to this not only does Joshua refer, but also the later Jewish tradition respecting Terah. To this place, where he settles down, Terali seems to have given the name of his dead son, in loving remembrance, and it may have been this name, as well as the fair land and ap- parent security, that bound him there. The circum- stance that Abraham, according to ver 32, does not appear to have departed before the death of Terah (with which, however, the history otherwise does not agree), has been interpreted by Syncellus and others as implying that Terah was spiritually dead. A like untenable .lewish hypothesis, which Hieronvmus gives us, assumes that the 75 years which are ascribed to Abraham, ch. xii. 4, are not to be dated from his natu- ral birth, but from the time of his deliverance from the furnace of fire, which was like a new birth. But that Abraham tore himself away before his father's death has, at all events, the important meaning that, in the strife between filial piety and the call of faith, he olieyed the higher voice. The family group in Haran. however, is thus distinctly denoted, because it now forms the provisional earthly homestead of the wandering patriarchs, and because, also, as the later history informs us, it was to furnish wives of like theocratic birth for their sons. 5. Legends concerning the migration of Abra- ham. See Rahmer, "The Hebrew Traditions "(Bres- lau, 1861, p. 24). According to a Hebrew Midrash (Rabba 38, in Hieronvmus), Abraham, at Ur, was cast into a furnace of fire, because he would not adore the fire which the Chaldieans worshipped, but was miraculou.^ly preserved by God. His brother Uaran, on the contrary, was consumed, because he was unresolved whether to adore the fire or not. It was Nimrod who had him cast into the furnace. Here belongs, also, the Treatise of Beer, entitled "The Life of Abraham, according to the Jewish tra- ditions." Leip., 18S9. HOMILETIOAL AND PBAOTICAL. As Abraham's life of faith develops itself in his posterity, so did it have its root in the life of bis fore- fathers.— How the life of all great men of God renH upon a previous hidden history. — Comparison of th« two lines of faith, that of Seth to Noah, and from Sliem to Abraham: 1. outwardly, ever less (at lasi reduced to one point) ; 2. inwardly, ever strongei (attaining at last to the one who makes the transition) [Thus Xoah passed through the corrupted rici and through the flood; thus Abraham made the transition through heathenism.] — Terah's migration to Canaan: 1. its spirited beginning; 2. its failur* ?o go on. — Abraham and his kinsmen: 1. He was probably the author of their movement; 2. they, probably, the cause of his tarrying in Hiiran. — The death of children before the eyes of their parents (ver. 28). — Sarah's barrenness, the long and silent trial in the life of Abraham. Starke : The Sethites, among whom the true church is preserved. — God's remembrance of the righteous abides in his blessing. — Osiandeb: A Christian when he is called, must, for the sake of God, leave joyfully his fatherland ; he must forsak' all that he loves, all that is pleasing to him in th< world ; he must follow God obediently, and only where He leads. [Excursus on the Confiision of Languages.— That there was here a supernatural intervention the language of Scripture will not permit us to doubt. We need not, however, trouble ourselves with the question how far each variety of human speech is connected with it, or regard, as essentially aftecting the argument, the greatness or smallness of the nuni' ber of languages now spoken upon the earth. There is, doubtless, many a local jargon, the result of iso- lation, or of unnatural mixtures, that has but little, if anything, to do with an inquiry in respect to this most ancient and world-historical event. It is so difficult to determine what is a language in distinc- tion from a dialect, or mere local variety of idiom and pronunciation, that such lists as those of Baibi and others can hiive but little philological value. For all essential purposes of such inquiry, therefore, there is no need to extend our view beyond that district of earth in which languages now existing, either as spoken or in their literature, can be historically or philologically traced to peoples connected with the earliest kLov\'n appearances ')f the human race. We give this a very wide sweep when we include in it Southern and Middle Europe, Western Asia, and Northern Africa. Here ])hilological science, though yet very imperfect, has found great encouragement in its inquiries, and within this district has it begun to make out, with some clearness, what must have been the earliest divisions of language. The result thus far, as stated by some of the latest and best writers, has been the recognition of three general families or groups. In giving names to thise, there has also been recognized, to some extent, the ethno- logical division snpposetj to be made from the sons of Noah ; and hence some have been inclined to call them the Japhethic, Shemitic, and Hamitic (Bunsen, Khamism and Semism). It was early perceived, however, that the ethnologic and linguistic lines do not exactly correspond even in the Shemitic ; and there is still more of aberration and intersection within the supposed limits of the two others. The first group has therefore been called the Indo-Ger- manic, and of late the Arian. In the third the terra Hamitic has been generally dropped for that of Tt» raiuan. The general correspondence, however, givei much countenance to the first ethnological naming CHAP. XI. 10-32. 37? But whatever method be adopted, it does not affert the main characteristics belonging to each of the three. These may be thus stated. The Shemitic is the smallest, the most unique, both in its matter and its form, the most enduring, the most easily recog- nized, and ha\ing the least diversity in its several branches. The group termed .Vrian, Indo-Germanic, or Japhethan, is less marked in all these character- istics, though retaining enough of them to make clear the family relationship in all the best-known branch- es. The third is so difftrent from both these, it seems so utterly broi to be found m the Greek and Latin even in their earliest stages. It has kept to the mould in which it was tirst mn. Po also in the expression of time, the Shemitic still preserves its rigidne.ss. Il keeps its two tenses immo'liJied in form, thoug'h it has ways of denoting all varieties of time, relative or absolute, thatany other language can express. Compare it with the Greek and Sansciit copiousness of temporal forms ; how early born are they, and how fruitful, in the one case, how unyielding, how stubbornly barren, we may say, in the other ! Surely, one who carefully co/ siders such phe^ nomena as these, must a-lmit that there is iti the birth anc perpetuity of language some other power^either as favoi^ mtr or resisting — than that of miitaal development, or re- ciprocal chanee, however long the peric Is tjiat may he a» sumed for it as a convenience to certair .heories. — T. L. i R74 GENESIS. OR THE FIRST i?OOK OF MOSES. the ODe ca^e (whether we call them supernatural or extraordinary matters but little to the argument) why should a similar idea be regarded as iri-ational in the other. Thus there are no linguistic marks in Greek and Hebrew (regarded as early representatives of two great families), or in Syriac and Sanscrit, showing that at any time they were a common language,* or *Dy beginning of mutual divergency as traced down- ffarda, or any evidences of convergency as we fol- low tliem up the stream of time. In fact, they stand in most direct contrast in their earliest stages; even as the fresh geological rupture must present, ^t^tubt- less^ a more distinct breakage than is shown after ages of wear and abrasion. When history opens, these languages stand abruptly facing each other. This mav be said with some degree of confidence, for our knowledge here is not scanty. We have the Shemitic all along from the very dawn of history to our latest times. The Arabic of the present day, copious as it has become in its derivative vocabulary, is as rigid in its Shemitic features as the oldest known Hebrew. There is some reason for regarding it as retaining even still more of the primitive type. The Greek was in its perfection in the days of Ho- mer, and as Homer found it. It has never been sur- passed since in all that makes the glory of language as a spiritual structure, in its classifications f of out- ward things, in its still higher classification of ideas, • [This is said more especially in reference to the form, or what may be called the soul of each language respectively. Of the malfer, or vo< alized material, as it may be styled, there is a ^'ood deal that is common. There are many roots In the Arianthat are evidently the same with the Shemiiic, whether coming from a common original stock of souuds, or from a later borrowing fiom each other. Words pass from one lantaiage to another, or original vocal utterances are broken up, in an immense variety of ways ; but the Btructiiral forms are unyieldins. In this resides the char- acterizing principle of perpetuity ; so that it is no parados to affirm a generic identity in la, guage, in which the greater part, or even all the articulated sounds had bi-cn changed, or have given place to others. "When we consider the great facility of mere phonetic changes, through cognate letters or those of tht- same organ, tlirough transition letters, by whose intervention there is a passage from one family into another Cas i and y make a transition from the dentals U^ the gutttirals, and w ot v from the gutturals to the labials), or through nasal combinations, such as vg, nd, mb, which, on dissolution, may i-ariy the syllable in the new direction of either element with all its affinities, thus making, as it were, abridge between them— when we bear in mind how soondB wear out in the bcginnint^ or at the end of words, entirely disappearing, or easily admitting in their attenu- ated state: the substitution of others belonging to a different organ, or how, in the middle of words, the compression of ByllabU'S bringing together harsh combinations, crushes out letters in some cases (especially if they be gutturals), or in- troduces a new element demanded l>y euphony — we te;Lse to wonder at th** gieat variety and extent of vocal changes. It is seen how in various ways any one letter almost, or syllabic sound, may pa-b into almost any other, and how the same word, as trac^-d through it> phonetic ch:inges, presents an appearance in one lanenagc that neither the eye nor the ear would recogni/e in another. To take one example that may nUind for an illustratiun of some of the most important of soul, changes, who, by the sight or sound alone, or by any outward marks, would recognize the I>atin diVs in the French jowr, or the English tfariteaghr, 5aiepu) in the Latin lacTy Uicrima. or the Knirli-ih Ifad in the Latin (a/>ul and the Greek KtiftoAij, though nothing can be more certain than their relationBhip a'l traced by; the phonetic laws. 'Iho rual wonder is that the changes in thin department have not been greater thiin they are found to be. It in the soul of language, the unyieldmg rigidity of its form, that, by its ossoCL'ttion, preventM the utter diHSolution and mutiition ot the material. Ita eonsirvntism, in thiM respect, is shown in the caxe of bintTingcs tliat are m<;rely spoken. It has its most complete- ijlei-t in those thai have a written and print- ed literature. — T. L.J t [The nmingemi-nt. in the mind, of things to bo named, helODgf Ui the formation of language, as much aw the n an- ng, if it may not rather be oaid to be the most important in its precision and richness of epithet, in the pro found presentation of moral and aesthetic disMnctiona, — in tt'is respect ever in advance of the people who used it — in the elements it contained for the expres- sion of philosophic thought whenever its stores should be required for that purpose, and, withall, in the melodiou.'^ness, the flexibility, and the exuberance of its vocal forms. The Thucydidian Greek falls below it in all these respects. Certainly it had not risen above it. It is the tendency of language, when left to itself, to dechne in the attributes mentioned. The assertion may be hazarded that the evidence of this fact is exhibited in most modern tongues. More co pious are they doubtless, better adapted to a quick political, social, or commercial intercourse, or to cer- tain forms of civilization in which a greater commu- nity of action, or of understood conventional pro- ceedings, makes up for the want of pictorial and dialectical clearness as inherent in the wonls them- selves— but everywhere, in their old worn state, pre- senting a lack of that vividness, that exquisite shad- ing of ideas, that power of emotion, which aston- ishes us in the early languages just mentioned. The tendency, in fact, is towards Sinism, or a language of loose arbitrary symbols, not away from it. A? savagism is the dregs of a former higher civilization, so Sinism is the remains of language, bearing evi- dence of attrition and fracture; and this, however copious it may be, or however adapted it may be to a mere worldly civilization, such as that in which the Chinese have long been stationary, or slowly falling, and to which a godless culture, with all its science, is ever tending. There is in language accretion, ad- dition, looseness, decay; but we rarely find, if we ever find, in any speech that has long been used, what may be truly called growth in the sense of or- ganic vigor, or inward structural harmony.* That young and vigorous constitution which is discovered in the earhest Arian and Shemitic speech, they must have received in some way for which it is very ditti- eult to account on any natural or ordinary grounds. part of the naming itself. Things, thus regarded, may be divided into three general classes: 1. Outward sensible objects; 2. actions, qualities, etc., us the ground of their naming, and themselves, therefore, demanding an antece- dent naming; 3. mental acts and states, thoughts, think- ings, emotions, etc., regarded as wholly spiritual. Id re- spect to the ttrst, it may, indeed, be said that nature map-^a the classification, but the mind must recognize it, more or less coiTcctly, before it can give the names. The second liea in both depai'tments ; since acts {doings^ sufferings) must be the souice whence direct names are drawn for the first, and flgures, jiictm-es, or spiritual representatives, for the thirdt as ie shown in that large class ot words that are said to have secondary meaninKS, or abstmct ideas denoted by something material or sen-^ible in the root. The third cias^ific;ltion is wholly spiritual or within, though its namings are thus drawn from without. We fiid all this work done for \a when we are bom. The earliest languages have it as vivid- ly :is the latest, more vividly, we may say, if not oirried to so wide ail extent in the elassification of outward olijccts, more profoimd, as analysis would show, in the distinctions of moral and asthetical ideas. Whence c;iiiie itV Wa must ascend to the very taproot of humanity to find an an- swer, if we are not to seek still farther in some divine teach- ing or inspiration. The phenoniena lie ever before us j their commonness sliould not diminish oiu: wcr.Jer at th« mystery they present.— T. L.] • [We may thank God that some of the nohletit «n- piatres (Greek, Hebrew, Sanscrit, T^atin) died lo g ago, or in their comparative youth. They have thus been em» balmed, preserved from decay, made immorial, ever yoing, —their ex]jre.--sive words and fonns still remaining as a re- serve store fur the highest philosophicjil, theological, and even scientific uye. They are Cilled " the dead langUL-tre*! ; " but that which some would make an objection to what tifti long and justly been deemed their nlace in eduo«lioii, if thf very gn'uud of their excellence.- f. L.l CHAP. XI. 10-SS 37{ Convention will not explain it, as Plato saw long ago in tbe very dawn of philological inquiry ; ouoma- topic theories fail altogether to account for the first words, to say nothing of grammatical forms ; devel- opment is found to be mere cant, giving no real in- sight into the mystery. If the originating processes 'all wholly within the sphere of the human, then must we suppose some instinctive logic, some sure inlelligence working below consciousness, and some- how belonging to the race, or races, rather than to the individual. If this is difficult to conceive, or to unde:«tand, then there remains for us that which hardly surpasses it in wonder, whilst it falls short of it in mystery, namely, the idea of some ab extra supernatural power once operating on the human Boul in its early youth — whether in the fiist cre- ation, or in some subsequent early stages of re- markable development, — and now comparatively unknown.* When we study language on tbe map, the diffi- culty of any mere development theory bringing one of these families from the other, or from a common original stock, is greatly increased. Whilst the Ari- au and Shemitic present, in the main, certain geo- graphical allotments tolerably distinct, this Hamitic or Turanian conglomerate is found dispersed in the most irregular manner. It is everywhere in spots thioughout the regions occupied by the more organic families ; sometimes in sporadic clusters, as in parts of Western Asia, sometimes driven far oft* to the confiaes as is the case with the Fhinic and Lap lan- guage, or, again, wedged into corners, like the Basciue language in Spain, lying between two branches of the Ariau, the Roman and the Celtic. Had we found rocks lying in such strange ways, it would at once have been said : no slow depositing, no long attrition, no gradual elevation or depression, has done all this. Tliey may have exerted a modi- fying influence ; but they are not alone sufficient to account for what, appears. Here has been some eruptive or explosive force, some ab extra power, whether from above or beneath, sudden and extraor- * [It is not extravagan'; to suppose something like this still lying at the ground of that mysterious process which * we witness without wonder, because so common, — the rapid acquisition of language by the infant mind. It is not the mere learning to speak the names of outward, sensible, in- dividual things— there is nothing much more strange in that than in teaching a parrot to talk,— but the quick seiz- ing of those hidden relations of things, or rattier of tliought about things (ideas of the soul's o\\ti with which it clothes things), and which it afterwards tasks all our outward logic to explain. How rapidly does this infant mind adapt words, not merely to chairs and tables hut to the relatioual notions of number, case, substance, attribute, qualifying degree, flubjoctive raodalitv, time relative and absolute, time as past, present, and iuture, or time as continuous and event- ual, knowing nothing indeed of these as technical names, but grasping immediately the ide.as, and seeing, with such amaziug quickness, the adaptability to them of certain forms of expression, a mere termination, perhaps, or the feintest intlectioa, and that, too, with no outward imitative indices from tbe sense, such as may aid in the learning of the names of mere sensible objects. This indeed is wouder- fal, however common it may he. We never do it but once. All other aCiiuisition of languages, in adult years, is by a eroce-= of memory, comparison, and conscious reasoning — I other wcrds, a sti-ictly scientific process, however certain abbreviations of it may be called the learn'Ug of a foreign longne by *' the method of naturi- " and of infancy. Some- iliing in the race analogous to this process in the individual Infant soul, may be, not iiTationally, supposed to have eharacterized the earliest human history of language. The feilure of every system of artificial language, though at- tempted by the most philosophical minds, aided by the bighest culture, shows that neither convention nor imitation hail ^nvthing to do with its origin. — T. L.1 dinary in its effect, however generated in its causal ity, and however we may style that causality, whethei natural or supernatural, simply inexplicable, op di- vine. Such eruptive forces are not coiiiined to rockt and strata, or to sudden changes in material organi zation. They have place also in the spiritual world in the movements of history, in the souls of mec, is remarkable changes and formations of language. There are spiiitual phenomena, if the term may b« used, for which we cannot otherwise easily account. The evidence here of any such intervening power may be less striking, because less startling to tha sense, but to the calm and reverent reaxon they maj be even more marked than anything analagous to them in the outer world of matter. Gieat confusion has arisen in our theological reasoning fi'om confin- ing this word miraculous solely to some supposed breakage or deflection in the natural sphere. To say the least, therefore, it is not irrational to carry this view into the history of man regarded as under the influence of supernatural, as well as natu- ral, agencies. And thus here, as we contemplate the remarkable position of the early languages of tha world, and especially of the three great families, some force from without, sudden, eruptive, breaking up a previous movement, extraordinary to say the least, would be the causal idea suggested, even if tha Scripture had said nothing about it, A primitive formation has been left comparatively but little af- fected ; all around it, east and west, are linguistic appearances presenting the most striking contrasts to the first, and yet the most remarkable fannly like- nesses to each other ; elsewhere, as a third class of elements show, the eruptive or flooding force haa broken everything into fragments, and scattei'cd them far and wide. Philology cannot account for it ; but when we study the tenth and eleventh of Genesis in what they fairly imply as well as clearly express, we have revealed to us an ancient causation adeiiuate, alone adequate, we may say, to the singular effect produced. The language of the account is general, as in other parts of Scripture where a mighty change is to be described, universal in its direct and collat- eral historical effect, without requiring us to main- tain an absolute universality in the incipient move- ment. From some such general terms in the com- mencement of chapter xi. it might seem, indeed, as though every man of the human race was in this plane of Sliinar, and directly engaged in the impious undertaking described. Taking, however, the two chapters together — and it is too much to say, as most commentators do, in the very face of the ar- rangement, that the eleventh chapter is wholly prior to the tenth — we must conclude that one line, at least, of tbe sons of Shem, that of Arphaxad, the ancestor of the Chaldteans, and of Eber, the more direct progenitor of the Hebrews, remained in the upper country of the Euphrates. It is fairly to be inferred, too, that tlie Joktau migration to Arabia had commenced, carrying with it the Shemitic ele- ment of speech to modily or transform the Cushite, whether introduced befoie or after it. Some of the sons of Japheth may have already set off, west and east, in their long wanderings (to (ji'eece and India perhaps), whilst Sidon, a descendant of Haiu, had even at this early day, founded a maritime settle, ment, and ventured upon the seas. It is not easy to understand why the nan-ation of the tenth chapter should have had its place before that of the eleventh, unless a portion, at least, of the movements ther/ recorded. ! ad been antecedent in time. It is com S76 GENESIS, OR THR FIKST '^ >0F '"F ittiSEH. moiilr siiiii that the tenth is anticipatory in respi'ct to wliat follow.^, but this is not altoge Vr satisfac- tory. As the story of the greater scattering comes after tlie ethnological divisions iu the order of nar- ration, it may be consistently maintained that it was subsequent to some of them, at least, in the order of time, whilst the seeming universality of ''le lan- guage may be explained on the ground of ■i>-. mag- nitude of the later event, and its \nrl-f -r.ae, r'fiect in the human history. A close exam— ^ion, however, ghows that, even in the diction, this universality is not so strict as some interpretations would make it. After these earlier departures, as we may supply from chapter x., it proceeds to say, " the whole eartli (land country) was (yet) of one language and one speech." It had not been broken up, though it may have be- gun to be affected by causes which would naturally produce changes of dialect. " And in Ikeir journey- ing," or " as thei/ journeyed onward (CTjl^a), the(/ found a plain in the land of Sliinar." " As tliei/ journeyed," that is, as men journeyed onward, or migrated more and more. Who or how many they were is not said, and these indefinite pronouns give us no right to say that every man of the human race, all of Xoaehian kind, were in this plain of Shinar. There is the strongest proof to the contrary. We cu2not believe that Noah was there, althougli he lived three hundred and fifty years after tlie flood, or that .Sliem was there, who lived one hundred and fifty years later, aud even in the days of Abraham. The idea is abliorrent that one so highly blessed of God, and in " whose tents " God had promised " to dwell " — Shem. the Name, the preserver of the holy speech, and the direct antithesis of that false "name" which these bold rebels sought to make unto them- selves— should have had any participation, even by liis presence, in so unholy a proceeding. As little can we believe it of any of the line from which came Abraham, or even of their not remote conxanguinii, the Joktanite Arabians. The same feeling arises when we think of the pious fathers of Melehizedek, Wng of Salem, king of righteousness, and who had consecrated I'im » priest to El Elion, that Most High God of the Heavens (see Gen. xiv. 18), who is here so blasphemously defied.' Who were they, then, that composed this strange assemblage on the plain of Shinar? A vast multitude doubtless, a majority of Noah's descendants perhaps, yet still, as is most likely, a colluviea ge^Uium, a gathering of the bad, the bold, the adventurous, from every family, but with the Hamitic character decidedly predominant.f Nimrodiau, perhaps, might they be called with more propriety, if we take the constant Jewish tradition that Nimrod was tlieir leader iu rebellion. The no- iler sons of Ham are to be distinguished from these • iThua 'B.zJ.n interprets their n^n , " Go to, now let us eliinl' tbe tirm.-imeiit and make war upon liie most Iligh." lielchiZL'dL-k and his forefathers were, in all proljitbility. Oanaanites. There uuKht Ix- piety and faith even among these, !is is instanced, afterwards, and iu a time of still Kroat- •r comiption, in the im^h of Itahab, who was a dii-ect iinces- il«r> 'if our Lord I What I'.ml says (lloS. vii, .1) of Alel- ohi£;dek's being airarup and afiTjTittp, '* without father and Tithout mother," is not iiitcndc'l to deny his havins any aartliiy linoaKe. -T. Ii.l * [The opinion th:it ihe men in the plain of Shinar wcro aot the whole huinuu race, but predominantly Ilumitts, or follower*! "( Wiiurod, is miiintiiined bv Augustine, and, amonK mod^^rn anthrnilios, liy Luther and Calvin. Ser ;iUo the account of Jobki'uus ("Ant." i. 4;, who miiktis Kiin- rod tho great leafier ol the tIjoIo rebslliou* »iv"-'^ineiit. — T. L.i riiibyliinis,n Hamit f". The founder of .ht Egyptiac monarchy, aid, perutfDS, the Arabian t.'jshites, haii in all jirolml -Jity gou*. to their respective settlements The very name, Nimnid, shows a difference betweeo them. It is not the name of a country, or of a fam ily of descendants, Ul.o the others mentioned Gen. z. 8 ; a fact of which Maimonides takes notice (se* marg. note, p. 849) win,n he calls attention to the manner in which Nimrod is mentioned irregularly, aa it were, or out of the line, after the other sons of Cush had been disposed of. He was not, like them, a "father of a people," a patriarch, or ancestor, but a bold adventurer, a " mighty hunter of men before the Lord," or in defiance of the Lord, who gathered together, out of every people, those who were like himself, not to settle the world, but to prevent its peaceful settlement by engaging in bold and reckless enterprises of an opposite nature. He may be said to have represented the empire founding, instead of the planting or colonizing, tendency. He was the postdiluvian Cain, and there would seem to be a sig- nificance not to be disregarded in the fact that here there is given to this rebellious multitude that same name, Ctsn ''32 , "sons of men," which, in its fem- inine form, is used Gen. vi. 4 (D'7'f 'I '^''?) 'f* denote the godless in distinction from the more pious. The line here indicated, between the sons of God and the " sons of men," was less distinct, perhaps, than tliat which was drawn between the Sethites aud the Cain ites, yet it still existed to some extent, making a di- vision between the better branches of the Shemites, with some from both the other lines, and this vast rabble of the sensual and ungodly. The grammat ical form of the name Nimrod (which is veryunusua for such a purpose) shows that it had a popular, in- stead of a family, origin. It is the hrst person j>lurai future jussive, lSi2D , " co?/ie let us rebeiy It wa? the watchword of the impious leader, afterward! given to him as a title by bis applauding followers " Let us break Jehovah's bands, let us cast his corda from us," let us build a tower that lihaU reach llim in the Heavens.* On this impious host oi Nimrod, predominantly, although not solely, Hamitic, fell especially the scat- tering and confounding blow, like the bolts froEC heaven aimed at the rebellious Titans ; and hencn this rabble of tongues called Hamitic or Turanian, or these allophylic conglomerates which philologists find so remarkable as compared with the enduriug unity of the Shemitic, and the diversified, yet unmis- takable Arian relationship. These two were, drnbt- less, afflicted by the shock ; one of them may have had much of its subseque"' modification, if not its origin, from it; but on lue Hamitic host fell th» • [It was A thought exceedingly w-icked, yei. naving in it a kind of teniiic sublimiiy. Neither culu the idea of in ._ y. jNeituer culu llie laea of . .'aching the heavens, or sky, be called irrational, or absur>i, however unscientific. Theyreasnned inducluely, Baconian- ly, we may say, from sense and observation Their limited experience was not against it. It showed a vast ambition. It was not an undertaking ol savages, but of men possessed with the idea of somehow getting above nature, and havinf much of that spu-it which, even at the jaeseut day, charao tei-ines some Kinds of scientitic boasting (see remarks, _ p :165). It was not the success merely oi t*-. . undertaking (from wnich we are yet as far as ever), i._y the impiolU thought, that Ood meani to confound, aud to strike down, whenever it arose in the miuds of men. History is full of ovurthi-own Babels; and it is still to be tested whether oul ej-cessive modern boasting about what is going to bo achiev- ed by science, progress, %ud democracy, will form an azoej^ five cose. — T. ti.i CHAP. XI. 10-82. 371 Btone that ground tlu-m to powder. *'For there* Jehovah confoundeil the language of all the earth" {land or coimtrij). This Ninirodian Babel of tongues wrought more or less of confusion everywhere, mak- ing the universality in the effect rather than in the immediate causality — a view perfectly consistent with the soberest interpretatiou of the artless language of Holy Scripture. The causative influence, we may believe, was primarily a spiritual one. It was a confounding not only of their purposes {zh p-inuiniD , Gen. vi. 5)— thus introducing confusion, madness,! and discord, into their camp — but also of their ordinary thinkings and conceivings, rwv fV^uw-TiTeair Koi ii/voiuiv wapSias, Heb. iv. 12, "reaching to the dividing line of soul andspmV," ^vxv^ "^^ fal Trrcu/uaros, holding back the divine gift of reason, and thus introducing disorder into the sense and the utterance through a prior con- fusion in the spirit. It deranged their word-forma- tions by a previous derangement of their thoughts. The difficulty attendmg the mere outer view, here, arises from a fundamental error which may be found even in acute treatises of philology. Words do not represent things, as outer existences merely, according to the common notion, but rather what we think about things. They are in truth symbols of our own inner world as affected by the outer world of things around us. They translate lo us our own thoughts as well as help us to make them known to others. The animal has no such inner world, and therefore it is that he cannot use speech to represent it to himself or to other animals. This would be * [C'lJ ""S; for there. It may denote fact or circum- stance as well as place. For there — in that event, or in that confusion. Compare Ps. cxxxiii. 3, where this particle, niT , is used in just the same way to denote the opposite condition of brotherly love, and the opposite effect : nirr^ ni:£ Cli; "^3, "/or (A^re Jehovah commanded the blessing, even life forever more; "not in "Mount Her- mon," or *' the mountains of Ziou,*' merely, but as belong- ing to this holy affection of brotherly love. Compare 1 John iii. 14. -T. L.]" t [For a notable example of this, see 2 Chron. xx. 23, where the hosts of Amnion, of Moab, and of Mount Selr, who rose up against Jehoshaphat, are sudflenly turned against each other. Profane history records such events as I taking place, now and then, in great armies ; cases of sud- den and irretrievable confusion, giving rise to hostility as well as tiight. They are called panics, whether the terra means simply unive^rsal disorder, or what was sometimes called "the wrath of Pan" (Ilafbs bpyi^, see Eueip. "Me- dea,'* 1169), bringine madness upon an individual or a mul- titude; it denotes something inesplicable, even if we refuse to call it supernatural. See Polt-exus : De Strateg., ch. 1 ; also a very striking passage in the ^'Odyssey," xx. ^46, which shows, at all events, the common belief m such sud- den madness falling upon multitudes of men, whatever may D6 the explauation of it : tJ.vr\t have been not only articulate (that is, formod of vowels and conso- nants) Kut truly representative. They were none of them at^uvoi (ver. 10), or mere 4>^oyyoC., sounds, or noises. They had a real Bvvant^ t^? f/xur-TJ? (ver. 11), a true "power of voice," and thi^ could be nothing else than an inherent fit- ness in the utterance to represent the entranced state, not generally, merely, but in its diversities of ecstatic idea or emotion. They were not understood by the hearers, be- cause, in their" ordinary state, there was nothing within them corresponding to it. Even the utterers could not translate it into the common logical language of the vov^ (ver. 14), or understanding. They were spnken iv Tri'fi/juoTt, in the spirit, and only in the spirit could they be under stood, like the words that Paul heard in his entranced state, "whether in the body, or out of the body, he could not tell." Paul certainly does not mean to deny, or disparage, the greatneiis of the spiritual t;ift in what he says, ver. 19, hut only to set forth the Greater outward usefulness of tho prophetic charisma. " 1 thank God," he sars (ver. IS) '* 1 sperik with toncues more than you all." He was often in the state that demanded this languai'e to express itself tfl itself. In respect to the connection of this pe^iuliar case with the L'eneral argument, the analogy holds thus far, namely, that the?e ecstatic utterances were real representa^ tive words. They represented an inward spiritual state of thought, or emotion, or both, from a real inherent fitness to do so. We may, therefore, rationally conclude that a simi- lar correspondence between words and ideas was at the be- ginning of all human speech. Had man remained spirit lal, this connection would have continued as soraetliing inlui« tively perceived, and leading ever to a rijht application of articulate sounds to the things or acts sicmified, a? it seems to have ffuided the first huniaidty in the naming of animali from some spiritual effect their appearance produced. Thii primitive gift or faculty of intuition became daikene'l by nt^ GKNESIS» OR VHE FIRl/T BOOK OF MOSES. so these Barnes of outward objects must hive come after words donoting action or quality, and from which their own naming, unless supposed to be purely arbitrary, could alone have been derived. Orijrinally they must have been all descriptive, that is, they Iiad a meaning beyond their mere sign significance. lu proportion as such primary mcaninj^rs have faded out in modern langua.t^^es, have words lost vividness and emotive power, tliough still remahiingasa convenient classifying notation. Thus in early speech the names of animals, for example, were all descriptive. We find it so even now, as far as we can trace them in the siguifieance of their roots. They invarialdy de- note something which the animal does^ or suffers, or M, or is supposed to do, to suffer, or to be — thus ever implying some judgment of the human mind respecting it; awd this corresponds to what is said in the Scripture of the animals being brought before Adam to see (r"X'b for Adam to see, judge, decide) what name should be given to each one. This name is ever taken from something more general, and the name of that from sometliing more general still, and ''o back from the concrete to the more and more ab- fitract, imtil we are lost in the mystery, and compelled to admit that there is something in ourselves, and in language, which it is not easy to understand. We may be sure, however, that in all these primary names of animals there was something descriptive, though in many it may have been long lost. In some cases it stUl shines dimly through the wear of time and usage, enabling us to infer it universally. Thus6/W, we may be certain, means something more than b'lrd^ and dog than rfor/, even as foid^ fu(jel^ vor/el^ siiW car- ries with it some faint image o^ Jlyhig^ and ckien^ hund^ Kuoff, caiiis {cano, canot'us, tlZ'^p\ suggests the clear, ringing, houndlike sound that denoted the animal in tlie earliest Arian speech.* Connected with this there is another thought that has impor- tance here. The first impression is that nouns, or the names of things, must be older in language than verbs. Examination, however, shows just the con- wary as a fact, and then we see that it must be so, if names are not arbitrary, but ever imply some ac- tion or r4uality of the thing, and so an antecfdent naming of that action or passion. But not to pur- sue this farther, it is enough to show that the spring sin, eensuality, and earthliness tm-niner the mind outward, and thus tending, more and more, to make words mere ar- bitrnry signs With all this, there is evidence that in the earliest speech of men there was more of vividness, more of a conscious livintf connection between words and that which they signified, than afterwartis existed when l;in- guapes became moie copious and more mixed. In this way may we suppose that the e^irly roots, ihouch comparatively few in number, had more of a self-interpretinf; jiower, anil that, in proportion as tliis continued, there wa;- the tneater security apainst the changes Find diver'^ities which a h)wer Bpirilual state must necessarily bring into languaiic. A total loss of it amontr this rebellious Ilamitic host may have led to a more rapid confounding of words and forms, and, of con^Ofiuence, a greater ruin of language than ever ciimo from any other event in human history. Then- are exani- "ies enough to wliow how soon the best'language becomes a Jargon in a community of very bad men, such as ihiuveB fcnd evil ndventureta. Here was a similar fiuso, its we may •onceive it, only on a vasi ly larger t-cale.— T. I*.] * i'l'he name civen to an animal could lU'ver. of course, be a lull dnsnriplion. It i^ the selection of some predomi- nant tniit, afiii»n, or habit, as the dis^tinpul. 'filing or naming feature. TU'.a may vai-y among different pi-dple. In nne tongue the sumo animal may be denoted by lis color, if it has Homethintf yieculiar, m another by bis manner of move- ment, in another by a burrowlntr property, or by his method of seizing his prey. These difTercnt Cdnci'ivingH may give rise to ditferent names; and yet if tho actions ao ropre- ■entecJ by those names have the same or similar verbal roots hoy may bo iodicative of a remoter unity.— T. L.1 of language is in the thought, the conceiving, th< affection, as the source of names for things, and foi the relations of things. Confusion here is eonfueioD throughout, and this would be much more operatlvf in a multitude thus atfectod than in an individual Break up the community of thought and the com- munity of language is broken up, or begii;s to break up along with it. It affects not only the matter but the form, the soul, the grammatical stnicture.* Go- ing still deeper, it changes the mode of lexical deri- vation, or the process through which secondary sen8e.i (as they exist in almost all abstract words) come from the primary — the inward etymologies, as they may be called, which are of more importance in determiu- ing the affinities of langnages than the outward pho- netic etymologies on which some philologists almost exclusively insist, and which are so easily lost — all the more easily and rapidly wlien the more spiritual bonds are loosed. So, on the other hand, the main taining secure against mutation the higher ideas that dwell in a language, especially its religious ideas, is most conservative both of its matter and form. Thua may we account, in some degree, for the way in which the Shemitic endured the shock that left all around it those masses of fragments which philolo- gists call the Hamitic or Turanian. The great name of God was in it in fulfilment of the promise. Those other remarkable appellations of Deity, El, Allah, Eloah, Elohim, Adonai, EI Sbaddai, El Elion, El Glam, TrauTOKpdrwpy v\pi(nos^ anuuniSy have been to it like a rock of ages, giving security to its other re- ligious ideas, whilst these again have entered exten- * [If our modes of conceiving individual flensiV>le objects have such an effect upon ianifuage, much more important, in this respect, are the more abstract conceptions, such as those of time, relative or absolute. The conserving power thus arising may receive an illustration from the scanty, yet most tenacious, Shemitic tenses, as compared with the Greek. In the Hebrew, time is conceived of as reckoned from a moving present, making all that comes after it, future, al- though it may be past to the absolute present of the narra- tor or describer, nnd all before it, past. It need not lie said how much more of a subjective cliaracter this imjiarts to tho language, especially in its poetry. It has hail, besides, the effret of giving a peculiar form to the two tenses, and of making thrse, deficient as they may seem in number, de- note all the varieties of time that are expressed in other languages, but in a more giiiphic manner. Whilst dispens- ing with an absolute present form, which would make it fixed and rigid, it has a flowing presence which may become absolute whenever the narration or description demands it. Iti the Inrlo-Germanic tongues, on the other hand, there is a fixed present and a fixed iorm for it, which will not allow a dejiarture from the absolute time, except as sometimes implied in tho assumption of a poetical style. Hence a much greater number of tense forms are demanded, not only for the past, present, and futui'e, simply, but for a past and future to the past and futuie respectively, besides on indefinite or aorist form. Thus there is a wide machinery peifonning these offices— accurately, indeed, though with little more precision than is found in the Shemitic — whilst there is a loss of pictorial and dramatic power, 'i'hcre is no tim<-, relative or ahsolute, denoted by the Greek tense forma, thai may not, in some way, be expressed in the Arabic ; whilst tlie manner in which the latter shifts its present, aa we may say. by hanging it on a particle, or making it de- jiend upon its place before or after, gives a greater vivldnesi nf narration. It is astonishing how such scantiness of mode and tensi- escapes confusion ind ambiguity ; and yet there in a comparative test of this which is conclusive. The Arabic is written and read without anything like capital letiers or italics, \vithout any grammatical or logical puno tuation, of anv kind, niikiiig any diWsion of paratrraphs, sentinees, or clauses. I'Yom the beginning of a book to the e id, 1 here are none of these helps to relieve defieii'neies of expression, whether the result of carelessness, or comiiij from unavoidable looseness in the language. In English this could not be done. Without pucb outward heljis, tin most fticurate writer, lake ho ever so much paitia, woubi bf full of grammiiticAl cotistructions that might be taken if different way«. and not a few unsolvable logical am aigui ties.— T, L.i CHAP. XI. 10-82. 37. •iyely into its proper names, its common nouns and verbs, conserving it against tlie corruption and de- generacy of tliose wiio spoke it, and giving even to its Arabic and Syriac branches a Iioly and religious aspect beyond anything presemed in any anciout or modern tongue. Well and worthily have the Jewish Rabbis called it •i:;npn "iVrb , the holy tongue. Truly it is so, whether we regard it as the original Noachian speech, or something later preserved entire from the wreck of the Babid confusion.* How this extrnordinary breaking up of language iool^ place we may not easily know, though main- taining its possibility, and its strong probability, as a fact, aside from the express Scriptural declaration. There is no department of human inquiry in which we so soon come to the mysterious and inexplicable ■s in that of language. Some have maintained its onomatopic origin, as has been lately done in a very clear and able treatise by Prof. Whitney. If this, however, is confined to vocal resemblances in the names of sounds themselves, it accounts for oidy an exceedingly small number of words ; if carried far- ther, to supposed analogies between the names of certain acts, or efforts, and the effort of tiie organs in pronouncing them, it takes in a very few more; beyond tins it would be that idea of some inherent fitness in sounds which has been already considered in the note, p. 377, and to which the name onoma- topic may be given in its widest sense ; though then, instead of being the easiest, it would be the least explicable of all. So the philologist may endeavor to find the beginning of speech, especially in the names of animals, in the imitation of animal sounds; or lie may absurdly trace it to a conventional nam- ing, overlooking the truth that for the initiation of gucli a proceeding language itself is required — or he mav deduce it from accident, or, give him time enougii — and a past eternity is very long — he may fancy it coming out of inai'ticulate or merely interjeotional sounds, making its random "natural selecti'ins," until, after ages of chaos, a light inexplicidjle begins to gleam, an inteUigence soj/tfAoto enters into the process, and thus, ai last, language comes into form, as a vehicle of rational, that is, of logical f thought. But for human minds, A070S, speech, and logos, re^uion, * [Th:s 16 on the supposition tliat the Shemitic (for any diiference here between the earliest Hebrew, Arabic, and Syriac, is of little consequence) was the primitive Nt achian apeech that came out of tlie ark. The best argument for it is that there is no good argument to the contrary. If no other has any better claim on inward phiIologi>-al grounds, the Bible history greatly favors the idea., to say the lest, that tliis languly struggling, resolutely patient and enduring, over- coming the world. He is the type of the conflicts, obedience, and victory of faith — TraTTjp -navTuv rwv wicrTi\j6vTii>i'. His loving endurance repeats itself in Isaac, his hopeful wrestlings in Jacob. 'Et' eATriS, Trap' eK-iriSa is their motto. The promise and faith are the two correlated factors of the people of (iod Renouncing the present, and in the midst of trials its life passes in hope. Hope is its true life, impulse, and aflfection. Desire is Israel's element. Viewing the patriarchal history from the central point of that history, the incarnation of God in the fulness of time, its position in the history of salva- tion may he thus defined. There are seven stages in this history : 1. The antediluvian time, Itoth para- disaic and after paradise, during which God was per- sonally and visibly present with men, closing with the Hood, when he retires into the heavens and frcm thence exercises his judicial and sovereign provi- dence. The goal of history is thenceforward th« restoration of this dwelling of God with men. The history has ever tended towards this goal. 2. The patriarchal time during which God manifested hira- pelf personally and even "lisibly upon the earth, but CHAP. XII. 1-20. 3St only at times and only to a few holy men, the patri- archs, at important points in the history of salvation ; and even these revelations cease from Jacob to Mo- ses. The revelation of God in the name mn^, i.e. as the one coming down into history, and revealinj:; himself in it, belongs to this time of the completed creation, of theopeninj; redemption of Israel, His pecu- liar people. 3. The IsraeUtish period prior to the ex- ile, duringwhich God did not reveal himself personally and visibly as in the patriarchal period to a IVw, and to these only at times, but to a whole people and perma- nently, liut still only to a people and not to mankind. There are two distinguishable epochs in this period. In the first Israel is led by the Angel of Jehovah in the pillar of cloud and fire — the glorious and gra- cious presence of God, visible for tiie whole people. The second is that of the presence of God in the temple and in the word ; in the temjile for Israel, but only through the mediation of priests, in the word, but only through the mediation of prophets. But even this lower, less accessible temple-presence ceases when Israel filled up the measure of its ini- quities. The glory of Jehovah departed from the temple. As God at first withdrew his manifested presence from the race and destroyed it with the flood, so now from the Jewish people, and abandons Jerusalem to destruction. As the first stage of the history closes with a judgment from the ascended God, and the second in the long profound silence from Jacob to Moses, so the third again ends like the first. 4. The time succeeding the exile, at its com- mencement not essentially different from the close of the third period. God was present in the word, but tlie ark of the covenant, the covering, the cher- ubim, the Urim and Thummim, and, more llian all, the Shechinah, the visible symbol of the presence of Jehovah, were wanting in the temple. But ' prophecy itself grew speechless with Malachi and Daniel. The people complain, We see not our signs, there is no more any prophet (Ps. Ixxiv. 9). They named Simon the brother of the Maccabeean Jona- than the liyuufiefos xal apx'€P«^y fis ^of aiwva^ but it was ettis Tov avaarrivai TTpo(piiT7}v irnni'iv. Thus forsaken of God, and conscious of its forsaken state, the true Israel passed through this fourth stage of the history, a school of desire for believers waiting t and longing for the new unveihng of the divine I countenance. Then at last tlie dawn broke, Jeho- 1 vah visited his people, and in the mystery now un- veiling itself -dei? etpacepw^T) ec aapKi completes in far-surp.'\5sing glory the antitype of I'aradise. 6. The time of the life of Christ in the flesh. It is now true in the most literal and real sense, eirK-hvoMrfp iv T]ix1v. But at first Israel alone saw him. The rays of his glorious grace reach the heathen only as an exception. But Ins own received him not. They oailed the manifested in the flesh to the cross. But he who e^ arr,dtt'eias died, rose, eV Sffauews b^ov^ and ascended into heaven. He withdrew himself from the people who had despised him. But as Jehovah, after he had seated himself upon his heavenly throne, sent down at the close of the hist stage the judgment of the flood, at the dose of the third works the destruction of Jerusalem, so now the God-man ascended into heaven abandons Jeru- salem to destruction and Judah to an exile which still endures. For Israel he will come again, but m the fire of judgment ; and for beUevers he will also come again, but not visibly nor in the tire of judg- ment, but in the firj of the Spirit. 6. The stiU- «>during present, the time of the spiritual presence 23 of the incarnate God in his church. This presene* is both more than the visible presence of Christ in the days of his flesh, and less than the visible pres- ence of the exalted one in winch it reaches its en- largement and completion. We must not forget that the Spirit sent upon us from the glorified Son of Man is so far the TrapaKK-nro\ as he comforts ua on account of his absence ; that all the desire of th« Christian is to be at home with Christ; and that the hope of the whole chiu-eh is eiTiltraced in the hope for the revelation of Christ. Without sharing in tt« exaggerated estimate of the miraculous gifts by tho Irviugites, it caimot be denied that our time resem- bles the second part of the post-exile i)eriod, and that the church now, as believers then, desires the return of the wonderful intensity and gracious ful- ness of the spiritual presence in the primitive church. This desire will receive its fulfilment in the glorious time of the church upon the earth. 1. But the seventh stage of the history of salvation, which endures through the ^Eons of jEons, will first give full satisfaction to all the desires of all believers, and bring that glorious, transcendent restoration of the paradisaical communion with God in the incarnation, to its final perfection. The new Jerusalem (Rev. XXL 8) is the antitype of Paradise. The communion of God with the first man to be redeemed, has now become his communion with the finally redeemed humanity. His |>resence is no longer a transitory alternating, now appearing then vanishing, but en- during, ever the same, and endless; not limited to individuals nor bound to localities, but to all, and all-pervading ; not merely divine, but divine and human; not invisible, but visible; not in the form of a servant, but in unveiled glory. God ascends no more, for sin is for ever judged and the earth haa become as heaven. He descends no mote, for the work of redemption is complete, the whole creation keeps its soleiun sabbath, God rests in it, and it rests in God ; Jehovah has finished his work, and Elohim is now all in all, 1^a^Ta eV Traaw. See De- LITZSCH, p. 239-249.— A. G.] 6. The fundamental form of divine revelation, par- ticularly of the revelation of the old covenant, and still more particularly of the patriarchal period (see p. 48, Introd. ). The historically-completed fundamen- tal form of the divine revelation of salvation, is the revelation of God in Chiisi, the God-man, i. e. in one distinct, unique life, wherein the divine self-commu- nication and revelation, and the human intuition of God, are perfectly united in one, while yet as ele- ments of life they are clearly distinguished from each other. The progressive revelation must correspond in its outline and characteristic features to this goal to which It tends. In its objective aspect it must be through theophanies, in its subjective the vision of the revelation of God, in its plan, tendency, and de- velopment, Christophanies ; the chief points in the interchange between God manifesting himself per- sonally and the receptive human spirits in the pre- figurations of the future advent of Christ. The individual phases in the development of this foira of revelation are these: (1) The revelation of (Jod through the symbolism of heaven and earth ; visibly for the paradisaic spiritual and natural clear-sighted vision ; and coming out in particular words and representations of God, addressed to the ear and eye, promptly, according to the necessities of human development, and according to the energy of the Spirit of God, who translates the signs ii:to words. The form of the primitive religion. (2) The self- oSO GENESIS, OR THE I'lRST BOoK OF MOSES. revelation of God in the form of an angelic appear- ance, distinct from his being ; the pre-announcement of the luture Christ, or the Angel of Jehovah in re- ci])rocal relation and action with the unconscious see- ing, as in vision, resting upon the unconscious ecnta- sies of believers, manil'esting himself first through the miraculous report or voice, then through miraculous vision, I, e. first through the word, then through the figurative aopearance. The form of the patriarchal leUgion. (3) The revelation of God, distinguishing Ids face, i. e. Iiis gradual incarnation, from his behig, or nature, or the angel of his presence in recipiocal relation and action, with the conscious visions, based upon unconscious ecstasies. The Angel of his face, or the face. The fundamental form of the Mosaic sys- tem, (-i) The appearance of Jehovah himself in his glory, in the biightness of his glory, surrounded by angelic forms, in reciprocal relation with the con- scious visions, resting upon the conscious ecstasy of the prophets, or Jehovah appearing in his divine Archangel and with his angel-bands over against the prophets overwhelmed and trembling, drawing grad- ually nearer to the incarnate angel of the covenant (Mai. iii. 1). The fundamental form of the prophetic period. (5) Tlie hidden pieparation for the advent of the angel of the covenant, in the period of na- tional religiousness; his work in the depths of hu- man nature. (6) Christ the Angel of the Covenant, the unity of the divine revelation and the human intuition of God, and therefore also upon the divine side the unity of God and his Angel, and upon the human side the unity of the spiritual intuitions and the natural vision of Clirist. We have already, in what we have thus said, as indeed elsewhere {Lebeu Jesu, p. 4i'> ; Doginatik, p. 586; Hkrzog, "Encyclopedia," Tlie Patriarchs t,f the Old Testatiieiii), stated our view of the Angel of the Lord; but we must here repeat that in our conviction the exegctical prejudice, ever coming into greater prominence, that the Angel of the Lord is a creature-angel, as also the prejudice in reference to the supposed angels (ch. vi.), burdens, obscures, and confuses in a fatal way, Old Testament theology, and leaves no room for a clear psychology of the faith of revelation, an intuitive Christology, or an organic unity of biblical theology. In regard to this point, Kurtz has undertaken witli great zeal the defence of the erroneous interpreta- tion, although he had earlier defended the true one, '" HistO'7 of the Old Covenant," p. 144, 2d ed. We introilucp here his reference to the state of the ques- tion before we enter upon its discussion. " The views of interpreters, as to the nature and being of the Angel of the Lord ( nin^ T\'^\y., also called C^n^sn "si;^) who appears first in the patriarchal history, have been divided into two classes. The one Bees in him a representation of the deity, enteiing perceptibly the world of sense, in a human form, and as .'*uch regards hiia as tlie preligiiiation of the incarnation of God in Christ; the other sees in him •D angel, like other angels, but who, because he ap- pears in nanje and mission as a representaiive of Je- bovah, is even introduced and spoken of as Jehovah ; Indeed, Ijiiiiself speaks and acts a.") Jehovah The fiist view has alreaily made a beaten path for itself" In the eldest theology of ilie synagogue, and in the theological doctrine of the ilitalrun, of that, from God emanatiiui, godlike revealer of the divine na- ture, has assumed a defiiiile shape and form, although ■obracing lc.eiQ'\ elcnieuts (comp, IIenostknbkuu : 'Christology,' iii. 2. pp. 81-86). It was adhered t« by most of the Fathers (Hkngstenberg, as above), and with these must be counted the old churchly Protestant theologians. In recent times it has been defended most decidedly and fuUv by HEXGSi>:NBEKn (i. p|i. 125-142, 2d ed. ; and iii. "2. pp. 31-86), who, with the Fathers and tlie old Protestant theologian.s, recognizes in the angel of the Lord the manifested God, the logos of the Christian doctrine of the Trin- ity, and holds this view to be so widely developed in the history of the Old Testament revelation, that it lays the foundation for the doctrine of the toijos in the Gospel by John (compare his ' Commentary on the book of Revelation,' i. p. 613). ISack (Comment, fheol., Bonn, 1821), had already discusfcd the que* tiou, and reached the conclusion, tliat the angel of the Lord is identical with Jehovah, but that the term does not designate a person distinct from him, but merely a form of manifestation, on which account hB prefers to render Tfi^'S ' the commission ' rather than 'the sent' (comp. his Apologetik, 2d ed. p. 172). In the footsteps of these two last-named persons, the writer of this [Kurtz] sought to prove, in Tholuck's Anzeiffer, 1846, No. 11-14, that the Maleach Jeho- vah is God, as presented in the authors of the Old Testament ; appearing, revealed, entering into the limitations of space and time, as perceptible by the senses, distinguished from the invisible God, in his exalted and therefore imperceptible existence, above the world of sense, and removed from all the limita- lions of space and time; still without bringing it to a full, distinct consciousness, whether this disiinction was merely ideal or essential, whether it was to be regarded as supposed for the moment, or grounded in the very nature of God. The most miportant parts of this essay were included in tlie first edition of this work. Dklitzsch : 'Biblical and Prophetical Theology,' p. 289; Nitzsch : 'System;' T. Belk: ' Christian Science of Doctrine ; ' Keil : ' Book of Joshua,' p. 87 ; H.-lveknick: 'Old Testament The- ology,' p. 73 ; Ebraru : ' Chrisiiau Dogmatics,' vol. i. ; J. P. Lange : 'Positive Dogmatics,' |i. iS6; Stier: 'Isaiah, not Pseudo Isaiaii,' p. 758, and others, all agree in the same exhibition of this theo- logical question. " The other view has found a defender in AuGCS- TiN : Ue Trinitate, 11.3, and meets the approval of the Catholic theologians under the influence of their view of the adoration of angels ; and of the Soeinians, Ar- minians, and Rationalists, from their opposition to the ecclesiastical doctrine of the Trinity. In more recent times, however, some eminent persons, who are entirely free from these interested motives, have adojiled this view, viz., Stecoel, in his Ffini/stpro- i/ruiiime for 1830, and in his ' Old Testament Theol- ogy,'p. 252 ff. ; HoFMA.NN: Weissatjung und Krfidl' mif/, i. p. 127, and Schriflbiweis, pp. Ifi4-l.'i'.l and 321-3411; Baumgarten: 'Com.' p. 195; Tiioi.uck ' (iiispel by John,' 6th ed. p. 52 ; Pelt . ' Theo- logical Encyclopedia,' p. 241 ; and siill more recent- ly, Dei.itzsch, rciiouneing his earlier view, and adopting that of Ilol'maun : 'Com. on Genesis.' p 241). Between Steudel and Holinann there is, how- ever, this difference, that the former sees in the Maleiich .lehovah an angel especially commissioned by God for each p.arlieular case — it being left unde- teraiined whether it is one and the same or not, while, ill Hofinaun's view, it is one and ihc same angel-prince, who here, as the Miileach Jehovah, later as the captain of the hosts of tl'". Lord (Joslv CHAP. XU. 1-20. 381 f. 14), as the angel of his face (Is. Ixiii. 9), under the personal name of Micliael (Dan. x. 13, 21 ; xii. 1), as the representative of Jeliovah, controls the coni- mouwealth and history of Israel ( Weisxaifnn,/ uiid Erfullmiff, pp. 131, 132). In his later work, how- ever, Hofmann has moditii'd his view so far, that the angel who performs this or that work is ever a defi- nite aiif,'el, but the same one is not destined for all time, while it is still true that Israel has his prince, his special angel, who is named Michael (Schriftbe- toej.f, p. 157). " B.iRTH has in a most peculiar way attempted to Dnite the views of Hengstenberg and Hofmann: ' The .^.ngel of the Covenant. A Contribution to Christology. A Letter to Schelling.' Leipzig, 1845. He holds, with Hengstenberg, the divine personality, and with Hofmann, the angelic created nature of the Maleach Jehovah, and unites the two views through the assertion of a past assumption of the angelic nature of the logos^ analogous to his later incarnation. We leave tliis view unexamined, as utterly baseless." Kurtz closes his reference (in the 2d ed.) with the explanation, that he finds himself in the same posi- tion as Delitzsch, constrained by his conviction to bdopt the view of Hofmann. According to the view of the old ecclesiastical theology, the (First) argument in favor of the self- revelation of God, in the Angel of the Lord, is the personal and real identity in whicli this Angel-name always appears. If Maleach Jehovah, Maleach Elo- him, may flesignate some one angel of the Lord, in a peculiar appearance, still it must be kept in view here, that from ch. xvi. onwards this name, with slight and easily explained modifications, is a stand- ing, permanent figure. Hofmann replies: Maleach Hamelech is not the king himself, but the king's messenger. So also Maleach .Jeliovah is not Jehovah himself. Certainly ! so also the king's son is not the king himself. According to Hofmanu's view, therefore, it must follow that the 8on of (>od is not God. The nature of God in his self-distinction is exalted far above that of earthly kmgs. Secondli/. The Angel of Jeliovah identifies him- self with Jehovah. He ascribes to himself divine honors, divine determinations (Gen. xvi. 10, 11 ; rviii. 10, 13, 14, 20, 36; xxii. 12, 15, Ifl, etc., etc.). • Some one objects : The prophets also identify them- selves in a similar way with Jehovah. This is sim- ply an incorrect assertion. There is no authentic passage in which the prophet, in the immediate an- nouncement of the word of God, does not in some way make a clear distinction between his person and the person of Jehovah. The examples which De- litzsch quotes, that amba.ssadors have identified themselves with their kings, rest upon the political rights and style of ambassadors, and are as little applicable to the style of a creature-angel as to that of apostles and prophets. Thirdly. The writers of the history, and the biblical persons, use promiscuously the names Angel of Jehovah, and Jehovah, and render to this angel divine honor, in worship and sacrifice (Gen. xvi. 13 ; rviii. 1, 2; xxi. 17-19; xxii. 1-1; xlviii. 15, 16, etc.). Our opponents answer : It is not high treason when an officer, in the name and commission of the king, 18 the representative of the person of the king, re- ceives the homage of the subjects. It is not his own person, but the person of the Iving, whom in this case he represents, which comes into strong relief. With this halting, limping comparison, they seek to justify the conduct of the men of taith in the Old Test.ament, who, in their view, rendered freely and without re- proof divine honor to a creature-angel, and did this con- stantly, whenever this angel appears, notwithstanding the Old Testament abliors and condenms the deifying of the ereatuie, and that liere the express divin« watchword is: "My glory will I not give to another neither my praise to graven images" (Is. xlii. 8). The following reasons are urged in favor of the supposition of a creature-angel : a. The name angel designates, throughout, a certain class of spiritual beings. Kurtz formerly replied to this that the name angel is not one of na- ture but of office (Mai. ii. 7; Hag. i. 13). Although the name angel now indeed points in many eases to a certain class of spiritual beings, still the faet that there are symbolic angel-forms is a sufficient proof that the Angel of the Lord need not necessarily be regarded as a behigof that certain class of spirits. b. Hofmann urges that since the advent of Christ the New Testament speaks of the 6.yyf\os nu^iou (.Matt. i. 20; Luke ii. 9; Acts xii. 7). Kurtz has answered that in the places quoted the expression designates a different person from the Maleach Jeho. vah of the Old Testament, or even of the speech of Stephen (Acts vii. SO). He recalls this reply, how- ever, with the remark that if Matthew and Luke had even had a suspicion that the ayyiXos Kup.ou in the Old Testament always designated the Son of God, who has since become man in Christ, they would never have used this expression even once in i-efer- ence to a creature-angel. With this conception of angelic appearances the transition to Hofniann's view was surely possil:)le and easy. To his objection (p. 120) we reply, that the incarnate Christ at Beth- lehem could just as well be made by God to assimie an angelic form, near at hand and remote, as the Logos of God in the preparatory steps to his incar- nation. To Kurtz this wonderful manifestation of the " ubiquity " of Christ is only a '■ pure idea" or fancy. But just as iGen. xviii. 19) the two anL'els who went to Sodom are distinguished from the An- gel of Jehovah before whom Abraham stood «ith his intercessory prayer, and as Paul (Gal. iii. 19) suggests the distinction between the angel giving the law at Sinai and the Angel of his face, who was the Christ of the Old Testament (1 Cor. x. 4), so we can distinginsh in the New Testament between the two men or the two angels at the grave of the risen one (Luke xxiv. 4 ; John xx. 12), or the two men upon the Mount of Olives (Acts i. lo) on the one side, and the angel who announces the birth of Christ on the other. Only Matthew, in his solemn and festive expression, has embraced these two angels in one symbolic form of the Angel of the Lord, and this indeed upon good groimds, siuce in the resurrection or the second birth of Christ the Logos was active, as in his birtli at Bethleheni. c. Baumgarteu urges: Why should the Angel of the Lord first appear to the Egyptian bondwoman. Gen. xvi.? Kurtz and Delitzscli have, in their earlier work.s, given various replies to this question. We answer with another question: Why should the riseo Christ first appear to Mary Magdalene, and not to his mother or John ? We think, according to the simple law, that the Lord reveals himself first to the poorest, most distressed and receptive hearts. It is^ besides, a mere supposition that tlie Angel of the Lord lias first appeared here, where he is first namc(^ with this name, as we shall see further below d. Kurtz urges again : It lies agaiust the ide* of a continuous development of the knowledge o£ 388 GENESIS, OB THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. the historical salvation, in the Holy Scriptures, if there is actually in the very beginning of the Old- Testament history so clear a consciousness of the disliuction between the unrevealed and revealed j God, and this consciousness is ever becoming more , obscure in the progress of tlte Old Testament, but has vanished entirely and forever in the New Testa- ment. But this is all as manifestly a pure supposi- tion as when Hofmann thinks the Old Testament cannot speak of the self-distinclion of God because in that case it would anticipate the doctrine of the Trinity. That indeed is the organic development of revelation from the Old to the New Testament, that the revelation of the Trinity in the divine being was introduced througti the revelation of the duality. But when the form of the Angel of the Lord in Genesis, passes to the Angel of his face, or the per- sonified face of Jehovah himself in Exodus, then to the prince over the armies of God in Joshua, and finally to the Archangel, the Angel of the Covenant of the later prophets, the organic development of the doctrine in question is manifest. e. Kurtz remarks again the fact that in the New Testament the law is said to be ordained by angels or spoken by the angel (Acts vii. 63; Gal. iii. 19; Heb. ii. 2), as in tavor of the doctrine of the created angel. Here he plainly refutes himself. For Paul (Gal. iii. 19) clearly refers to this feature of the law, that it was (irJumed by the angel, in order to show that the law was subordinate to the promise given to Abram. But if the mediation through angels is a mark of the imperfection of the law, it follows that Abram could not have received the promise through such a mediation of a created angel. To this end he presses especially the appeal to (Heb. ii, '1) " the great superiority of the promise to the law- is derived from this, that the law was announced ti ayy fKuiv but the gospel Sia tov Kvpiovy For the answer see Rom. iv. where the promise to which the law is subordinated appears as the yet undeveloped gospel of the old covenant. /. Heb. xiii. 2 refers to the three men who ap- peared to Abram in the plains of Manire (Gen. xviii.). But why not to the two angels whom Lot received (Gen. .xix.) ? The words can refer only to a peculiar kind of hospitality. Abram knew, how- ever, that the men who were his guests were of a higher order, while Lot appears not to have known it at the beginning. (J. The angel-prince Michael (Dan. x. 13, 21 ; iii. 1) has the same position which the Malcach Je- hovah lias in the historical books. But that Michael cannot be the Logos is clear, since he is not the only ins ita. Gabriel appears as a second archangel (Dan. viii. 16 ; ii. 21), (Tob. xii. 15), add-* Raphael and (4 Ezra iv. 1) still further Uriel. When 1 now, from the identity of Gabriel or Michael with the appealing figure in Rev. i., draw the conclusion, — Gabriel or Michael are syndjolical manifested images of Christ (as tlie old Jewisli theology saw in Michael the manile.-ted image of Jehovah), and thus the one syinbolical angel-lbrm of tlie Angel of the Lord or angel-prince has branched itself into the seven archangel forms of the coming Christ, Kurtz finds in these forms " puic ideas " or fancies. But I call them the veiled angelic modes of the revelation and energy of Christ, in the foundation, limits, and life of humanity and history. But Michael had need of help tl);iti. xi. 1). Indeed ! that can in no case he ■aid of the Logos (Luke xxii. 43). A. Zach. 1 I'i the Angel of the XiOrd was sul>or- dinated to Jehovah. The Angel of Jehovah as th« intercessor for Israel prays to Jeliovah of hoett (oompai-e the high-piiestly prayer John xvii.). !. Mai. iii. 1, the Messiah was named the Angej of the Ci>venant. "But," Kurtz argues, " if Mala- chi had intended by the Angel of the Covenant tha Angel of Jehovah, he w-ould certainly so have named him." Then Moses could not have meant the Angel of the Lord when he speaks of the Angel of his face. Certaiidy it is true that in the Angel of the Covenant the union of the divine form of the Augcl of Jehovah and of the human Sou of David, as th( divine-human founder of the New Testament, ii prophetically consummated. k. The Angel of his face (Exod. xxiii. 20), of whom Jehovah says. My name is in him (Exod. xxxii. 34 ; xxxiii. 15 ; Is. Ixiii. 9), is accoiding tc Kurtz the same with the Angel of Jehovah in Gene sis. But now (Exod. xxxii. ;i4) Jehovah appears so to distinguish tliis angel from himself that we can- not think of him as one with Jehovah. We can- not indeed freely use the ingenious answer to this difficulty by Hengstenberg,* which Kurtz contests (see p. 164). But the opposition here is not this, that either a created angel goes with Israel, or thf Logos-angel, but this, that he would not longer him self be present in the camp of Israel (Exod. xxxiii 5), but beyond it (ver. 7), that thus a stricter dis- tinction and separation should be made between the impure people and his sanctuary. I. In the history of the three angels who visit Abram in the plains (the oaks) of Mamre (Gen xviii. 19), not only the one angel who remains will Abram er.ters as Jehovah, but the two others, so soon as they were recognized by Lot in their super-earthly being, were addressed by him with the names of God, Adonai, etc. Kurtz overlooks here the ci\ange of persons w-hich appears in the narra- tive (ch. xix. 17-19). The peculiar work of the two angels continues until ver. 16. They lead Lot out of the city and set him without (before) the city. The angels now retire to the backgiound, and Je- hovah comes into view and says, " Escape for thy life." That Jehovah had gone up from Abram into heaven, and here again stands before Lot, can only be a souice of error to the literal conception, which attributes to Jehovah a gross corporeal form, and in the same measure the local changes in space. We do not wonder now that Lot clings to the vanishing angel-forms with the cry, Adonai, Now the one unique appearance presents itself clearly before hun (ver. 21). Then (ver. 24) Jehovah rained upon Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from Jeho- vah out of heaven. Without a perception of the change of different voices and visions, and the cor- responding change of different revelations, any one will liave great difficulty in finding his way through this statement of the struggles of Lot. We now bring into view the gradual develop- ment of the specific revelation of God, which begins with the call of Abram. Hofmann asks: Ought we not to expect that the manilestations of God, so fat- tis they form a preparation lor the coming of Christ, should from the vei-y beginning of the histoi-y of .salvation, and not first from Ahiam, be de- scribed as manifestations of the Malcach Jehovah f • f tlonRwtenbLTjj: fiolde that after the hiu witli the goldei calf, God tlireatpnod tlio people that the Matcach Jehovah, the inineiited iiuRel, bhouM no longer go with tln-m, l>ut a lower, t.ui'Oidili;ile, creiiled angel ; but that in :iiibwer to the pray(-r of Muses he a^uia puiiuitti the uuureated ajigtj to uccoiupjiiiy them.— A. li.J CHAP. XII. 1-20. {8V The whole distinction between the piimitive and patriarchal religion is thus overlooked. The faith of salvation first takes on the form of a definite religion of the future and liecomes a more definite preparation for the incarnation of Christ, in the faith of Abram. Hoftnann himself, as he in other places admits that the Maleach Jehovah is the one only form of theopliany in the history of the old cove- nant, notwithstanding the numerous changes in the designation of the revelation : e. g. " Jehovah aji- peared," etc., deprives the implied objection in the above question of any force. Indeed, the appeurance of the Maleach Jehovah is announced with the patri- archal revelation. It is recorded (Gen. xii. 1), And Jehovah said to Abram. Starke holds, agreeing with the older theologians, that the Angel of the Lord (see Gal. iii 16) is the Son of God himself But Stephen (Acts vii. 2) says the God of glory (Sdfa) apjieared to our father Abram when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Haran. The ques- tion meets us here therefore : In what relation does the Maleach Jehovah stand to the So^a or Ti;3 of Jehovah ? In Luke ii. 9 there is a very significant parallttlism — &yyi\u^ Kvpiov iireaTTj auru'is^ Kal bi'i^a KUfjiov 7repteAau4'6*' avruO^, i. e. both ideas are bound together in the closest manner and by an inward tie. In Exod. xxiv. 16, eh. xl. 34, the 5o|a of Jehovah is in the same way intimately conuected with Jeho- vah. But in ch. xxxiii. the 56^a of Jehovah, \er. 18, is fully identified with the face of Jehovah, ver. '20. According to ver. 14 (compared with ver. 2 and Is. Ixiii. 9), the face of Jehovah is identical with the Angel of his face. The Angel of Jehovuh is thus the manifested figure of Jehovah, in the same way as his So^a. The glory fills the holy of holies, ind Jehovah appears in the holy of holies (Exod. il 34 and other passag^-s). According to Isaiah vi. 8 the revelation of the 5dja of Jehovah shaU fill the whole earth (compare Ezek. i. 28 ; iii. 12, etc.). In Titus 'i. 13 Christ who comes to judgment is de- scribed as the 5d|a (glorious) appearing of the great God, and in Heb. i. 3 he is styled iiroii7atTwo t^s So^Tji Sifav. It is certain that the word So^a has a manifold signification, and that when used to desig- nate the theophauy it points rather to the manifested jBplendor of the Spirit, than to the spirit of this glorious appearance. (Hence it is closely connected with the pillar of cloud and of fire.) But so much is clearly proved, that the 5o|o of Jehovah can properly be personally united with Jehovah himself, with Christ, but not with any creature-angel. It is now in accordance with the course of development, as it is with the character of the patriarchal theo- phany, that it should begin with the miraculous report or voice, the word (Gen. xii. 1), and advance to the miraculous vision or manifestation (ver. 7). For the word of Jehovah is in the first place the primary form of revelation in the time of the patriarchs, and in regard to the vision, it is the more interior (sub- jeelive) event, which appears already in a lower stage or grade of the development in the line of visions. After the separation of Abram from Lot (ch. xiii. 14) he receives again the word of Jehovah, which bless- es him for his generous course, and in a way corre- •ponding with it. So also after his expedition (ch. %y. 1). The blessings in both cases correspond to his well-doing : to his renunciation of the better portions of the land, the promise of the whole land is given, and to the pious man of war, God gives himself as a shield and reward. In the important i;t of the justification of Abram (ch. xv.), the mi- raculous appearance enters with the word of Jcho vah. The word of the Lord came to him in vision If now the Angel of the Lord first appears under thii name in the history of II agar (xvi. 9), wo have th< reason clearly given. Hags: had learned faith ig the house of .\brani, and her p jwer to behold or per- ceive the vision was developed in accordance with her necessities But the Angel of Jehovah, as tht Christ who was to come through Isaac, had a pecu liar reason for assisting Hagar, since she for the sake of the future Christ is mvolved in this sorrow. Be sides, there is no increase of the divine revelation in this appearance; Abram saw Jehovah himself in the Angel of Jehovah, and Sarah also in the manifesta- tion of Jehovah sees above all the Angel. Between Abram's counection with Hagar and the next manifestation of Jehov.ih there are full thirteen years. But then his faith is strengthened again, and Jehovah appears to him (xvii. 1). The most prominent and important tlieophany in the life of Ahram is the appearance of the three men(ch. xviii.). But this appearance wears its prevaiUng angelic form, because it is a collective appearance for Abram and Lot, and at the same time refers to the judgment upon Sodom. Hence the two angels are related to their central point as sun-images to the sun itself, and this central point for Abram ia Jehovah hiniself in his manifestation, but not a com- missioned Angel of the Lord. Thus also this Angel visits Sarah (ch. xxi. 1 ; compare xviii. 10). But the Angel appears in the history of Hagar a second time (xxi. 17), and this time as the Angel of God (Maleach Elohim), not as the Maleach Jehovah, for the question is not now about a return to Abram's house, but about the independent settlement with Ishmael in the wilderness. The person who tempts Abram (ch. xxii. 1) is Elohim — God as he mani- fests himself to the nations and their general ideas or notions, and the revelation Is eflected purely thi-ough the word. Now also, in the most critical moment for Abram, the Angel of the Lord comea forward, calling down to him from heaven since there was need of a prompt message of relief. In the rest of the narrative this Angel identifies him- self throughout with Jehovah (vers. 12, 16). To Isaac also Jehovah appears (ch. xxvi. 2), and the second time in the night (ver. 24). He appears to Jacob in the night in. a dream (ch. xxviii. 12, 13). Thus also he appears to him as the Angel of God in a dream (ch. xxxi. 11), but throughout identified with Jehovah (ver. 13). Jehovah commands him to return home through the word (ch. xxxi. 3). Laljan receives the word of God in a dream (xxxi. 24). The greatest event of revelation in the life of Jacob is the grand theophany, in the night, through the vision, but the man who wrestles with him calls himself God and man (men) at the same time. According to the theory of a created angel, Jacob is not a wrestler with God (Israel), but merely a « restler with the Angel. It is a more purely ex- ternal circumstance which God uses to warn Jacob through the word to remove from Bhechem (xxxv. 1 ). In the second pecuUar manifestation of God to Jacob after his return from Mesopotamia (xxxv. 9), we have a clear and distinct reflection of the first (xxxii. 24). In the night-visions of Joseph, whicl already appear in the life of Isaac, and occur more frequently with Jacob, the form of revelation during the patriarchal period comes less distinctly into view. But then it enters again, and with new energy, in the life of Moses. The Angel of Jehovah (Ex. iii. 2) if 39C iJENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK. Of MOSES. connected with the earlier revelation, and here also is ideutified with Jeliovah and Elobim (ver. 4). But oe assumes a more definite form and title, as the Angel of his face, since with the Mosaic system the rejection of any deifying of the creature comes into Sweater prominence, and since it is impossible that the face of God should be esteemed a creature. ' The reasons which are urged for the old ecclesi- astical view of the Angel of the Lord, aie recapitu- lated by Kurtz in the following order: 1. The Maleach Jehovah identifies himself with Jehovah. 2. Those to whom he appears recognize, name, and worship him as the true God. 3. He receives sacrifice and worship without any protest. 4. The biblical writers Mnstantly speaU of him as Jehovah. We add the following reasons: 1. The theory of our opponents opens a wide door in the Old Testament for the dei- fying of the creature, which the Old Testament every- where condemns; and the Romish worship of angels finds in it a complete justification. 2. The Socinians also gain an important argument for their rejection of the Trinity, if, instead of the self-revelation of God, and of the self-distinction included in it in the Old Testament, there is merely a pure revelation through angels. As the fully developed doctrine of the Trinity cannot be found in the Old Testament, so no one can remove from the Old Testament the be- ginnings of that doctrine, the self-distinction of God, without removing the very substructure on which the New Testament doctrine of the Trinity rests, and without obscuring the Old Testament theology in its very centre and glory. 3. It would break tlie band of the organic unity between the Old and New Tes- taments, S' it could be proved that the central point in the Old Testament revelation is a creature-angel, and that the New Testament revelation passes at one bound from this form to that of the God-man. The theory of the creature-angel in its continuation through a colossal adoration of angels, points down- wards to the Kabbinic and Mohammedan doctrine of angels which has established itself in opposition to the New Testament Christology, and is bf>und to- gether with that exaggerated doctrine of angels in more recent times, which ever corresponds with a veiled and obscure Christology. On the other hand, it removes from the New Testament Christology its Old Testament foundation and preparation, which consists in this, that the interchange between (iod and men is in full operation, and must therefore pre- figure itself in the images of the future God-uan. 4. The doctrine of angels itself loses its very heart, its justification and interpretation, if we take away from it the symbolic angel-forTn which rules it, as its royal centre, i. e. that angelic form wluch, as a real manifestation of (iod, as a typical manifestation of Christ, as a manifestation of angels, has the nature and force of a symbol. But with the obliteration of thesymliolic eh;'iiienl,all the remaining symbolic and angelic images, the cherubim and seraphirn, will dis- appear, and with the key of biblical psychology in its representation of the development of the life of the eoul, to an organ of revelation, we shall lose the key to the exposition of the Old Te'ftament itself. 5. Augu.stin \va.s consistent when, with his interpreta- tion of the Angel of Jehovah as a creature-angel, he decidedly rejects the interpretation which regards the Bona of (iod (ch. vi.) as angel-beings ; for the assump- tion of angels who, as such, venture to identify thcm- ■elvcR with Jehovah, and notwithstinding they are in peril, abandon themselves to lustful plca.sures »ith the daughters of men until it i-sues in aposnisy and a magical transformation of their nature, com. bines tn o groundless and intolerable phantoms. Wc hold, theretbre, that Old Testamei t theology, in itf very heart and centre, is in serious danger from these two great piejudices, as the New Testament from the two great prejudices of a mere mechanical structure of the Gospels, and of the unapostolic and yet more than aposiohc brothers of the Lord. (See the defence of the old ecclesiastical view in the Commentary by Keil,* also with a reference to Kah.ms, de Angela Domini diatribe, 1858. The as- sertion of the opposite v lew held by Delitzsch in hia Commentary, meets here its refutation). 6. The aspect of all theophanies as visions. It is a general supposition, that divine revelation is partly through visions, or through inward miraculous sight* and sounds. We must, however, bring out distinctly the fundamental position, that every theophany is at the same time vision, and every vision a theophany; but that in the one case the objective theophany, and in the other the subjective vision, is the prevail- ing feature. The subjective vision appears in the tnost definite form in dream-visions, of which Adam's sleep, and Abram's night-horror (chs. ii. and xv.), are the first striking portents. It develops itself with great power in the lives of Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, and is of still greater importance in the lives of Samuel and Solomon, as also in the night-visions of Zechariah. We find them in the New Testament in the life of Joseph of Nazareth and in the history of Paul. It needs no proof to show that the mani- festations of God or angels in dreams, are not out- ward manifestations to the natural senses. In the elements of the subjective dream-vision, veils itself, however, the existing divine manifestation. But what the dream introduces in the night-life, the see- ing in images — that the ecstasy does in the day or ordinary waking life (see La.ngk : " Apostolic Age "). The ecstasy, as the removing of the mind into the condition of unconsciousness, or of a different con- sciousness, is the potential basis of the vision, the vision is the activity or effect of the ecstasy. But since the visions have historical permanence and re- sults, it is evident that they are the intuitions of actual objective manifestations of God. Mere hallu- cinations of the mind lead into the house of error, spiritual visions build the historical house of God. But in this aspect we may distinguish peculiar dream- visions, night-visions of a higher form and power, momentary day-visions, apoealyptic groups or circles of visions, linked together in prophetic contempla- tion, and that habitual clear-sightedness as to visions which is the condition of inspiration. But that theo- phames, which are ever at the same time Angelopha- nies and Christophanies, and indeed as theophanies of the voice of God, or of the voice from heaven, of the simple appearance of angels, of their more en- larged and complete manifestations of the developed heavenly scene — that these are always conditioned through a disposition or fitness for visions, is clear from numeious pas.sages in the Old and New Testa mcnts. (2 Kings vi. 17; Dan. x. 7; John xii. 28, 29; XX. 10-12; Acts ix. 8; xii. 7-12; xxii. 9-14. In theology the psychological aspect of revelation has been hitherto very much neglected. All possibly • [The Btatemont and defence, by Keil, of the ordinar? view held by tlic Cliurch, is admirable, and completely sat>. iafactory. As it is now within the reach of the KnKlisb reader, it is not necessary to quote it here. Those whc would see this subject thorouphly and exhatistively treated, may consult IIengstknbeho'b •' Clinetology." 2d ed., pp 124-14;) of vol. i. and 31-86 of the 2d part of vol. ui.— A. O CHAP XU. 1-20. 391 forms of revelation have been placed side by side witliout any connection. Starke 8ay3, tbe Son of God has appeared to believers under six forms or ways : 1 . through a voice and words ; 2. in an assumed form either of an angel, at least under that name, or lu the form of a man, preti?uring his future incar- nation; 3. in a vision; 4. m dreams; 5. in a pillar of cloud and fire ; 6. especially to Paul, in a light from heaven. EXEGETICAl AND CEITICAi. 1. The call of Abram and his migration to Ca- naan until he reaches Sichem (ch. xii. 1-7). The call of Abram demands from him a threefold re- nunciation, increasing in intensity from one to the other : 1. Out of thy country. — The fatherland. The land of Mesopotamia as it embraced both Ur of the Chaldees and Haran. — 2. And from thy kind- red.— The Chaldaic descendants of Sbem. — 3. From thy father's house. — Terah and his family (ch. xi. 81, 32). With the threefold demand it connects a threefold promise : 1. Of the special providence of God, leading him, indeed, to a new land (see Heb. li,) ; 2. of the natural blessing of a numerous seed (ch. xiii. 16; xv. 6; xvii. 2, li, 16; xviii. 18; xxi. 13 ; xxii. 17); 3. of a spiritual blessing for himself, and in its wide extension to all the f imilies of the earth, making his name glorious, and constituting about his person in its spiritual import and relations the great contrast between the subjects of the bless- ing and the curse. — And will make thy name great. — That is, as the divinely blessed ancestor and lather of a renowned people (Knobel). The name of tile father nf believers should shed its light and vield its inrtueuce through the world's history. — Thou shalt be a blessing. — Lit : Be thou a bless- ing. It is a superficial view of this word which in- terprets it, thy name shall become a formula of blessing (Kinichi, Knobel: so that those who desire the greatest happiness shall wish tiiemselves as happy as Alirami. It is through the union of men with him (in that they pronounce and wish huo blessed), that the mercy and blessing of God passes over to them, and through their enmity to him, which only reveals itself in calumnies and blasphemies* they draw upon themselves the curse of God. The ore- iude to the ecclesiastical blessing and the ecclesi- astical ban or curse. The curse : (Gen. iii. 14 and 17; iv. 11; V. 29; ix. 25; xxvii. 29).— In the« shall all the families of the earth be blessed.f — The rendering it as reflexive is arbitrary, since we have the special form of the hithpael to express this, and the interpretation all families shall desire that their prosperity may be as thine, is shallow and in- con'ect (Jarchi, Clericus and others). The reflexive rendering is not necessary, indeed, in ch. xlviii. 20. — * [3^p the reproaches — blasphemous curses of men — in diftinctioQ from ~7^ the judicial curse of God. Keil. — A. G.] t [ We must not miss here the fundamental meaning of the " i7>, while we include its instrumcDtal sense, through. Abram is not only the cbaanel but the source of ble&'ong for (11 Keil. —A. G.; {The families refers to the division of the 081C human family into a nnmher of families or races. (See X. 5 ; XX. 31). The blessing of Abram will bind into unity the cow dissevered parts of the race, and transform that curse which now rests upon all the earth on account of sin, into a .Messing for the whole hiuaan race. Keil.— A. G.] [The Did Testament is as broad and catholic m its spirit as the New Testament. Mubpht, pp. 262, 263.— A. G.l T. 4. The obedience of Abram. He left what he was required to leave, and took with him what it waa in his power to take. Lot, although Lot was a burdeu to him rather than a source of strength (see artieU Lot, in the "Bible Dictionaries"). The emigration was the more heroic, since he was 75 years old, and his father was still living* (ch. 11). He probably went by Damascus (see xv. 2). — V. B. The souls that they had gotten. — Strictly, made, descriptivt of the gain in slaves, male and female. t — Sichem — The first resting-place of Abram, who came to the place Sichem, | and, indeed, to the oaks of Moreb (Deut. xi. 30), the oak-grove of Moreh. — Moreh.— Probably the name of the owner. Knobel : the oaka of instruction, which appear to be the same with the oaks of divination (Judges ix. 37). I* is not probable that Abram would have fixed his abode precisely (as Knobel thinks) in a grove, which according to heathen notions had a sacred character as the residence of divining priests. The religious significance of the place may have arisen from the fact that Jacob buried the images brought with him in his family, under the oak of Shechem (xxxv. 4). The idols, indeed, must not be thrown into sacred but profane places (Isa. ii. 20). But, perhaps, Jacob had regard to the feelings of hia family, and prepared for the images, which, indeed, were not images belonging to any system of idolatry, an honorable burial. At the time of Joshua the place had a sacred character, and Joshua, therefore, erected here the monumental stone, commemorating the sol- emn renewal of the law. Thus they became the oaks of the pillar at which the Shechemites made Abimelech king (Judges ix. 6). — Then also the Canaanite was in the land. — This explains why in his migra- tions he must pass through the land to Sichem, to find a place suitable for his residence.§ It does not follow from this statement, either that the narrative originated at a time when the Canaanite was no longer in the land, or that the term here desigiiates only a single tribe of this name, which in the time of Moses dwelt upon the sea-coast, and in the valley of the Jordan (as Knobel thinks), comp. ch. xiii. 7 ; xxxiv. 30. It is a tradition of the Jews, that Noah had assigned Africa as the home of the children of Ham, but that the Canaanites had remained in Canaan against his command, and that therefore Abram, the true heir, was called thither. Ver. 7 . The first appearance of Jehovah in vision. Abram's life of faith had developed itself thus iiir since he had entered Canaan, and now the promise is given to him of the land of Canaan, as the possession of the promised seed. The second progressive promise) comp. ch. xiii. 15, 17; xv. 18; xvii. 8; xxvi. 3; xxviii. 4, 13 ; xxxv. 12. Abram's grateful acknowl- • [But according to Acts vii 4, his father was dead. Terah died when he was 205 years old. and as Abram left Haran when he was 75 years old, he must have been bom when Terah was 130 years old, and thus have been the younger son of Terah. — A. G,] t [Not only gotten a^ secular property but had mad« obedient to the law of the true God Wordsworth A. G.] I [See Jacobus ; " Notes on Genesis," vol. i. pp. 227. 228. -A. G.j § [The author of Genesis evinces in this clause a knowl. edge of the Canaanites, and presupposes their character to be known in such a way as a late writer could not do. Jacobus, p. 228. — A. G.] 'i [Abram is the first person to whom the Lord is said to have appeared, and this is i he first place at which the Lord is said to have appeared lo Abram, and at this plaot Christ, tti£ Lord of glory, first revealed himself as the Mepi* siah (John iv. 26; to the Samaritan woman (the type of '.hi Gentile Church). "Wordsworth, p. 66 — A. G.l 392 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. edgiuent : the erection of ar altar, and the founding of an outward senic? of Jehovah, which as to its first feature consisted in the calling upon his name (cultus), and as to its second, in the profession and ackuow lodgment of his name.* Thus also Jacob acted (ch. xxxiii. 20 ; Josh. xxiv. 1, 26). Bethel, Jerusalem, Hebron, Beersheba are places of the came character (i. «., places which were consecrated by the patriarchs, and not as Knobel tliinks, whose consecration took place in later times, and then was dated back to the period of the patriarchs). Abram's altars stood in the oaks of Moreh, and Mamre, in Bethel, and upon Moriali. Abram. and the patri- archs generally, served also the important purpose of preaching through their lives repentance to the < 'anaanites, as Noah was such a preacher for his time. For God leaves no race to perish unwarned. Sodom had even a constant warning in the life of Lot. 2. Abratn^s migration through Canaan from Sichem to Bethel and still further southwards (vers. 8 and 9). The want of pasture for hig herds, ihe presentiments of piety, the yielding of the patriarch to the divine guidance, led him further southwards to a new residence east of Bethel. He pitched his tent between Bethel and Ai. " In the time of the Judges there was a sanctuary of Jchov.ah at Bethel (1. Sam. X. 3), and at one time also it was the abode of the ark of the covenant (Judges xx. 18, 20). In later times it was the chief seat of the illegal worship (cultus) established by Jeroboam (1 Kings xii. 29 ; Amos vii. 10), and hence its name Bethel in the place of the o* 1 name Luz (ch. xxviii. 19 ; Josh, xviii. 1.3 ; Judges i. 23). In Genesis it bears this name already in the time of the patriarchs, who here re- ceived manifestations of God and offered sacrifices to him (ch. xiii. 4 ; xxviii. 22 ; xxxv. 7)." Thus Kno- bel explains the name as if there was an internal necessity for denying the fact of the consecration of Bethel through the dream and vision of Jacob. But that Bethel should be geographically known as Luz by the Canaanites, long after the patriarchs had made it theocratically Bethel, involves no real diffi- culty, f — Abram journeyed (broke up his en- campment and ■went). — The whole statement brings to view and illustrates the nomadic life, as also the allusion to his dwelling in tents. J — Going on still toward the South The southern part of ("anaan toward the wilderness, a rich pasture- land, A particular definite residence in Hebron is spoken of in ch. xiii. 18. 3. Ahram's journey to Egi/pt (vers. 10-20). — There was a famine in the land.— The frequent famines are a peculiar characteristic of early times and of uncivilized la:ids. Kgypt .as a rich and fruitful land was even then a refuge from famine, as it was in the history of Jacob (Joseph., Antiq. xv. 9, 2). — Say, I pray the© (or now, still), thou art my Bister. — The women at that time went unveiled, and • [He thus also look possession of the land in the uamo of his oovonant Ood. See BuSB, :J64 ; .Jacobus, 229.— A. O.] t [*' Jacol> gave thisuame to tht* placo twico(Gi'n. xxviii. 19; xxxv. !.'>). As tlie name was notjirsf fiiven in tho sec»ind butancc, so it may not have lieen in the first. Accordioffly we meet with it as an existing name in Al>riim'M timi:, without being constrained to account for it by Biipjujsing the present narrative to hnvo hecn compusod in its present form after the time of .Jacnh's visit. On tlio other hand, wo may regard ii as an interesting trace of early piety having been prosriit in the land even before tho arrival of Abram." Murphy.— A. (}.] ] I*' Jle hftfi loft his AffMJfff at Haran. and now dwelt in lentt as in a u'-ange country " (Heb. xi. 0). Wonlswurth. -A. 0.1 this receives confirmation from the Egyptian mont. ments. The custom was changed after the conquesi of the land by the Persians. Sarah was ten yean younger than Abram (ch. xvii. 17), and, therefore, about 65 years of age. In the patriarchal mannei of life, her age would not make so deep a mark ; and there is no real ground for questioning the continu- ance of her youthful bloom and beauty. It is more remarkable that Abram should adopt the same course again (ch. 20), and that Isaac should onco have imitated his example (ch. xxvi. 7). Modern criticism in this case, as often in other cases, chooses rather to admit, that there is a remarkable confusion in the narrative, than that there should have been a remarkable repetition of the same act. " It is held with good reason," says Knobel, " that one and the same event lies at the foundation of these three nar- ratives." But the result of the first act of Abram did not necessarily restrain hhn from the second, and Isaac, especially in moments of anxiety, may have easily yielded himself to a slavish imitation of his father's conduct. The name Abiinelech lays no real ground for the identity of the second and third narrative, since this was a standing title of the kings of Phihstia, as Pharaoh* was of the kings of Egypt. According to (ch. xx. 13) Abram had al- ready in his migration from Haran arranged with Sarah the expression referred to for his protection while among strangers, and this explains the re|)eti- tion of the act, the prominent point in the moral problem (see below). " The Hebrew consciousness," says Knobel, " pleased itself with the thought that on different occasions the ' mothers ' were objects of admiration for their beauty, while they were kept from insult, and their husbands protected in their rights by God." Since the " Israelitish consciousness " has not concealed by silence that Leah, the mother of the larger part of the Jews, was not beautiful, we may trust its account of the beauty of .'t for the nomadic life and occupation ; a farr whicb speaks decidedly for the antiquity and historical characta of the narrulive." Kurt*. — A. G.l CHAP. xu. 1-ao. :»»;• Egyptian court coneiMed of the sons of the most llfustrious prie3t3. — Into Pharaoh's house, i. e., barem." Schreder. — Ver. 16. The possessions of the Qomadic chief. "According to Burlvliardt and Kobinson all the Arabic Bedouin hordes do not own dorses. Strabo already relates this as true of the Nabataeans (p. 16)." Knobel. The horse does not appear with the patriar'r'.is, and as a costly, proud animal, both as a war-horse and in ordinary use, was generally in tlie theocratic view regarded as a symbol of worldly splendor.— Ver. 17. The Lord plagued Pharaoh with great plagues [blowsj. — I'hey were such plagu>'S of sieliness as to guard Sar:ii from injury (ch. xx. 4, 6). — Ver. 18. This Pharaoh is not hardened like the later king of that name. lie concludes that he is punished for the sake of Sarai. Whence he draws this conclusion we are not told.* — V. 20. Now follows the dismissal of Abram, but still a dismissal full of honorable accompaniments. "Pharaoh's conduct moreover shows how under all that idolatry which then held the Egyptians in its embrace, there was still existing a certain faith in the supreme God, and a kind of reverential fear bef'x^e him.*' DOCTRIIfAi AND ETHICAL. 1. Keil: "The history of the hfe of Abram from his calling to his death unfolds itself in four stages, whose beginnings are marked by divine revelations of special significance. The first stage (chs. xii.-xiv.) iiegfns with his calling and emigration to Canaan ; the second (chs. xv. xvi.) with the promise of an heir and the formation of the covenant ; the third (chs. xvii.-xxi.) with the establishment of the covenant through the change of name and the introduction of the covenant-sign of circumcision ; the fourth (chs. ixii.-xxv. 11) with the trial or temptation of Abram for the preservation and perfecting of his faith. All the divine revelations to him proceed from Jehovah, and the name Jehovah prevails through the whole life of the father of the faithful, the name Elohim appearing only where Jehovah, accordmg to its sig- nificance, would have been entirely out of place, or less appropriate." Viewing his life with respect to ' his faith, the first Section (chs. xii.-xiv.) marks pecu- liarly the calling of Abrah.am ; the second states his juskjication, confirmed through his reception into the covenant of Jehovah — obscured, but not weak- ened, through the erroneous workings of his faith in his connection with Hagar (chs. xv. xvi.) ; the third states his cotisecratio7i to be the father of the faithful, and therewith the legal separation of his house, and the establishment of his mild and yet strictly marked relations to the heathen (ch. xvii.- xxL) ; the fourth treats of the sealing or cojijirmation of his faith. (From these we must distinguish as a fifth Section the time of the solemn festive rest of Ids faith, or the evening of life (chs. xxiii.-xxv. 10). For the nature of the patriarchal history, compare Dklitsch, above. 2. The translation of Stier (xii. 1), t/it Lord had taid, is based upon an mcorra:!! interpretation of the • [Y. 19. So I might have taken, Heb. And I took. The constnictioii of the Hebrew does not require the -sup- position that she actually became his wife. Our version, (houffh not literal, gives no doubt the correct sense. If ihe present narrative admittei of any doubt, the doubt iH removed by a reference to the parallel ;:ase, ch. ss. 6. - A. O.l passage, in accordance with a misunderstanding ol the words of Stephen (Acts vii. 3). As the first call of Abram in Ur is by no means excluded here bj the second call in Harau, so in Acts, the second call- ing in llaran is not excluded by the first in Ur. Thf first calling was plainly to Abram and his father'l house. In the call before us he was told to go ou. from his father's house, while his father with thi rest should remain in Haran. Starke also fails tc distinguish these two callings correctly.* 3. The particularism entering with the calling of Abram must be viewed as the divine method ol securing universal results. '* In the i);irticular we see the general, in the individual the whole, in the small the great ; Abram's calling is the seed out of which springs the great tree under whose shade many nations rest ; all indeed shall one day rest." Lisco. — There is no mere external preference for Israel in the Old Testament. God has, in his word threatenings and judgments, dealt as strictly witt Israel as w ith any people ; with peculiar strictness, indeed, according to the peculiar gifts and gracea which Israel had received. But the proper restric- tion is the truest universality. " In the example ot the Jewish people God declares, that which was con cealed, the method and law of his wisdom, and authorizes us to apply it for direction m our own fives, and to other subjects, people, and events." A quotation in Lisco. — The elements of Abram's char- acter: heroic faith, humility, and self-sacrifice, en- ergy, benevolence, and gentleness. His call in the East : Christians, Jews, and Mohammedans trace their origin back to him. The purer elements of Islamism come from him. 4. The calling of Abram : 1. In its requisitions; 2. in its promi.ses (see the Exegesis) ; 3. in its mo- tives, a. The grace of God. The election of Abram The choice of God reflects itself in the dispositions of men, the gifts of believers. As every people has its peculiar disposition, so the race of Abram, and especially the father of it, had the reUgious disposi- tion in the highest measure. 6. The great necessity of the world. It appeared about to sink into hea- thenism; the faith must be saved in Abram. c. The destination of Abram. Faith should proceed from one behever to all, just as salvation should proceed from one Saviour to all. The whole Messianic proph- ecy was now embraced in Abram.f • [" There is no discrepancy between Mosee and St. Ste- phen. St. Stephen's desig-n was, when he pleaded before the Jewish Sanhedrim, to show that God's revelations were not limited to Jerusalem and Judea, but that he had tirst spoken to the father of Abram in an idolatrous land, Ur of the Chaldees." " But Moses dwells specially on Abram's call from Ha- ran, because .\bram's obedience to that call wad the proof of his fliith." Wordsworth. There is no improbability in the supposition that the call was repeated. And this supposition would not only recon- cile the words of Stephen and of Moses, but may explain the tilth verse; "And they went forth to go into the land ol Canaan, and into the land of Canaan they came." Abram had left bis home in obedience to the original call ot God, but had not reached the land in wliicb he was to dwell. Now, upon the second call, he not only sets forth, but ccn- ttnues in his migrations until he reaches Canaan, to which he was directed. — .^. G.l t [" Willi the closing word of the promse. ' in thee shall all the families of the eartli be blessed,* the final goal of all histoi-y is proclaimed, for there is nothing beyond the bless- ing of all the families of the earth. Thus the whole fulnest of the divine purpose in reference to the salvation, is stated in the call of Abram, and connected with him in the closes! manner. For the T^Z dot-s not designate any relation what, ever of Abram to the general blessing, but designate? hin SSI4 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. a. The calling of Abram to the pilgrimage of faith (Heb. xi. 8). His migration: 1. into Canaan; 2. through Canaan; 3. to Egypt; 4. his return, llis calling and migrating an example of the calling and pilgrimage of his race. — A type of the calling md pilurimage of all believers. ti. The diameter of the Hfe of faith: a. The ex- perience of faitli. Personal revelation of God, the personal providence of God. 6. The work or couces gion of faith. Personal trust and personal obedience. 7. The word of God to .\brahiiu, sealed through the manifestation of God in Canaan, as the word of the gospel is sealed to the believer through the sacra- ment. Keil : " The promise was raised from its temporal form to its real nature through Christ, through him the whole earth becomes a Canaan." 8. Abram and the companions of his faith. Sarai, Lot. The blessings and perils of the companionship of the faithful, " The father of believeis and his suc- cessors appear constantly in ih« Bible as one whole: hence it is said so often, ' To thee will I give this land (ch. XV. 17, etc.)'" Gerlach. 9. The solitude of the nomadic life of the patri- archs, a source of the lifeof prayer and illumination — a prerequisite for the higher revelatioiL The solitude of Moses, the prophets (" by the rivers of Babylon," "in the desert,") of John the Baptist, of Christ the Lord, of the Christiana in deserts, of the mystics in the cloisters of the middle ages, of Lulher (Jacob Bohme, Fox, etc.). In tranquil retirement. " Abram was a rich, independent herdsman, just as the Be- douin chiefs are still in the deserts and the broad pasture-grounds of Syria, Arabia, and Palestine." Gerlach. There were already a variety of pursuits ; huntsmen, husb:mdmen, and shepherds. Their sepa- rations and variances (ch. xliii. 32 ; xlvi. 34). For the tents, deserts, pasturages (uncultivated regions), see Biljle Dictionaries. 10. The consecration of Canaan, through the manifestations of God, and the altars of .\bram (as well as of the other patriarchs). The heavenly signs of the Church of Christ ; the setting apart of the old eartli, to a new. The chosen laud a type of the Christian earth and of Paradise. " Abram takes his church with liim." Calwer Haudbuch. 11. Abram's altars, or his calUng upon the name of Jehovah, is at the same time a testimony to his name. The true worship is a source of the true mis- sionary— the cuitus itself a mission. 12. Abram's maxim or rule, lo report thai Sarah was his aiater." It was determined upon in the early period of his migrations (ch. xx. 13), but was here tirst brought into use, and from its successful issue was repealed once by himself, and once imi- tated by Isaac. It was wiih respect lo his faith a fearful hazurd. Faiili is at the beginning uncertain as to the moral (|uestions and complications of life. Every broad view of the general is at first an uncer- tain view as to the particular. Thus it is in the broad synthetic view in science ; it is at first want- ing in reference to the critical and analytical knowl- edge as to the particular. Still the scientific Syn- •a tlie organic means or instrument through whicli blessing •hould come." Haumgarten.— A. O. I [••The Apostle Paul expounds the promiso (Gal. iii, 16), ahowiiig : 1. that by its express terms, it was made to ex- tend to the Gentiles- uuu, 2. that hv the term * need* is meant Christ Ji'sus. The promise looEis to the world-wide t>enefits of redumption which should come through Christ, the seed of Aiiram." .Ucmdi s, p U2-').— A. (i.j * [8ee liENusTS.NUEUu's Ucilrdyft, iii. p. b'2&S. — A.Q.] thesis is the source of all true science. And tha( faith, the great synthesis of heaven, is at first uncer tarn as to the moral problems of the earthly life. Th« his'ory of all the great beginnings of faith furnishes th« proof. But still, the great life of faith is the sourct of all pure and high morality in ihe world. Abram's venture was not from laxity as to the sanctity of marriage, or as to his duty to protect his wife ; it was fc om a presumptuous confidence in the wonder- ful assistance of God. It n as excused through th« great necessity of the time, his defenceless state among strangers, the cu-tomary lawlessness of those in power, and as to the relation of the sexes. There- fore Jehovah preserved him from disgrace, although he did not spare him personal anxiety, and the moral rebuke from a heathen. It is only in Christ, that with the broad view of faith, the knowledge of its moral human measures and limitations is from the beginning perfect. In the yet imperfect, but growing faith, the word is true, " The children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light." As a mere matter of prudence, Abram appeared to act prudently. He told no untruth, although he did not tell the whole truth. His word was, at all events, of doubtful import, and therefore, through his anx- ious forecast, was morally hazardous. But the ne- cessity of the time, the difficulty of his position, and his confidence that God would make his relations clear at the proper time, serve to excuse it. It was not intended to effect a final deception: his God would unloose the knot. In his faith Abram was a blameless type of believers, but not in liis apphca- tion of his faith to the moral problems of life. Still, even in this regard, he unfolds more and more his heroic greatne.ss. We must distinguish clearly be- tween a momentary, fanatical, exaggei-ated confi- dence in God, and the tempting of God with a selfish purpose (see the history of Thamar, Rahab). Baum- garten is not correct when he says: "Abram aban- dons his wife, but not so Jehovali." The modern stand-point is too prominent even in DeUtzsch : " He thus thinks that he will give the marriage-honor of his wife a sacrifice for his self-preservat on ; at all events, he is prepared to do this." Abram knew from the first, that the promise of bh'ssing from Je- hovah was connected with his person. Hence the instinct of self-preservation is lost in the higher im- pulse for the preservation of the blessing. And if, in relation to this impulse, he placed his marriage in a subordinate position, this occurred certainly from his confidence in the wonderful protection of Jeho- vah, and the heroic conduct of Sarai. His syllogism was doubtless morally incorrect, but it rested upon an exaggeration oS his faith, and not upon mora] cowardice.' Upon any opposing interpretation, the same conduct of the patriarchs could not possibly have been repeated a second and third time. Jeho- vah himself could not have recognized any tempting of God, nor any moral baseness, in his conduct; but * [We are not to be harsh or censorious in our iudgmentl upon the acta of these eminent saints. But neither are we called upon to defend their arts ; and if the view of Lange dees uut satisfy every one, it is well to bear in mind that the Scripture rei^ords these aets without oxpressine distinctly any moral judt.Tnout upon them. It impliedly coudeiiins. The .Seripture, however, contains clearly the great princi- ples of mural truth and duty, and then oltcDtimos leaves tha reader to draw the itifercnee as to the moral quality of tha acts which It rec'trds. And its faithfulness in not concealing what may bo of quosti'tnaide morality. " in tlio lives of th* greatest saints shows the honesty ana accuracy of the histo* riau." Wordsworth says well : *' the weaknesses of thi patriarchs sirengthen our faith in the Pentateuch." — A. C CHAP. XII. :-2o. 3ys indeed ooncems himself in tlic leading of Abram's faith (as in the life of Stilling), wliile he prepares for the presumptuous and erroneous syllo.^ism of his faith Its deserved rebuke. In a similar way Calvin recog- nizes the good end of Abram, but at the same time remarlia that he failed in the choice of his means. 13. That the Bible speaks in this frank and sim- ple way of ihe female beauty, as it does generally of beiuty in life, and the world, shows liow free it is from the gloomy, morose, monkish asceticism, while, however, it does not conceal the perils of beauty. 14. The Pharaoh of this early period, and more simple life, had already his courtiers, flatterers, and harem. How soon the misuse of princely poiver has been developed with the power itself! In this ct^e, too, as it often occurs, the prince is better than his court. Pharaoh treats the patriarch with honor, humanity, and a magnanimity which must have put him to shame. 15. As we find recorded in Genesis the begin- ning of polygamy, of despotism, of the harem, and even of unnatural sexual crimes, so also we have here the first corporeal punishment of these sexual sins in the house of Pharaoh. We are not told, indeed, what was the particular kind of punishment, but it is represented as sent for these sins of Pharaoh. 16. Delitzsch holds, that the silence of Abram under the reproof of Pharaoh, is a confession of his guilt. " Ashamed and penitent, he condemns him- self." tt would be very difiicult, on this interpreta- tion, to explain the twofold repetition of tids act in the life of Abram and of Isaac. We may not trans- fer our judgment of the ease to the stage of the moral development of Abram. 1 7 The history of Sarai, in whose person God guards the future mother of Israel from profanation, is at the same time a sign of the fact, that God pre- serves ti.e sacred marriage in the midst of the cor- ruption of the world. 18. Among the rich possessions which fell to Abram in Egypt, more through the protection and blessing of God, than his own prudence, was most probably the Egyjitian maid, Hagar, who afterwards exerted so important an influence upon his course of life. EUezer, of Damascus, and Hagar, from Egvpt, are undesigned testimonies to the genuine historical character of the account of his ndgration from Meso- potamia to Canaan, and from Canaan to Egypt. 19. Abram's return from Egypt at this time, was already in some sense a return home, and a tvpe of the Exodus of his descendants from Egypt.* 20. The significance of the wonderful land of Egypt for the history of the kingdom of God. Its connection nith Canaan, and its opposition. How often it moves down to Egypt (Egypt lay lower than Canaan), and from thence moves back again ! There 'lie Hamiiic spirit blooms, here the Semitic (Ziegler) ; there are enigmas, here mysteries ; there miracfes of death, here of life ; there the Pharaohs, here spiritual princes. HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL. See the Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. — Jeho- lah. 1. The profound nignificance of the name; * ['The same necessity conducts both him and hig de- fendants to Egypt. They both encounter similar danprers m that land— the same mighty arm delivers both, and leads them back enriched with the treasures of that wealthy Mimtiy." Kurtz.— A. G.] 2. its eternal value and import.mce. — Calling ol Abram. — Three first proofs of his faith : 1. Hi must go out Irom his country and liis father's house, into a strange land ; 2. he finds in Palestine " n< continuing city," and soon suffers from famine ; 3. he must go further to Egypt, in danger of his Ufe, marriage, and hope.* — Abram at his alt.irs u pieach er of repentance for the Canaanites. — His pilgrimage —The companions of his faith. — The providence of (iod over the lives of believers. — The infallible faitt of Abram, and his errors in the applications of hia faith, or of his life : 1. That infallibility does not prevent these errors ; 2. but it prevents' their dan gerous consequences, and at last removes them.— The consecration of Canaan. — The blessing of f lith. St.irke : Wurtemberg Bible : Ver. 1 The call from the condition of sin, or true conversion, springs not from one's own strength, etc., but only from the grace of God. — Cramer : Whoever will be a follower of God, must separate himself from the world and it3 wickedness, must leave all consolation and help in the creature, and place his confidence only and alone in the Lord. — If we follow the call of God, we are always in the right way. — The promises of God are yea and amen. — Ver. 3. Whoever wishes and does good to the saints, will receive good again, but who- ever wishes and does them injury, must meet with calamity. — Vers. 4, 5. The strength of faith can do away with time, and present future tilings as if pres- ent.f — Upon ver. 13. Since Abram was continually dependent upon the grace of God, he must feel his weakness, which betrays him into manifold acts of insincerity and sins. For, 1. he acted from fciir, when he should still have looked to God ; 2. he "ave out that Sarai was his sister, when she was his wife ; 3. he had great guilt in the sin of Pharaoh ; 4. he thought to secure his own safety, while he placed Sarai and her chastity in the greatest peril. — Even in the greatest saints, there are many and vari- ous defects and transgressions. — God leads his own out of temptation, even when they have fallen. — Osiander: God avenges the injustice and disgrace, which are inflicted upon his elect. — Lisco: Abram obeyed because he trusted God ; the two togethei constitue his faith.:j: — Wherever Abram comes, in his nomadic life and wanderings, he works lor the honor of God. — Ver. 13. The failures of this chosen man of God appear, upon a closer survey, as sins of weakness, which, on the one hand, do not destroy his gracious standing with God, but on the other render necessary in him a purifying, providential training. The providence of God" watches over his elect. — Gerlach : In the simple, vivid narrative of the life of Abram, every step is lull of importance. — Ver. 3 is the expression of the more perfect covenant- relationship and communion. His friends are the friends of God, his enemies the enemies of God. God will himself reward every kindness shown to • [There does not seem to be suflBcient ground for the conjeclure of Murphy, that .\bram was now pursuing his own course, and venturing beyond the limits of the l.ind nf promise, without waiting patiently for the divine counsel ; and tli,-!! he went with a vague suspicion that he was doing wrong. There is reason to believe, that all the movementa of the patriarch were not only under divine control, hut wer« a part of G..d's plan for the testing and developing "f hii faith. It was a sore trial to leave the land promised to him. so soon after he had entered it. See also paragraph 20 above. — A. G ] t [Ver. 7. " Wherever he had a tent, God had an altai and an altar sanctified by prayer." Henry. — A. G.] t [Faith receives the promise, and leads to cbediecoe.- A. G.] SV)R GENESIS, OR THE FIRST COOK OF M DSES. him, and avenge every injury (in word and deed), Ps. cv. 13-lS. — Ver. 13. In the deception which Abram uses, as in the later instances of Jacob and Moses, we see a weakness and impurity of faith which did not yet rely perfectly upon the help of God in his own way and time, but selfishly and eageily grasped after it. It is not without re- proof. CaJ.wer Hand.: To the command of God follows the promise (ch. xii. 3). This advances upwards through six steps, until, at the most advanced, the Messiah appears, who should spring from the de- scendants of Abram. I will make thee a great na- tion, natural and spiritual — and still his wife was unfruitful — will bless thee — and still he did not pos- sess a foolbreadth of land — will make thy name great — and yet lie must be a stranger in a strange land. — In thee shall he blesse^^* etc. This promise was repeated to him seven times : the third promise of the Messiah. — The word of God never excuses the imperfections of believers. — Bunsen: Abram is the eternal model of all exiles, and the true father of the pilgrim-fathers of the seventeenth century (of the pilgrims of faith of all times, Heb. xi.). — And make thy name great. The Arabians, after Isa. xli. 8, call Abram the friend of God.^-ScHRiiDER : For a long time, as is evident from examples in the family of Abram, God had permitted the truth and its mar- red image to stand side by side. There must come at the last a moment of perfect separation, a moment of declared distinction between truth and falsehood. This moment also actually came. — Luther: It is cheering, therefore, and full of consolation, when we thus consider how the church began and has in- creased.— With him it is so arranged that he cannot remove his foot from his native ground, without planting it upon an entirely distinct region — the re- • [The promise receives its first fulfilment in Abram, then in the Jews, more perfectly whe;i the Son of God be- came incarnate^ the seed oj Abravx, then further in the church Bnd the preachmg of the gospel, but finally and fully when Christ shall complete his church, and come to take her to himself.— A. G.l gion of faith. — Krummacher: The East sviU re sounds with the name of Abram. — Ver. 3. Abrair becomes to many a savor of death unto death (2 Cor. ii. 16), although he himself should not curse That is the prerogative of God, he should only be f blessing. — Blessing and making blessed is the desti nation of all the elect. — Baumoarten: Ver. 10 Famine in the land of promise is a severe test foi Abr im. For the land is promised to him as a good which should compensate all his self-denial. — Ver 13. In fact, there are found in the oldest lustoriea frequently, here and tliere, the seeds of the later more developed boasted cunning and prudence. — Passavant : (Abram and his children). Abram was great before God. How so ? Through faith. Faith does it. Qo out of th^ land. The father-land is dear to us. But now it avails, etc. — He went out with his God. — Schwenke : " Hours with the Bible." Does not the call come to thee also : Go out V — And go in faith? A life in faith is a continual prov- ing— a permanent test. — Hepser: (The Leadings of Abram.) Abram in his pilgrimage : 1. The goal for which he strove; 2. the promises which secured its attainment ; 3. the dangers under which he stood ; 4. the divine service which he rendered.— Taube : The calling of Abram, a type of our calling to the kingdom of God : 1. As to its demands ; 2. as to its gracious promises.* — W. Hofmann : It is through Abram that we receive all the sacred knowledge until we reach back to paradise ; all that afterwards was preserved for us by Moses came through his mind and heart. — It was the believing look to the past, which fitted Abram to look on into the future. Delitzsch ; The facts (Abram in Egypt) are related to us, not so much for the dishonor of Abram, as for the honor of Jehovah. f * [Abram also is an illustrious example to all who hoar the ca]l of Uod. His obedience is prompt and submissive. He neither delays nor questions, but went out not knowing whither he went, Keb. xi. 8. — A. G.) t [Hengsteuberg says: The object of the writer is not Abram's glorification, but the glorification of Jehovah.— A.G.I SECOND SECTION. Abram at a xmtneti for Ood in Canaan, and his self -denying separation from Lot. Promise of Ood. His altar in Hain (oaks) Mamre. l%e Ifnc Chapter XIIL 1-18. 1 And Abram went up out of Egypt, he and liis wife, and all that he had, and Lot 2 with him, into the south [of Canaan]. And Abram was very ricii, in c:ittle [possessions], in 3 silver, and in gold. And he went on lii.s journeys [nomadic departures, stations] irom the aouth, even to BolJiel, unto the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between 4 Bethel and liai ; Unto the place of the altar which he had made there at the first: and B there A Ijrain called upon the name of the Lord. And Lot also, which went with Abram 5 hai than at flrHt. Hi- is old Lot has taken beforehand his part of the good thingi. His choice appears as a mild or partial example ol the choice of Esau (the choice of the lentile-pottage). 12. Tlie Holy land: an allegory of Paradise, a symbol of heaven, a type (germ) of the sanctified and glorified earth. 13. For the piiinitive, consecrated Hebron, and the oakgrovo Mamre, see the dictionaries, geograph- ical hand-books, and books of travels, and also the Bible-work, Book of Joshua. 14. Starke (the Freiberg Bible): "This is th« first time that silver and gold are mentioned since tlie flood, and we may infer, therefore, that mining for these metals must have been practised." (Re- flections upon Tubal-Cain). 15. The declaration that the Canaanites and Perizzites were then in the land, like the allusion to tlie Canaanites, ch. xii. 6, furnishes no ground for the infi'rence, according to Spinoza, that the passage* wire first written when there were no longer any (^anaanites and Perizzites in the land. For the first passage says plainly, that it was on account of the Canaanites that Abram felt it necessary to go through the land to Sichem; and here again, that owing to their presence, he and Lot found themselves strait- ened for pasture-ground, and were compelled to separate. HOMILETICAI, AND PRACTICAL. See Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. The hap- py exodus of Abram from Egypt, a prophecy or type of the glorious Exodus of the children of Israel. — Abram's return to the altar in Bethel. — The house of God the consecration of the home. — .4brara and Lot. — The love of peace characteristic of the be- liever.^The scandal of kindred and family strifes. — The eager watchfulness of servants. — The true sepa- ration for the sake of peiice. — The watchword of Abram in its typical significance. — The blessing of* spirit of concession. — The character of Lot in its lighter and darker aspects. — Lot's choice: 1. In its fair promise ; 2. in its evil results. — The third prom- ise of God to Abram. — The peril of the worldly life, and the blessing of retirement : Lot in the gate of Sodom, Abram in the oak-grove of JIamre. — How (piickly tlie paradise of Lot's choice lay in the terri- ble depths of the Dead Sea. — How firm the promise of the eternal possession of the Holy land to Abram's seed . 1 . The conditional character of the |)ioniise with reference to his natural descendants (the Ara- bians in Palestine are still his natural sons) ; 2. itg unconditional character for his believing children (.Matt. V. 5). Starke ; Abram and Lot feared God ; they were related, and fellow-travellers. Poverty, hunger, and toilsome journeys to and fro, could not bring about any strifes, but the ahnndiincc of temporal posses- sions had nearly aecoinplishcd it, when Abram saw and mari.ed the cunning of Ihe devil. If this could happen to holy men like these, we may easily ses how far Satan may carry those whose hearts cling to this world's good.s. — L.\N(1K, ver 2 : It is one thing to be rich, and ipiite another to desire riidies, and bend all one's energies and efforts to that end. It is not the former, but the latter, which is in oppo and cliildlesfl, and yet his need ^hall be as the dust of thi earth. All around him is liis, and ho is only one Hmo^^ th« taiusands^bul «ir' cAiriSt nap fATrifia." Iluli1z&-'h -A. fJ.| CHAP. XIV. 1-24. 401 sition to true faith, and the tiivine blessing (Sir. ixii. 1). — Ver. 7. The devil is wont to sow tares, misunderstandings, and divisions, even between pious men and believers (Ps. cxxxiii. 1). — Vers. 8, 9. What a beautiful example of humiUty and the love of peace ! The elder yields to the younger. — Whoever will be a son of Abram, must strive to win his neighbor by 'ove, but never seek to prevail by violence. — Ver. 13. It is commonly (often) true, that the people are more depraved in those parts of the land which are more rich and fruitful (Ps. cvi. 24-29). — A good land seldom bears pious people, and we cannot en- dure prosperous days with safety (Ezek. xvi. 49). — OsiANDEB, upon ver. IS: Religious worship at the first and last. — Lisco : In this history, the principal thing is the grace of God towards the chosen race, the divine providence, through which circumstances are so arranged as to separate from this race one who was not a constituent portion of it. Under this providence Lot freely concedes all his claims to the land of promise, to which the plain of Jordan no longer belonged (certainly not the plain of Sodom, after its submersion). This interpretation is mani- festly correct from the account vers. 14 and 15, that the new promise of the land of Canaan was given to Abram after the departure of Lot. — Ver. 16. In- cludes not barely the natural but also the spiritual descendants — the children of Abram by faitn (Jer. ixiiii. 22).* — Ver. 17. This journey should be a * (See also in confirmation the Epistle to the Hebrews, ch. xi. 10, 16, where the apostle points to the true and high- eat sense of the land promised. The spiritual st-ed require a heavenly inheritance, and the heavenly ioheritance implies a spiritual seed. — A. Q. ] type of the possession which took place much latel under Joshua. — Gerlach upon ver. 2. The outward earthly blessing was, to this man of faith, a pledge of the spiritual and invisible. — Passavant : 1 John ii. 15; Matt. v. 5, 9; vi. 33.— Indei'd, if we onl7 assert our just right and posses.-^ious, harshli/ and Jirmli^, there is no praise nor reward from God, no promise — no pleasant bow of peace ; we have our reward, blessing and peace therein. — Schbuder : From all these notices in reference to Canaan, it is clear that everything in this chapter bears upon the land of promise. — Calvin : If no Canaanites sur- round us, we still live in the midst of enemies, whiW we live in this world. — Luther: To the service of God, and the preaching of religion, and faith to- wards God (ver. 4), there is added now a most beau- tiftd and glorioiii example of love to our neighbor, and of patience. — Abram's generous and magnani- mous spirit conies out all the more clearly, through the directly opposite conduct of Lot (ver. 10). — Be- cause Lot had in eye only the beauty of the land, he had uo eye for the far higher, inward beauty of Abram's character. — Schwexke : In his faith, Abram had placed a low estimate upon the world and its good things, and found a much richer blessing. — Heusee : Abram in his disturbed relation with Lot : 1. The disturbance; 2. the way in which Abram re- moved it ; 3. the thought which gave him strength for his work.* * [The whole chapter remarkable, as it presents to us the workings of faith in the domestic and ordinary life, in the common transactions between man and man, and affords us an opportunity of obser\iiig liow far his daily life was in unison with that higher character with which the inspire*" writers have invested him. Bush, 210. — A. G.] THIRD SECTION. Abram and his War with the Heathen robber-hands for the rescue of Lot. The victorious Champion of Faith and his greeting to Melchizedec, the prince of peace. His conduct towards the King of Sodom, and his associates in the War. Chapter XIV. 1-24. 1 And it came to pass in the days ' of Amraphel [Oesenius : it seems to be Sanscrit Amrap4Ia, keeper of the gods; M surer : perhaps, robbers; Fiiist : = Arphaxad] king of Sllinar [region of Babylon], Arioch' [Oesenius, after Bohlen, Sanscrit Arjaka, venerated ; FQrst : the Arian, embracing Persian, Median, and Assyrian] king of EUasar, [Symmaohua and Vulgate: Pontus; Gesenius : probably the region between Babylon and Elymais], Chedorlaomer* [Maurer: band of the sheaf; FOrst: probably from the ancient Persian] kino- of Elam [Elymais], and Tidal [Gesenius: fear, veneration] king of nations [Clericus : Galilean heath en] ; 2 That these made war with Bera [Gesenius = 5-}",a] king of Sodom, and with Birsha [Gesenius = 5ia-;-ia] king of Gomorrah, Siiinab [Gesenius : father's tooth] king of Adraak [Furst: fruit region, city in the district of Sodom, farm-city], and Shemeber [Gi-senius ; soaring aloft; glory of the eagle 7] king of Zeboiim [Gesenius: place of hyenas] and the king of Bela [devoured. 3 destroyed], which is Zoar [the small]. All these were joined together in the vale of Siddim [Aqmla? valley of fields ; Gesenius: depressed land, "Wadyj Furst: plain], which is [now] the salt sea 4 [aeaof asphalt. Dead sea]. Twelve years they served Chedorlaomer [as vassals], and in the 5 thirteenth year they rebelled. And in the fourteenth year came Chedorlaomer, and the Icings that were with him, and smote the Rephaims [riants; Ewaid: long-drawn, tau] in Ashte 26 io2 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. roth Karnaim [horned Astarte ; from Astiirte-worehip, city in Batanaea, Dent, i, 4 ; Josh. liii. 12j, and thf ZuzilliS FSusaer; Gesenitis : from the fertility of the cuimtrj* ; Septuagint and others: i0VT} Itrxvpa^ in HaiT [treasures; probably an Ammonite region], and the Emiins [terrors; Emacr, originally in the land of Moab] in Sliaveh [plain] Kiriathaim [twin cities in the tribe of Reuben, Num. xxxii. 37; lat«r in Moab, Jer. 6 xlriii. l]. And the Horites [dwellers in cave.=] in their Mount Seir [rugged; Gesenius: wooded; Furst; hairy], unto El- [o.ik, terohinth] Paran [probably, cave-region], which is by the wilderness. 7 And thev returned, and came to En-mishpat [well of Judgment], which is Kadesh [sanctuary 1, and smO«e all the country [fields] of the Amalekites [between Palestine, Idnmea, and Egypt], id] also the Amorites [mountaineers?] tiiat dwelt in Hazezon-tamar [p:ilm-pnming, a city in tin S wilderness of Jndea; later, Engedi, fountain of the kid]. And there Went Out the king of Sodolll, and the king of Gomorrah, and the king of Admah, and the king of Zeboiiiii, and thf king of Bela (the same is Zoar;) and tliey joined battle with them in Ihe vale of Sid 9 dim ; With Chedorlaomer the king of Elam, and with Tidal king of nations, and Aniraphel king of Shinar, and Arioch king of Elksar; [wi.ich] four kings with five. 10 And the vale of Siddira was full of slime-pits [pits upon pits] ; and the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled, and fell there [the warriors] ; and they that remained fled to the 11 mountain. And they [the victors] took all the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah, aiid all 12 their victuals, and went their way. And they took Lot, Abram's brother's son, who [for he] dwelt in Sodom, and his goods, and departed. 13 And there came one that had escaped' [fugitives], and told Abram the Hebrew [immigrant] ; for he [who] dwelt in the plain [oak-grove] of Mamre [richness, strength] thf> Amorite, brother of Eschol [vine-branch], and brother of Aner [i. e. -lyj , i^^p?] ; and these 14 were confederate with Abram. And when Abram heard that his brother was taken captive, he armed [led out to war] liis trained servants [initiated, tried], born in his own 15 house, three hundred and eighteen, and pursued them unto Dan. And he divided him- self against them, be and his servants, by night, and smote them, and pursued them unto Hobah [hiding-place], which is on the left hand [northerly] of Damascus [restless activity]. 16 And he brought back all the goods, and also brought again his brother Lot, and hi.'f goods, and the women also, and the people. 1 7 And the king of Sodom went out to uieet him (after his return from the slaughter of Chedorlaomer, and of the kings that were with him [confederates]), at the valley of 18 Shaveh [the plain northward of Jemsalem, 2 Sam. xviii. 18], which is the king's dale. And [But] Melchizedec [king of righteousness] king of Salem [schaiem = cibr] brought fori h bread and 19 wine: and he was the priest of the most liigh God [of El-Eijon]. And he blessed him. and said. Blessed be Abram of the most high God, possessor of heaven and earth 20 And blessed be the most high God, which hath delivered thine enemies into thy hand. 21 And he [septuagint: 'Agpa/i ; compare Heb. vii. 4] gave him tithes of all. And the king of Sodom said imto Abram, Give me the persons [souls], and take [ret.iin] the goods to 22 thyself And Abram said to the king of Sodom, I have lifted up my hand unto the 2o Lord, the most high God, the possessor of heaven and earth. That I [the form of an oath : ifl] will not take from a thread even to a shoe-latchet [the least], and that I will not take '/■- anything that is thine, lest thou shouldest say, 1 have made Abram rich: Save only that which the young men have eaten, and the portion of the men which went with me, Aner, Eschol, and Mamre: let them take their portion. » [Ver. 1.— Lange render-' *hifl first clause as independent. "And it came(,to pass after days, or, in the lapse ol iays."— A. G.) ^ I Ver. L— Wordsworth and Murphy, lionine, or linn-like.— A. G.] ■ [Ver. 1. — ".Some identify it with Telassar ; others more probably regard it as Larsa. now Simkamh, about fifteen oulcs Houtheasi of Wiirka. Eiawlin "on, Wokuswohth, p. (i9.— A. G.) ♦ iVer. I — '* Kawlinson cimpareh it with Kttdur-Mapulo , or ilaluh, whose name is found on the bricks of Chaldea. ■sd whose title is Apda Uartu, Havaeer ct the Wist."— Mdrpht, p. 278.— A. G.) GENERAL REMABKS. 1. Th^ Modern Criticium — Knobkl (p. 143) ng- Bi(rns the Section (with ch. xv.) to the Jeliovislic enlar«enient, since the Klohistic author narrates the founding of the theocratic covenant elsewhere (ch. XTii). Wc must carefully liistinguisli, in a tlieologi- cal point of ^lew, be'ween the permanent covenant of faith (ch. xv.), and the special and temporary cov en:int of circumcision * (ch. xvii.), which rests upon it (see Rom. iv.). The idea that Ihe character of Alirani and the narrative of Melchizedec are driwr • I Temporary, however, only as to its external form, And tho sign 01- seal of the covenant. The covenant itself ir oni and permanoiit.^A. O.I CHAP. XIV. 1-24: 40? :r«ditionally from interested motives of the Hebrews, a without foundation.* 2. For special literature upon ch. xiv. see Knobkl, I p. 134. S. T!u Warinal-ivg Powers. — According to Knobel, wLj here agrees with Joseph., Antiq. i. 9, the Assyrian must be viewed as the ruling power, which leads all the individual attaclcmg kings, as subject princes or monarchs ; for there is no trace Bf evidence in history, that the elsewhere unimport- ant Elymais (Susiane) has ever exercised a sort of world-dominion. Josephus calls the Assyrian tlie leading power, Syncellus the Syrian, which in this case is just equivalent ; but according to Ktesias and others, the Assyrians were the first to establish a world-dominion (see p. 142, flf.). Keil, on the other hand, holds that the kingdom of Amraphel of Shi- nar which Nimmd founded, had now sunken to a mere dominion over Shinar, and that Elam now ex- ercised the hegemony in inner Asia. The beginning of the Assyrian power falls in a later period, and Berosus speaks of an earlier Median dominion in Babylon, which reached down to the times of the patriarciis. (He refers to Niebuhr's "History of Assyria," p. 271). There is clearly a middle view. At the date, ver. 1, Amraphel, king of Shinar, stands at the head of the alliance of Eastern princes ; but the war was waged especially in the interest of Chedorlaomer of Elam. Amraphel appears as the nominal leader ; Chedorlaomer the victorious cham- pion of an Eastern kingdom, involved to some extent ji decay. The Palestinian kings, or kings of Sid- iim, opposed to them, are described as previously fassals of Chedorlaomer, because the narrative here treats of the history of Siddim, pre-eminently of the history of Sodom and Lot ; but this does not exclude the supposition, that the princes or tribes named in vers. 6 and 6, were also at least partly dependents of Chedorlaomer. For in order to subject the lower Jordan valley, he must have somewhere forced a passage for himself into the land. Keil : '' It seems eignificiuit that at that time the Asiatic world-power had advanced to Canaan, and brought the valley of the Jordan into subjection, with the purpose, doubt- less, to hold, with the valley of the Jordan, the way to Egy(rt. We have, in this history, an example of the 'later pressure of the world-power against the king- dom of God established in Canaan ; and the signifi- cance of these events with reference to the historical salvation, lies in the fact, thai the kings of the Jor- dan valley and surrounding region are subject to the world-power. Abram, on the contrary, with his home-born servants, slays tlie victor and takes away his spoil — a prophetic sign, that in its contests with the world-power, the seed of Abram shall not only aot be brought into subjection, but be able to res- THe those seeking its help. 4. Ancient Damascus, also, first appears here in Ihe dim distance. EXEGETICAL AND CEITICAL. 1. The Rings at ITar.— (Vers. 1-3). " The kings named here never appear again." Keil.f — * [The ooimectioii of this chapter with what precedes and follows is close and natumL It shows that Lot's choice, ffiiiie apparently wise, was attended with bitter fruits; it lays the ground, in Abram's conduct, for the promise and transactions of the xvth cha|»ter. There would be a seriijus Teak in the history were this wanting. — A. G.] ^ I Chedorlaomer, Upon the bricks recently found in Shinar and Elam (see ch. 10). Ellasar, probabl) Artemita, which is called also Chalasar, lying in Soutliern Assyria. (Goiim *) Nations is here of special significance (see translation of the text, als*. upon ver. 2 ; compare Josh. x. 3, 5, 23). — Al] these; namely, the last-named five kings. — In the vale of Siddim f (see the text). "The five named cities described (Wis. x. 6) as a -rnvTairoXis, ap- pear to have formed a confederacy. The four first (connected together; also ch. x. 19) perished afterwards (Deut. xxix. 22 ; comp. Hos xi. 8). On the contrary, Bela, i. e., Zoar, was net over- taken in the ruin. The most important are Sodom and Gomorrah, which are elsewhere exclusively named, even here, vers. 10 and 11." Knobel. TIjere is no ground for his conjecture that they were not Canaanites, drawn from a misunderstanding of ch. xii. 12, that this region did not belong to the land of Canaan. Keil: "That there were five kings of the five cities, is in accordance with the custom of the Canaanites, among whom, still later, every city had its king."J 2. liie H'[7r (vers. 4-12). a. Its cause {\er. 4). b. The course of the Eastern Kings hi their March. — '"They came, doubtless, in the usual way, through the region of the Euphrates to Syria (Strabo, xvi.) ; from here, as they afterwards directed their return march to this region, advancing southwards, thev attacked tho-e who had revolted ; at first, namely, the Re- phaim in Bashan, i. e. the northerly part of the country, east of the Jordan (Xumb. xxxii. 39), then the Zuzims, dwelMug farther to the south, and after- wai ds tlie still more southern Eminis." Knobel. — The Rephaim. — " A tribe of giants of great stat- ure, spread throughout Pt-raea ; also found westward from Jerusalem, upon Mount Ephraim, and in Phi- listia. They were gradually exterminated through the Amorites, Ammonites, Moabites, and Israelites." Keil holds that they were of Semitic origin (p. 140). Ashteroth Kamaim, or simply Ashteroth, a chief city of Bashan, the residence of Og, the king (Deut. i. 4). The details may be found in Keil and Knobel. § — Zuzima (an Ammonitish province), probably the same with Zamsmnniims (Deut. ii. 20.) — Ham. Identified (Deut. ill. 11) with Rabliah of the Ammon- ites (ruins of Ammon). — Emims, terrors. The older inhabitants of the cotmtry of Moab, like the Zuzims, included with the Rephaim. — Kiijathaim. Incorrectly located by Eusebius and Jerome ; the ruins el Teym, or el tueme. — The Horites. The original inhabitants of the country of the Edomites. They drove the Horites to Elath, upon the east side of the wilderness of Paran. The mount Seir be- Chaldea there occurs the nnme of a king— i'uifurmapufa- which Rawlinson thinks may be the same, especially since he is further distingruished as the Rnvcgir of the West. Jacobcs, p. 247. — A. tr.l * [Delitzsch suggests perhaps an earlier name foi "Galilee of the OenHles." Comp. Josh. xii. 23; Jndg. iv. 2 ; anil Isa. viii. 23. — A. G.J t [Which is the Salt sea, i. e., into which this valley waM changed in the overthrow of the cities (six. 24). Km., p. 139.— A. G.] t [The five kings belonged prol-ably to the family of Ham, which hivd pushedits way northward, but had heen here checked and held under the sway of the Shc-mitic king for twelve years, but had now revolted. Wordswoeth, p. 69.— A. G.l 5 putter finds it in the Tell Ashareh. J. G. Wetst«»c identifies it with Bosra, for which he urges the central posi- tion of this city in Persea, and the similarity of the n.ime4 Bortra and n-prrs . "Porter sngge.--ts 'Afinth, eight miles from Bosra", as the Samaritan version ha* *Anhln* for 'Ashlarnth." A. G ' 404 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. tween the Red and Dead seas.* — Yer. S. They now turned from the south to the north (i^ee Keil, p. 141). The victory ot the Amalekites wag gained in what wa.s later the southern territory of the Hebrews. Kail and Hengstenberg hold that it is not the Ama- lekites themselves, but the inhabitants of the land which later belonged to the Amalekites. It says, indeed, the country of the Amalekites, f and (Gen. ixxvi. 12, Iti) Amalek descended from Esau. But then we should expect some account of that original people. And the Amalekitish drscendants of Esau may have mingled with the eailier con>tituent por- tions of the people, as the Ishmaclites with the ear- lier inhabitants of Arabia. Lastly, even the Amor- ites, upon the west side of the Dead Sea, were involved in the slaughter. Kiiobel denies that Hazezon-tamar can be identified with Engedi, for which, however, 2 Chron. xx. 2, bears its testimony. A rapid march made it possible that these tribes should be attacked and overcome one by one. It is not said that they had all been tributary. Mean- while, however, the five kings in the vale of Siddim had time to arm themselves, c. The Battle in the vale of Siddim. The five feeble kings of the penta- polis coulii not resist the four mightier kings. — And they fell there. The valley, we are told, was full of pits of bitumen, or asphalt. This account is con- firmed by the mass of asphalt in the Dead Sea. For these masses of asphalt, see the condensed notices in Knobkl, p. 136. 1 This remark, however, does not explain why the five kings were defeated, but why they found the flight through that region so destruc- tive. They fell here, partly hindered by the pits, partly plunging into them ; only a few escaped into the mountains of Moab. The obvious sense appears to be, that the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah were themselves slain. Knobel thinks the troops or forces are intended, and holds it as certain that the king of Sodom escaped (ver. 17). But it may be his suc- cessor in the government who is here mentioned. Whatever of spoil, in goods or men, was found by the conquerors in the city, was taken away ; and, what is the main thing in the narrative, Lot with tliem. It is most significant : for he dwelt in Sodom. § 3. Ahram's March and Victory (vera. 13-16). — One that had escaped. The article marks the race or lineage. A fugitive who sought Abram in Hebron, njutaut Salim in whose vicinity John baptized (John iii. 23). Comp. Keil, p. 143. In favor of Jerusalem (11^ = ^^"i?, founding, or 'in""!, posses- sion ; the name obujn^ is either the founding or the possession of peace; the first is preferable,) are JosKPHUs : Antiq. i. 10, 2 ; the Targums, Aben Ezra, Kimchi, etc., Knobel, DeUtzsch, and Keil ; Krahmer, Ewald : " History of Israel, ii. p. 41ii," are in favor of the Salim of Jerome. That at the time of Jerome, the palace of Melchizedec was usually pointed out in the ruins of Salumias, lying about eight Roman miles from Scythopolis, of which Rol> inson .and Smith found no trace, proves nothing Salumias lay too far to the north, for the statemem in the narrative. Melchizedec (king of righteous- ness— the language of the t-'anaanites was Hebraic) is described as a priest of El Eljon. According to Sanchuniaton (EusebijS: Prpear3 to have doubted his unselfishness and inagnauimity. 16. We have here, also, the first stratagem, the first celebration of victory, and the first priest. \1. The first conflict of the hosts of faith with the first appearance of the world-power. The hi* torical examjile of the Maccabees, Waldenses, stc. HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL. See the Doctrinal and Ethical portions. — Texts for sermons on war, victory, deliverances, public calls, and demands to duty, and upon the oath, etc. War in a threefold form : 1. War of' violence ; 2. war of a faint-hearted defence; 3. the rescuing war of divine inspiration. — Alliances in a threefold form 1. Alliance for robbery; 2. the faint-hearted alii ance for defence ; 3. alliance for life and death.— Abram as a warlike prince. — Love of our brother as a motive in war. — Abram's war and victory. — Cele- bration of Abram's victory. — Melehizedec as a type of Cliiist. — Christ also does not enter into worldly wars, but he refreshes pious heroes with bread and wine. — Bread and wine the refreshment of the king of peace, for those who contend for God. — To every one his own, particularly to faithful confederates. Starke: This the first war which the Scripture commemorates, and its cause was the lust of domin- ion. (Let it be granted that Chedorlaomer had sub- jugated the cities mentioned in ver. 2, in an unright- eous way, still they were in the wrong, since the) began to rebel, and in this way would regain their freedom,* etc. — How can Abram help these rebels?) — God used the four kings as rods to punish others. Wurtemh. Bible: War and rebellion are evils above all other evils ; indeed, a condensed epitome, as it were, of all calamities and sorrows. — Osiaxder: If the saints dwell with the godless, they must often be brought down and punished with them. — (Query : Whether Abram, with a good conscience, could enter into a covenant with the Canaanites ? He might make different excuses; e. g., it is not proven that they were heathen ; finally, he could say cor- rectly, one must discern and distinguish the times. — Citation of Jewish fables : " In Abi-am's contest, all the ihist (every staff?) became swords, and every straw an airow.") Ver. 15. An instance of strata- gem, Josh. viii. 2 ; Judg. xx. 29 ; 1 Sam. xv. 5. — Cramer : God remembers even the poor captive. — Covenants, even with persons not of our reli- gion and faith, if made in a correct way, and with a right purpose, are not wrong ; still, we must not rely upon them (Deut. xx. 1). — Legitimate war. — Against rash undertakings. — Osianohr : No external power, but faith in God, gives the victory. — Ver. IS Here, for the first time, a priest is spoken of. — Cramer: Honor is the reward of virtue. — The tithes of Abram. — Osiander : A Christian must even make his possessions of service to the officers of the Church. — Kings and princes, if God grants them victory over their enemies, must not only give him public * [It is not said in the narrative that they were wrong ; and it is by no means clear that they were. Ilebellion may be right. It is so, if the government is unjust and oppres- sive, and there is good ri-ason to believe that success will at tend their etforts to shake off the yoke of boiida^:.- -A. (i. III? GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. Ihanks, but present to him of tlie spoil tliey have taken. — Teachers and princes must proft'er assistance *o each other, and exchange temporal goods tor epiritual (1 Oor. ix. 11. — Finally, upon the legitimate oath ; renunciation of his own rights, the compe- tency, the equitable vaijes or rewards of war, Lisco; Abram's magnanimity overlooks all the unbecoming deportment of Lot towards him ; he Teiitures his life for him. — The central point in this Darrative is the grace of God towards his chosen, through which he plan's him in a condition to wage victorious war with kuigs, and after the assured vic- tory, the same grace brings kings to meet him, the one in a thoughtful recognition, the other fawns in subjection and begs. — Abram's freedom from sel- fishness.— 0\LWER, Handfjuch : The humble man of faith, a victorious warrior and hero. — The strength of the Lord is mighty in the weak. — Schroder: No greeting of blessing, no word of God falls from the lips of this king of Sodom ; he is only thinking of the earthly. — (Calvin) : It is worthy of praise, that he is thankful to men if he is not ungrateful to God. It is possible, of course, that tlds poor man, stript of his goods, through a servile, hypocritical pretence of modesty, might obtain from Al>ram, at least, tlie captives and the free city for himself. (Calvin saw, correctly, that Abram, as possessor of the people of Sodom, and the conqueror of tlie rulers ol Sodom, won for himself essentially a legitimate dominion over Sodom, over which the king of Sodom would pass as lightly as possible). — Abram bows himself before Melchizedec, but before the king of Sodom he lifts his hand. — Thus Abram recognizes and ac- knowledges Melchizedec, while he penetrates to iti depth the nature of the king of Sodom. As he ii clearly conscious of his own high position, he con. descends to the lower standpoint of the Sodoniitet (out of which condescension the oath which h£ swears proceeds), in order thereby to recognize and own the higher religious standpoint of Melchizedec Tlie oath an act of worship. He testifies, thereby tliat he had not undertaken the war from any lust of gain, and cuts off the roots of all the soUcitation ti covetousness (even all suspicion of the same) through the name of God. — Passavant : Ps. .\ci. ; Rom. viii. 31. — Covenants for nmtual defence against such ex peditions for plunder and lite were necessary, and God permitted his servants among the Canaanites, tc use such means of help and defence. — There is some- thing greater than mine and thine, mightier than victoiy and the power of the victor, stronger than death, and it overcomes, indeed^ it inherits the world. What is it? Every child of Abram can tell. — Taube: We see in Abram's victory and blessing, the victory and blessing of every one who is a soldier for God. — The sacred history transplants us at once into the midst of the turmoil of worldly aflTairs ; from the quiet, peaceful tents of Abram, we are transferred to the tumults of war of heathen nations. — Heuser: The meeting of Melchizedec, the royal priest, with Abram: ./. The historical event itself; h. the typical elements in it; c. their realization; d. the importanc"; of these truths. [This history must be placed in its New Testa- ment light (Heb. vii.) if we would see its meaning and importance. — A. G.] FOURTH SECTION. dbram tlie approved Warrior of Faith, and God his Shield and his Retcard. Hi* longing for an Heir, and his thought of Adoption anticipating any exigency in the case. The great PromiM of God. Abram's Faith under the Starry Heaven*. The Symbol of the Starry Heaveni The righieonsness of Faith. The Covenant of Fuith, and the repeated Promise. Chapter XV. 1-21. 1 After these things [events of the war] the word of the Lord came [renewed itself] unta Abram in vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy siiield [in war even], and thy ex- 2 Deeding great reward [reward of the champion]. And Abram said. Lord God, what wilt thou give me, seeing 1 go [continually] childle.s.=:, and the steward [the futuri' possessor] of my house 3 is this Ehezer [thcheipof Ood, Oodismy help] of Damascus? And Abram said, Behold to me thou hast given no seed [bodily heir] : and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir 4 [on the way to become my heir]. And, beiiold, the Word of the Lord came unto him, saying, Tliis shall not ha thine iieir; but he tliat shall come forth out of thine own bowels 5 [thine own nature] shall be thine heir. And he brought him forth abroad [oiien air], and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the star.s, if thou be able to number tlieiu. And 6 he said unto liim, So .sliall tliy seed be. And he believed in the Lord ; and he counted 7 it to him for righteousness. And he said luilo him, I am the Lord tliat brouglit thee 8 out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it. And he said. Lord God, 9 whereby [ijy what hii,^!] shall I know that I shall inherit it? And he said unto liim, Take me [bring = sacriflm to inu] a lieiftT of three years old, and a she-goat of three years old, and a 10 ram of three years old, and a lurlle-dove, and a young pigeon. And he took un'o hnii r8a«riflccdj all tliesc, and divided them [the animal sacrifice | in the midst, and laid each piece CHAP. XV. 1-21. *\» 1 1 one against another : but the birds divided he not. And when the fowls zt.me dowr 12 upon the carcasses [not carrion], Abrani drove them away. And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep [na^np , chap, ii 2i ; Job w. 13] fell upon Abram ; and, lo, a horror or 13 great darkness fell upon him. And he said unto Abrara, Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs [thy desoendantsj, and shall terve them ; and 14 they sliall afflict them four hundred years ; And also that nation, whom they sliall serve, 15 will I judge; and afterward shall they come out with great substance. And thou ghait 16 go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt lie buried in a good old age. But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again ; for the iniquity of the Amorites i? not yei 17 full [to the measure of judgment]. And it Came to pass, that, when the sun went - wn, and it was dark, beliold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp [flame of are] that passed 18 between those pieces [of the sacrifice]. In that si>me day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto tliy seed have I given [now in covenant] this land, from the river 19 of Egypt [Wady el Arisch] unto the great river, the river Euphrates : The [land of] Kenitea [workers in iron, Judg. iv. 11, 17], and the Kenizzites [huntsmen 20 And the Hittites [fear, terror, in Hebron], and the Perizzites 21 And the Amorites [mountaineers, uplanders], and the Canaanites, [lowianders], and the Gir gashites [dwellers upon the clayey soil], and the Jebusites [0127 . a place trodden as a threshinc-floor] , and the Kadmonites [of the East], rttstics], ami the Rephaim [giants], GENERAL PEELIMINABT REMARKS. 1. The connection of this Section with the pre- ceding events must be carefully observed. The two chapters form essentially one history. Abram had in I'aith waged war ag.aiust a fearful and superior power ; hence the announcement to him : / (Jeliovah) tm thy shield. He had renounced all claims upon the spoil of war ; therefore he has the promise : I am thy exceeding great reward, i. e., reward to the war- rior. He had, through the fret^h, living, healthy in- terchange between his faith and the world, which was wanting in the hermit-like Melohizedee, kept himself as a man of faith, to whom it belongs, to beget a race of believers, who should stand in the midst of the world, against the world and for the world. 2. The form of the present revelation of God to Abram gives trouble to interpreters. Knobel thinks that the communication, vers. 12-16, belongs to a night-visiou ; on the other hand, the ue.\t suc- ceeding utterances to the waking moments. Accord- ing to Keil, the word of Jehovah comes to him in visible Ibrms, neither through internal, immediate converse, nor through dreams, but in an ecstacy through an inward, spiritual beholding, and indeed, in the day, and not in a nightrvision, as ch. xlvi. 2. " The ntnaa , ver. 1, rules the whole chapter." Against the first, it may be said, that the narrative speaks of a vision from the very beginning ; against the last, that Abram is led out to number the stars ; against both, that they do not involve and bring out any recognition of the psychological foim of the past revelation. To us, it appears entirely in accordance with the course of development of preceding revela- tions, that Abram should first have received the word of Jehovah, and then should have seen a mani- festation of Jehovah, and that it is now said, the word of Jehovah comes to him in vision. Abram, truly, at tliis time, could not have received the reve- lation from God without a dispo.sition for visions ; but in the case before us, which treats of a revela- tion of Jehovah by night, the visionary fitness of Abram comes into special prominence. This dispo- aition for the vision, and the prominence in which it appears, does not exclude the reality of the following jcts, which, also, Keil regards as only inward occur- rence's But ak to the phrase : " Hp spal<;e to him in visions ; " he accompanies the word in question with the corresponding image : Abram saw the divine shield and the divine treasures (Keil, p. 145). EXE0ETICAL AND CRITICAL. 1. The promise of Jehovah, the starry heavens and the righteousness of faith (vers. 1-6).* — Pear not. The coward fears before the danger, heroic spirits after. Abram had now an experience of the world in its wicked violence, as he had victoriously resisted its defiant challenge, and the beaten kings might easily visit him with vengeance Therefore he receives the consoling promise, that Jehovah him- self would be his shield, his defence in all conflicts (Ps. iii. 3 ; xviii. 2). — Thy exceeding great re- 'ward.'t' Not, perhaps, for thy general piety, but the reward for thy heroic conflict. — .Vbram received the promise of God with the same feeling of wtari- ness of his natural life, with which Moses at eighty years received the divine call to go to Egypt and free the people. He wished to establish his family. la Jehovah his exceeding great reward, then there naturally follows some one application of the prom- ise to his personal relations ; but he sees no other application, than that God himself would be his ex- clusive reward, that thus, as to this world, this Elie- zer of Damascus,}; his steward (cli. xxiv. 2), must be his heir. The thought is painful to him, but he acquiesces in the purpose of God, and desires only light as to the meaning of the promise, whether it is to be understood only of an heir by adoption, in * [ Tilt word of the Lard came or luas. " This is the first place in the Bible where this phrase occurs, and it intro- duces a prophetic vision and promise of Abram's posterity in Christ — the incarnate word." Wordsworth. — A. G. ] [The "i::!* is emphatic— A. G.) t [The rendering " thy reward is exceeding great," al- though consistent with the original, and yielding a good sense, fails to bring out clearly the prominent thought In the promise. It is not the great tilings which Jehovafc would give, but Jehovah himself, to which the mind of Abram is turned as his reward. — A. G.] I [There i;* an obvious paranomasia here — btn-mtstiek — Dnmmesek. Wordsworth, after Lightfoot and others, callc attention to the f ict, that the name Eliezcr is the same ax Lazarus in our Lord's parable (Luke svi. 20), and to thf anabtgy between that parable and this history. These "silent analogies between the Old and New Testament*" are strildng and important. — A. G.l «10 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. which case lliis Eliezer appears to him the most worthy. He desires mdst of all a decisive sentence, therefore his proposition of the thing by anticipation. Upon this allusion depends the marvellous tradition that Abram had been king of Damascus (Joseph., Antiq. i. 7, 2 ; Justin., xxxvi. 2). — To me thou haat given no seed. The pious complaint of hu- man weiikuis-; beffire God must be distinguislied from the impious murmurs aeiainst God (Exod. v. 11; xxxiii. 12-15; Numb. xi. 11, 21; .(osh. vii. 7 ; Job ; the prophets). — One bom in my house (son of my house).* It is not synonymous with house- born. It has a deeper meaning; it designates the most esteemed servant of his house. — Eliezer, he says, is already upon the way to become my heir. It is a complaining thought, which forma itself into a resigned proposition, but a proposition which veils a question. Upon this follows the divine decision (ver. 4). Jehovah leads him out of his tent, under the heavens as seen by night. His disposition, pre- paredness for the vision, does not exclude the reality of these events.f He had promised him at first one Datura) heir. But now tlie countless stars which he sees, should both represent the innumeralile seed which should spring from this one heir, and at the eame time be the warrant for his faith. Jehovah shows him the image of his descendants, in the stars of heaven. We recognize here the orientalist from Dr of the Chaldees, for whom the lights of heaven have a religious significance, but at the same time the free monotheist, who no longer seeks in the stars his gods, but the image of his children. Tliat God who speaks to him, can give to him a seed, count- less as the stars in heaven, is truly prosu|)posed ; the representation of the countlessness of his de- ecendants is the main thought, to which cleave the tll0ught^ of their shining glory and their he;ivenly character fsee chap. xxii. 17; xxvi. 4; Exod. xxxii. 13). — And he believed in the Lord. This can- not be either an element of a dream, or merely of a mind prepared peculiarly for visions, for it is an act of faith on the part of Abram, which was counted to him for righteousness by Jehovah. Knobel re- marks: " ."Vbram did not laugh, incredulously, as in the Elohistic section, xvii. 17," as if a believer, in the long delay of the promise, could never fall into doubt, (although there is no mention of any incredu- lity in the passage referred to). Keil asks: "How did Mipses know that Abiam believed? and that Je- liovah counted it to him lor righteousness?" He luswers: "He proves liis faitli, because, accor-ding to the following directions, he brought the sacrifices, and because what Jehovah did with the animals was a real declaration on his part, that he counted to Abram his faith for rigliteousncss." We must dis- tinguish, however, the inward events IVoni these sacramental signs, in which tliey are visilily mani- t'estcd and sealed. The faith of Abram in llie prom- ise of a boditi/ heir was tlie central point in the de- velopment of his faith ; with this faith he enjoyed the C'insciousness that Jehovah counted it to him lor righteousness. Justification by faith, as an experi- ence of the inner life, manifests itself in the peace * rBftiunf^rten suggests that Eliezer vaa bom at Domas- tUM ; then the T'^a ^3 is not Eliezer, but his son, p. 185. -A. O.l [IIi-li. Smt 0/ my house i» inlieritinff vie; 80 also in the Ith verso, there thall not inherit thee thii one.— A.. 0.1 t ('I'horo IM no inipji8sul)le cleft or abyss between tbo •phoreff of vision and of senst-, or between *bo superseUBi- ble and the sonmblo. — A, 0.) of God ; and Abram could have given testimony ai to this to his children, if nothing had occurred as tc the sacrificial animals and their consumption by fire The explanation of Knobel, " a right disposition ot heart is of just as much avail to him as integrity in acts," is both tame and shallow. [This is confessedly an im[iortant passage. W« liave here, and in the promise (ver. ! ), the geim o{ the great doctrine of the Lord our righteousiieM, We may not attach to the words here used the idea* in all their definiteness, which have been derived from the use which the Apostle makes of them in his discussion of the question, how a sinner can be justified (Rom. iv. 4, 6, 10, 18-25) ; but neither may we overlook his inspired exposition, and strive to interpret the words, as if they stood entirely by themselves. Leaving this out of view, however, it is clear " that Abram had no righteousness of his own, that righteousness was imputed to him, that it was faitli in Jehovah in him which was counted for righteousness ; " and further, that this faith is viewed here, not merely as the root of all true obedience to the will of God, and thus the sum of righteousness or personal holiness, but as embracing and stead- fastly resting upon (as the word rendered believed, here means) God, as the God of grace and salvation. It is the act by which he goes out from himself, and reUes upon God, for righteou.^ness and grace. Thn history clearly shows that there was this entiio re- moval from the natural ground upon wliich he had stood, and this entire, hearty, steadfast n.'sting upon Jehovah, " who is just and having siilvation. The promise which Abram's faith •■mhruced \\as the promise of salvation through th"> covenant seed, and lie so regarded it. His faith, therefore, was essen- tially the same with that specific faith in Christ which is said to justify (see Rom. iv. 13). The Notes of Kurtz, Baumgarten, Murphy, are suggestive and valuable ; and the exposition of Calvin is admirable, — :'wn . to think, desire, purpose ; then to esteem, reck- on, impute, set to one's account, 2 Sam. xix. If; Pa. xxxii. 2 ; Lev. vii. 18 ; xvii. 2 ; Num. xviii. 27 .^A. G.] 2. T/ie Covenant Sacrifice and the Covenant in reference to Canaan (vers, 7-17). Jehovah gave to Abram the starry heavens as a sign of the promise of an heir. Now he promises to Abram the laiul of Canaan for his possession (ver, 7). Abram asks a sign for this.* Jehovah appoints the covenant which lie would conclude with him over his sacrifices, for a sign. He determines, also, at first, the sacrifice which Abram should bring. The animals named here, are the sacrificial animals of ihe Levitical cultus. The future possession of Canaan was repre- sented beforehand in the sacrifices of Canaan. ■]• The sacrificial animals were all divided (hence n''"i3 ns , to hew, cui a covenant), except the birds, and the dissevered parts laid over against each other. " The ceremonial of the covenant of old consisted in the contracting parties pa.s.sing between the dead animals, with tlie imprecation, that in case of a breach in the covenant, it might be done to them as to these animals." Against which Keil (who, how- * [Not, however, na expressinp any doubt, but as th« natural wnrkinp and fruit of his faith.— A. (i.l [Ver. 7. ■ I am the Lord that brouplit thee, etc. Seetb* *' Preface to the Ten Commandments," Jacobus, p. 268.— A. ti.| t I llaumKiirten say.s that ns tins sacrifice wiib a covona&l sncrihce, ami lay at the foundation of all tbo sacrificee of th# covenant, all the animals used in those sncnUrcs were hsa% reuuircd. — A. Q.l CHAP. XV. 1-21. 41] ever, withoot sufficient ground, denies that this act had the peculiar nature of a sacrifice), remarl;s: " This interpretation of ancient usage is not sui>port- ed by Jer. xxxiv. IS." "The interpretation wliich the prophet here gives to the syniljolic usage, can only be a fuller explanation, whicli does not exclude another original idcM of the symbol. The division of the s;icrificial animals probably only typified the twofold character of the c-jvenant; and the passage of the two contracting parties between the parts of the one sacrifice, typified their reconciliation to a unity." This would be in accordance with the anal- ogy of the symbol of the ancients, the te^era /wspl- ta is, which was also divided into two parts in order to represent the alliance or union of the two posses- sors of the divided little table. Jehovah himself does not, indeed, appear as sharing in the offering of the sacrifice, but as a sharer in the sacrificial least, which was sign:dized in the later thank-offering, in the show-bread, and essentially in all sacrifices. If the man who presents the sacrifice gives himself away to God, so Jehovah gives himself into commu- nion with that man; forms a covenant with him. The individual specimens of the collective sacrificial :inimals, designate, in Calvin's view, all Israel in all its parts, as one sacrifice. In the three years age, Theodoret finds an intimation of the three genera- tions of bondage in Egypt ; which Keil approves, with a refereuce to Judg. vi. 25 (seven years' bond- age, a seven year old Imllock). The further intima- tions ol" numbers :n the passage, to wit, a number seven, five, and eight, Keil rejects. — And 'when the fowls came do'wn. The pieces lay for some time, unconsumed by the fire, and attracted the birds of prey, which would have polluted and preyed upon them, had not Abram driven them away. These are the heathen, the enemies of Israel, who would corrupt and destroy it, impure powers like the birds of prey, which were held as unclean by the Jews. The hawk was sacred to the Egyptians, but the later Jews represented the opposition between Jews and heathen, through the dove and sparrow-hawk (see Knobel). But Abram, in his faith, remained the guardian-spirit of Israel, who secured its sacreil des- tination (Ps. cv. 4-2). — Ver. 12. And when the sun Twas going down.* From this reference to the time, we may .judge what was the marvellous attention and watchfulness of Abram. The great scene of the revelation began on the previous night ; he had stood under the starry heavens as holding a solemnity ; the victims were slain, and the pieces distributed, and then the watch over them was held until the setting of the sim. His physical strength sinks with it, a deep sleep (HTiTin) overcomes him. But the disposition for visions preserves itself in the sleep, and so much the more, since it is even the deep, prophetic sleep. Abram sees hunself over- taken by a great horror of darkness, which the word of Jehovah explains to him. It was the anticipation of the terror of darkness, which, with the Egyptian bondage, should rest upon the people. This Ijond- dge itself is pointed out to him, under three or four circumstances : 1. They would be oppressed and tor- mented in this service ; 2. it would endure four hun- dred years ; 3. the oppressing people should be judged ; t. they should come out of the bondage with great substance. It is to be distinctly observed, that the name of this people, and the land of this •er»itude, is concealed. Moreover, there are further * [Heb., was about to go down. — A. G. 1 disclosures which concern the relation of the patri arch to this sorrow of his descendants. He hhnseli should go to his fathers in peace in a good, that is great age. But his people should reach Canaan in the fourth generation after its oppression, from which we may infer that a hundred years are reckoned as i generation.* — For the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full. The Amorites, as the mo.>-t power- ful tribe of the Canaanites, stand here for tl.t whole people (Josh. xxiv. 15). Israel's inheritance of Ca- naan is limited by the judgment upon the Canaanites; but this judgment itself is limited and conditioned by righteousness, according to which the measure of iniquity must first be lull.^Ver. 1 7. Behold a smoking furnace. This new manifestation must not be regarded as belonging to the dream vision, but as the intuition of the waking ccrasciousness, under the form of a vision. For the divine accept- ance of the sacrifice cannot be fulfilled in a dream, any more than the faith of Abram, than his sacrifice, or the making of the covenant itself. — The smoking furnace is analogous to the burning bush, and pillar of fire of Moses. That it here designates the anger of (iod (Keil) is not supported by Ps. xviii. 9.f The fire-symbols are not always symbols of the consuming anger of God (as perhaps the seraphim), but also signs of purifying and saving judgments, as the pillar of fire, and pre-eminently the fire upon the altar of burnt-offering. And beyond doubt, in the sense of this passage, Jehovah goes with the sacrificial fire between the pieces of the animals. That the pieces were not laid upon the altar, arises from the mode of forming a covenant, according to which the con- tracting parties must pass between them. Abram had gone between them long before the evening. Now Jehovah goes through in the sacrificial flame. The image of the sacrifice signifies that the sacrificial fire should never be extinguished in Israel ; this is visibly represented, moreover, under the flame of the altar. We must recognize clearly, that it is incredi- ble that the flame should pass between the pieces of the sacrifice without consuming them. But the flanje cannot designate the judgments of God upon the oppressors of Israel (Keil), since the pieces indeed designate Israel. But neither the judgments upon Israel, since the pieces which signify Israel were already divided, i. e., offered and dedicated to God. The sacrificial fire, as an eflicient element of change, changes the flesh into a sweet savor for Jehovah, and the judgment of an earthly dissolution into an act of deliverance, into a new, heavenly existence. 3. TTie foundinr; of the Covenant and its signiji- c.Dice (vers. 17-21). — Unto thy seed have I given this land. The covenant which Jehovah makes with Abram relates especially to the grant of the land of Canaan to his descendants. Hence, also, it is sealed with the offering of the sacrificial animals usual in the land. — From the river of Egypt. Keil holds that it is the Nile, because it is nrj , not bns (Numb, xxxiv. 5). Knobel, on the other hand, rem.arks correctly : " The Nile cannot be intended, since the Euphrates would not have been described as the great river in opposition to it." It is thus * [Ver. 13. Know of a surety. Know, ktww thou. Kno* certainly. This responds to Abram's question, WberetJ shall I know ? ver. 8. Mcepht, p. 218.— .\. G.] t [Kiiriz regards tbis as the first appearance of the Schecninah, and says : " It is the symliol of the graciouj presence of God : tlie splendor of his glory, tbe consuming tire of his holiness, which no mere human eye can bear, be- fore which no sinful child of n m can st^nd, is veiled benca*! his (trace," p. 180.- -A. G.l «)2 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK DF MOSES. tlie Wady el Arisch, brook of Egypt, otherwise called Rhinocolura, lying at the southern limits of Israel (Numb, sxxiv. 5; Josh. xv. 4; Is. xxvii. 12); not the Nile, because an oratorical liyperliole would not sfTee with the exact bounding of tlie land. [HENosTE.NBERii, lieitriige, vol. iii. p. 265. urges in favor of the Nile not only the term which is used, ^n:, and which is not interchangeable with the term for a small stream or brook, bnj. but also that the passage is rhetorical, as is clear from the fact that the tribes which the Israelites were to dispossess were purely Canaanitish, and no more extended to the Euphrates than to the Nile. Kurtz adds, tliat these two streams are here used as representative of the two great world-powers between which Israel should dwell. It is thus a prediction that the de- scendants of Abram should have an independent ex- istence by the aide of these two great empires, and that no nation should have any permanent sway be- tween them and these two empires. So tliat their dominion may be said to reach from the Euphrates to the Nile. — These two rivers aie, moreover, con- stantly referred to in the later Scriptures, as the ex- treme boundaries of Israel. See Is. xxvii. 12; Jer. ii. 18. In its best days too, the Israelitish dominion reached, to all intents, to Egypt, since all, or nearly all the intervening powers were subject to David and Solomon. Wilkinson liolds that the word IN"' . river, a form of which is here used, is the Hebrew form of the Egyptian word Jaro, river, applied to the Nile; see BrsH, Notes, p. 255.— A. G.] The Israelitish dominion should reach to the Eu- phrates, and did actually "in its best days" reach to it, but there is no record of its extension to the Nile. We are not dealing here with a prophetic and spiritual word, but witli the definite bounds of the land, for the race of Abram, as is clear also from the follow- ing enumeration. " Ten tribes are enumerated going from the soutliern border to the north, in order to fix and di-epen the impression of unirersahty and com- pleteness, of which the number ten is the symbol — no tribes are excepted oi- spared (Delitzsch). In other passages, sometimes seven (Deut. vii. 1 ; Josh. iii. 10), six (Ex. iii. S, 17; xxiii. 23; Deut xx. 17), five (Ex. xiii. 5), or even two (Gen. xiii. 7), are named; or finally, all are embraced under the com- mon name, Canaanites." Keil. The number ten is not, however, the number of completeness (that is twelve), but the number of. a completed develop- ment; here of the eoni[ilet'd development of the Canaanites for judgment. The llivites (ch. x. 17) are here omitted. The Hivites at Hermon, in the region of Lebanon, were afterwards driven out, but the Hiiites at Gibeon were graciously spared (Judg. iii. 3; Josh. xi. 10). "The Kenites were an Ama- lekitish — originally Arabian tribe, southerly from Canaan (Numb xxiv. 21 ; 1 Sim. xv. G; xxvii, 1(1; XXX. 2t)), of whom a pan afterwards removed to Ca- naan (Judg. i. Hi; iv. 11, 17)." Knob.d.— The Kenizzites. There is a reference to Kcnaz, an Edomite (chap, xxxvi. 16, 42), with which Knobcl joins the passage before us, but Keil objects, be- cause he correctly assumes that Kenaz nnist have descended from Edom, without bringing into account the mingling of the Edomites with the original in- hiiliitanlM of the land. The Kadmon.-.-«, also, are never anywhere more clearly determined.* * [They seom to have been tho more eastern, and to nave neld the other extreme boundary o ' tho proiniHed land, lowordi the Kupliratcn. Moupht. p. 31/0.— A. O.) DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL. 1. For the vision, see the Exegetical remarks The vision of a shield and of a vast treasure, bring! to remembrance the numerous revelations of God through images in the prophets, especially in Jere- miah and Zechariah. We must distinguish here tht threefold form of the one revelation made througt visions: 1. Revelation through images; 2. through the woi'd ; 3. through the vision in deep sleep, upon which there follows still a revelation to the waking consciousness through the word The prophetic frame of mind on the part of Abram is very extra- ordinary, since it continued through a whole night and day, and into the following night. 2. The stages of the promise which Abram re- ceived, viewed, as to its genealogical se(iuence, may be regarded in this order: 1. Thou shalt be a man of blessing, and shalt liecome a great people (ch. xii. 1); 2. to thy seed will I give this land (ch. xii. 7); 3. to thy seed the land, to thy land thy seed (ch. xiii. 14). Here (ch. xv. 18), the promise of the seed and the land was sealed in the form of a covenant. 4. The promise of a seed advances in the form of * covenant to the assurarice that God would be the God of his seed (ch. xvii. 7). 5. The promise is more definite, that not Islimael Imt the sou of Sarah should be his heir(ch. xvii, 15 fif,). 6. The heir was promised in the next yeai' (ch. xviii. 10). 7. The whole promise in its richest fulness was sealed by the oath of Jehovah (ch. xxii.). 3. The grand thought : God is our shield, or de- fence against all evil; God himself is our greatest reward or highest good; is the introductory com- pletion of all religious desires and hopes. But man can remain upon this high standpoint only with the greatest difficulty. This is manifest from the appli- cation to practical uses and gains which Abram makes: Lord, what wilt thou give ine ? Although this application to his own advantage, carried out in a childlike spirit, is perfectly consistent with his faith. 4. Abram under the starry heavens, and his righteousness of faitli. The peculiar determination of the character of the patriarchal religion. Here first, the full importance of faith comes into view. Here also, first, the reckoning ol' righteousness cor- responding therewith. From this point onward, both fundamental thoughts run through the holy scrip- ture (see Rom. iv ; James ii.).* The future of the Evangelical church was prepared on that night. It was the one peculiar bloonnng hour of all salvation by faith. But we must not, therelore, so weaken and lower the idea of righteousness, that we should explain it as equivalent with integrity, or in similar ways. Righteousness is tlie guiltless position or standing in the forum of right, of justice.f The * [Righteousness must be had, or there is no salvation. Men nave lost righteousness, and th.' ijower to gain it. How can it be serured ? It is by faith. It is counted to believers ; see for illustration Lev. vii. 18 ; xvii. 4 ; 2 Sam, xix. 19, and Eoui. 4.— A. G.l [JACOBUS, Notes, p. 267. 1. Abram had no righteousness ^r justification. 2 Faith is not imputed to him us a work, as a meiit irinus ground of justifieotion, Init only as in-tru- meutal, laying hold on a perfect ri£.dUeou>ness. 3. The law could not el. I im any other than a perfect rii^diteousncss— his own or anothel's imputed to liim— set to fiis aeeouDt, And this is the gospel plan of salvation — to reelton the per- fect rightoonsnesH received by faith, as oui' lighteousnjst for lustiflciition. — A. O.l t (KuttTZ : He is righteous who, througli the frocdoxu of his will, confomlB to tlic divine idea and en 1 of his being WoEDSwoBTH is bettor: Kightoousness is that itato ii trhiot OHAP. XV. 1-21. 4i:i forum in wliicli Abram stands here, is the forum of the innard life before God. In this he was, on the ground of his faith, declared righteous, through the vroid and the Spirit of God. Hence we read here, also, first of his peace, ver. 15. 6. The difference between the four hundred years, ver. 13, and .^ets vii. 6, and the four hundred and thirty years, Ex. xii. 40, is explained, not only by the use of round, prophetic numbers here, but also from the fact, that we must distinguish between the time when the Israelites generally dwelt in Egypt, and the period when they became enslaved and oppressed. Paul counts (Gal. iii. 17) the time be- tween the promise and the law, as four hundred and thirty yeiirs. in the thought that the closing date of the time of the promise was the death of Jacob (Gen. xlix.). See the Introduction ; and for the difference in question, Delitzsch, p. 371. [Note upon the four hundred tears Afflic- tion AND Servitude of Israel. — It is confessedly a matter of dispute how these four hundred years are to be computed. Some fix the birth of Isaac as the starting-point, others the entrance of Jacob into Egypt. The difficulty does not lie in reconciling the different statements of the Scripture, but in bringing any conclusion formed upon these statements, into harmony with a general system of Chronology. Baumgarten says : The principal thing in the threat- ening, tlte first word in the description of the sor- row, is an announcement of their condition as strangers, """il ""''!'"!7 ''?• "^^^ description, there- fore, in his view, covers the period of their sojourn in Canaan, during which they were strangers. He urges, in favor of this, the words of the Apostle (Gal. iii. 17), and the fact that the Israelites were to come out in the fourth generation ; a generation obviously falling far short of a hundred years. They were to be there,butthree gener.ations. The genealogical table, Exod. vi. 16 ff. favors a much shorter residence than four hundred years ; since the combined ages of the persons there mentioned, Levi, Kohath, Amram, in- cluding the years of Moses at the time of the exo- dus, amount to only four hundred and eighty-four years, from which we must take, of course, the age of Levi, at the entrance of Jacob into Egypt, and the ages of the different fathers at the birth of their sons. It is better, therefore, with Wordsworth, Murphy, Jacobus, and many of the earlier commenta- tors, to make the four hundred years begin with the birth of Isaac, and the four hundred and thirty of the apostle to date from the call of Abram. — A. G.] 6. The demand for a sign relates to the promise of the land, not the promise of a seed. The starry heavens was the sign of the latter promise to him. Compare the similar demand of Gideon (Judg. vi. 17), and of Uezekiah (2 Kings xx. 8). The pious and believing desire for a sign points to a divine assurance, the impious to an unsanctified knowledge, or, indeed, a doubt. The constant form of the pious desire for a sign, is the beUeving enjoyment of the wcraraents. 7. The sacrificial animals. See Leviticus. 8. The birds of prey. Compare Matthew xiii. 18, 19. 9. The profound sleep. Compare ch. ii. 21 ; Biblework, p. 209. 7%ou shall go to thy fathers in peace. With faith in the grace of God, the future is cnan's will is conformed to God's will — that state In which Adam was created, bat from which lie fell by sin, u. 74. — not only made clear ard t;lorified (John viii. 36), bir the other world also i.-; illuiuiuated. 10. The iniciuities of the Amorites. See Ex xxxiv. 11, 14 ; Lev. xviii. 24 ; xx. 23 ; Numb, xxxiii 52, 5.t; Josh, xxiji. 12. — No people is dcstroyec whose iniquity is not full.* 11. Both Delitzscpi (p. 373) and Keil (p. 151), assert that there is no account here of a peculiai sacrifice of a covenant, nor of a peculiar covenant Against the sacrifice of the covenant, it is said that Abram did not pass between the pieces of the sacri fice ; but this is a pure supposition, .^gainst the idea of a covenant, that there is no account of a pactio, but simply of a sponsio, a solemn promise of God to men. Let it be observed, however, that upon this interpre- tation the moral force in the doctrine of the covenant relation of God to the believer is fatally ignored, and that this interpretation also threatens to changt the covenant lilessing of the Christian sacramenta from a moral to a magical blessing. The subject o( the promise, Delitzsch remarks, excludes the idea of reciprocity. " In the covenant," says Keil, " which God concludes with man, the man does not stand as upon mutual and equal terms with God, but God grounds the relation of communion, through his promise, and his gracious condescension, to mat., whereljy he is first prepared to receive, and then, through the reception of the gifts of grace, is pre- pared to discharge the duties flowing out of the covenant, and thus made obligatory upon him." Although the covenant of God with believing hu- manity, i« not a contract between equals, but God founds the covenant, it does not follow, that his founding it is a simple promise, although, even a simple promise, without some moral motive giving rise to it, would be absurd. But now, according to Rom. iv. the foundation of the gracious covenant of God with Abram, was not laid in the covenant of circumcision (Gen. xvii.), but in the covenant of faith (ch. XV. i.f Hence the Jewish Targums, and after them. Christian theologians, have found in this chapter the forming of a covenant according to the explicit declaration, ver. 17. Delitzsch himself, upon ch. xvii., says first: "God sealed his covenant with Abr.ara," but then further, " God founded his cove- uaiit with Abrjun." But Keil, p. 155, remarks : " Long before, at least, long years before, God had established his covenant with Abram." We make the following distinction : in ch. xv., the eternal, Viilid covenant of faith was concluded ; in ch. xvii. the specific, old covenant of circumcision, the pro- visional sealing of the covenant of faith, of which, under the New Testament, baptism and the Lord's Supper are the senls. If we recall, that the relation between the Lord and his church is that of the bridegroom and the bride, we shall truly dismiss the assumption of a magical working and efficacy of the covenant, and return to the high estimate of moral relations in the kingdom of personal life, in which also the passive position, which the Formula Cone. recognizes and holds in conversion is to be conceived as a moral state — in which the soul is held in the * (The Lord administers th« affairs of nations on tlM principle of moral rectitude. Murpht, p. iQtt. Words- worth calls attention to ttiis sentence in its relation to th« destruction of the Can.lanites by Israel, p. 76. — A. G.l t [Kurtz holds th.at Abram did not now pass between the pieces ; that this is but one side of the oovenant, in which God. but not Abram, brintrs himself under covenan* obligation ; and that the covenant is computed and ratified by Abram in the transactions. Ch. xvii. p. 179.— A. G.l ♦It GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. Attitude of waiting, and does not grasp beforehand — produced in the strength of the iiratia prctveniens, and not as a pure creatur ely and unconcerned yield- ing of one's self to the pleasure of another. HOMILETICAI, AND PEACTICAL. See the Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. — The great thought: God himself is our God: 1. Our ■hield; 2. our great reward (comp. Rom. viii.). — It is allowed the saints, to ask : Lord, Lord, what wilt thou give me? — We learn from Abram to con.'^ult with God — as to our affairs; — to dehberate with Jehovah as to our future. — Ter. 4. If the lesser is denied us, that itself intimates a grant of the higher. — In submission we are near the highest promises and gifts. — Abram, the childless, shall become the father of nations. — Abram in the starry night. — The word of God in the starry night. — The faith of Abram: 1. Abram a believer ; 2. a father of believers (Rom. iv.); 3. a father of all believers, especially of be- lievers from the circumcision. — Abram's righteous- ness of faith. — The key-note of his righteousness of faith : 1 . The blessing has overcome the curse in liis heart and life : 2. he will overcome it iu the world through his seed ; his children shall be as the stars of heaven. — The high antiquity of Evangelical faith. — The covenant of God with Abram. — Abram's pro- phetic sleep. — The holy land : I. In the hteral sense; 2. as a type of the promised fatherland of believers. — The certainty of the promises of God. — The first mention of the grave cheerful and friendly. — The graTe already illuminated and glorified with the glimpse of the life beyond. Starke: Lange: Fear and discouragement may Bometimes assail the strongest heroes of faith ; it is well, however, when they are not allowed to reign (Ps. Uxxiv. 12; Rom. viii. IT; Ps. Ixxiii. 25,26; cxlii. 6) — [When some astronomers have attempted to specify the immber of stars, and one asserts that there are 1392, another 17ii9, and still another, 7uOO, these are pure conjectures, upon which they cannot agree among themselves. 'Then, too, there are the thousands of stars, so remote in space, that they are not visiljle through the best telescopes. It would have been a small consolation to Abram, if his seed should only equal the small number of stars specified.] — Rom, iv. 3 ; Gal. iii. 6 ; James ii. 23. — Ver. 3. What a great thing, is it not, to be near a prudent householder! — Ckamer: If we will be counsellors of God, we will do it to our injury. — tiod places before the reason, incomprehensible (and incredible) things; for, what we can comprehend, there is no necessity that we should believe.* — God foreknows all things. — Ver. 15. This is a pleasant description of death. — In what a good age consists. — The burial of the dead is a primitive custom, of which this is the first notice. We never find, in the Holy .'Scriptures, any mention of the burning of tlie dead, curtomary among the heathen ; or of any other way than of buri:il (Judg. ii. 9). — God exi-rcises a constant foresight, even over the seed of believers. LiSRo: The war with the kings, although victo rioiuly ended, might provoke retaliation afterwards ; thus the present state of Abram's mind is connected with his previous state. Ver. 2. God is here for the * (Tbla sbvionaly needn modification.— A. O.I first time called Adonai. — Ver. 6. Abram is imde) the trial or test. — Although Abram possessed sc many beautiful and noble qualities of heart, and it his walk manifests so many virtues, yet he is not, through all these, righteous before God, not iu the possession of the divine favor, for there is also sin in him, etc. This defect his faith, his living confi- dence in God (more precisely, the word of tiod which he grasps in his faith), supplies — The justification of the sinner by faith, is the only way of righteous- ness, before, during or after the giving of the law. — Ver. 15. Go to thy fathers. They must then still live upon the other side of death, in another state and lite ; the contiuued existence after death is here evi- dent, and, indeed, as the word in peace, iutimates, a blessed exi.aid unto her, I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it shall ;1 not be [cannot be] numbered for multitude. And the angel of the Lord said unto her. Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael i2 [God will hear] ; because ihe Lord hath heard thy affliction [distress]. And he will be a vrild man ; his hand wil! be against every man, and every man's hand against him ; and 13 he shaU dwell in the presence of all his brethren — [far and wide in a free country]. And she called the name of the Lord that spake unto her. Thou God seest me [of true seeing] : foi 14 she said, llave I also here looked after bini that seeth me ? [after the peculiar seeing t] Wherefort the well was called, Beer-l.ali;ii-roi [well of the uf? of seeing, or vision] ; behold, it is between Kadesh [consecrated] and Bered [hail, gravei-iite bain]. 15 And Hagar b.ire Aoram a son: and Abram called his son's name, which Hagar 16 b;ire, Ishmael. A. id Abram was fourscore and six years old, when Hagar bare Ishmael to Abram. PRELIMTNAET KEMAHK. For the difficulties growing out of the sexual relations in the history of the PaU'larchs, see the [ntroductioD, p. 80. EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL. 1. According to Knobel, this section is a Jeho- fistic eulargement of a brief Elohistlc original narrative. But the narrative bears upon its face a complete and living unity. 2. Sarai's fanatical Self-denial (vers. 1-4). Bare him no children. Not even yet, although he had already received (ch. 16) the solemn assur- ance of the great promise. She was barren in ch. li. 30, and remained so after ch. iv, 2. The child- less state of Abram's house was its great sorrow, and the more so, since it wa,s in perpetual opposition to the calling, destination, and faith of Abram, and was a constant trial of his faith. Sarai herself, more- over, the consort of Abram, came graduallv more and more to appear as a hindrance to the fulfilment of the divine promise, and as Abram, according to ch. XV., had fixed his eye upon his head servant, Eliezer of Damascus, so now, .Sarai fixes her eye upon her head maiden," Hagar the Egyptian. Ha- gar was probably added to the household of Abram during his residence in Egypt (ch. xii. lo). Sh« manifestly occujiied a prominent place in his house^ hold, and appears to have brought to that position not only mental gifts, but also an inward p.iriicipa- tion in the faith of the household. — The Lord hatb * [Here, of course, hersla\e. bond-woman. -A. t5.1 ♦16 GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. restrained me from bearing.* (The mother's womb closed — a figurative description of the ap- pointed barrenness). The barrenness, also, is traced back to the highest causality, the purpose of Je- hov.ah (ch. xxix. 31; xxx. 32; Ps. cxxrii. 3; Is. Ixvi. 9). The sexual relations, and the declarations in regard to them, are sanctified by their ultimate end, their spiritual reference. The dejection, at least, the sorrow, breaks out in the words of Sarai, also, as they had iu th>" utterance of .\bram, ch. xv. 3. — Oo in unto. Euoliemisiic explanation of the sexual connection. — It may be that I may obtain (be builded) by her. As to the connection between ns:. ". n''3. see the lexicons. To be built, is to become a house ; to become a house, is to obtain children, a family. Hagar should enlarge Sarai : Hagar's child should be her child (see ch. xxx. 3). The concubine, viewed in the light of this reason, for which she is chosen, is not so much the concubine of the husband, as supphmentary concubine of the unfe. The moral idea of monogamy shines clearly through this obscurity in its manifestation, and so far this, "possession of concubines" (as Knobel ex- presses it) must be distinguished from the later polygamy, which appear-ed among the Jews. Sarai practises an act of heroic self-denial, but still, in her womanly and fanaticiil excitement, anticipates her destiny as Eve had done, and carries even the patri- arch away with her alluring hope. The writer inti- mates how nobly generous sue was in her error. This greatness clouded eveu the clear-sightedness of Abram.f The narrator brings also into promi- nence the extenuating fact, that they had been already ten years in Canaan, waiting in vain for the heir of Canaan. — When she saw that she had conceived. " The unfruitful Hannah received the like treatment with Sarai, from the second wife of her husband (1 Sam. i. 6). It is siill thus, to-day, in eastern lands (see Lane : ' Maimers and Customs,' i. p. 198). The Hebrew regards barreimess as a great evil and a divine punishment (ch. xix. 31 ; XXX. 1, 23 ; Lev. xx. 20), and fiuitfulness as a great good and a divine blessing (ch. xxi. 6; xxiv. 60; Ex. xxiii. 26; Deut. vii. 14). The orientals regard these things in the same light still (see Volney : ' Travels,' ii. p. 369 ; Malcolm's ' History of Persia ; ' andWiNKR: Eeal-wortcrbnc/i, a.it. Kinder}." Knobel. Hagar, however, had not the position of a second wife, and erred, when in her disposition she assumed this position, instead of recognizing her subordina- tion to her mistress. This subordination was as- sumed by Abram, and therefore he does not seem to have noticed her haughtiness and pride.:}: 3. mc quali- ties as Btill exu.ting amon^ the Arabs. — A. O.) 27 abundantly confirmed this promise. '' Un'il to-daj the Ishmaelites are in unimpaiied, fiee possessior of the great peninsula lying between the Erphrate.s, the isthmus of Suez, and the Red Sea, from whence they have spread over wide districts in North Africa and Southern A.sia" (comp. Dki.itzscm, p. 377 if.)* — And she called the name of the Lord (Jehc vah). The naming of God by Hagar ("'STbx) haj been variously interpreted. Hengstenberg, with Tuch, explains the well named from this event " well of tlie living seeing," or " visior," i. e. where a per- son has seen the face of God, and reniains alive. Delitzsch holds this to be a verbal impossibil- ity. We add, that the actual [ rosi pposition also, in this explanation, which app.Hts also in Keil, is incorrect. We must distingu rU between the patriarchal and legal periods. Of the \ep:a.l period it is said ; thou canst not see my face, f. - ul man shal see me and live (Ex, xxxiii. 20) ; tha was true of Moses, so far as he was the mediato ■ of his sinful people (see Ex. xxxiii. 13). The preji.„Moe 'n Israel, that no one could see the revelation of Gol' and live (Judg. xiii. 22), took its origin from thesi words. But the sense of the words was, that the m), and only the less eminent wife, doubts and laughs (ch. xviii. 12). But here as there, the laughter, in the name of the prom- ised seed ( pnS^ ), passes into the history of Abra- ham." That the interpreter, from this standpoint, knows nothing of a laugh of astonishment, in connec- tion with full faith, indeed, in the immediate experi- ence of the events (Ps. cxxvi. 1, 2), is evident. Delitzsch : The promise was so very great, that he sank reverently upon the ground, and so very para- doxical, that he involuntarily laughs (see also the ciuotation from Calvin, by Keil, p. 151). ["The laiishter of Abraham was the exultation of joy, not the smile of unbelief." Aug. : de Civ. Dei. xvi. 26. Wordsworth, who also urges that this interpretation is sustained by our Lord, John viii. r,6. — A. G.] We may confidently infer from the difl'crcnt judg- ments of Abraham's laughter here, and that of Sa- rah, which is recorded afterward, that there was an important distinction in the states of mind from which they sprang. The characteristic feature in the narration here is, that Abraham fell u]>on his face, as at first, afler the prnndse, ver. 2. — Shall there be bom unto him that is an hundred years old?* The apparent impossibility is twofold (see * (" These questions are not addressed to God; thev merely ajjitate the breast of tlie astonished patriarch.*' Murphy, p. 311. "Can this bo? This that w.as only teo (;(H)d til he tliought of, and too blessed a cnnsuramarion of a;l his ancient hripes, to he now, at Ihis Kte day, so ilistinctlj assured to him by God him.solf." Jacobus, p. 289. — A. G.l CHAP. XVII. 1-27. 42£ the quotations, Rom. iv. and Heb. xi.). — O that Ishmael might (still) live. The sense of the prayer is ambiguous. " Abraham," says Knobol, "turns aside, and only wishes that tlie son he al- ready had should live and prosper." Calvin, and others, also inierpiet the prayer ii: the sense, that Abraham would be contented if Ishmael should pros- per. Keil, on the contrary, regards the prayer of Abraham as arising out of his anxiety, lest Ishmael should not have ;my part in the blessings of the cov- enant. The fact, that the answer of God contains no denial of the prayer of Abraham, is in favor of this interpretation. But in the prayer, Abraham ex- presses his anticipation of an indeliiMte neglect of Ishmael, whidi was painful to his parental lioart. He asks for him, theiefore, a life from God in the highest sense Since Abraham, according to ch. xvi., actually fell into the erroneous expectation, that tlie promise of God to him would be fulfilled in Ishmael, and since there is no record of any divine correction of his error in the mean time, the new revelation from God could only so be introduced when he be- gins to be in trouble about Ishmael (see ch. xxi. 9), and to doubt, as to the truth and certainty of his self-formed expectation, both because Jehovah had loft him for a long time without a new revelation, and because Hagar had communicated to him the revelation granted to her, as to the character of her son — a prophecy which did not agree with the heir of the promise. In this state of uncertainty and doubt [Calvin, however, holds, that Abraham was, all this time, contented with tlie supposition, that Ishmael was the child of promise, and that the new revelation startled him from his error. — A. G.] the promise of the heir of blessing was renewed to him. But then he receives the new revelation from God, that Sarah shall bear to him the true heir. It puts an end to the old, sad doubt, in regard to Ishmael, since it starts a new and transient doubt in reference to the promise of Isaac ; therefore there is mingUng with his faith, not yet perfect on account of the joy (Luke xxiv. 41), a beautiful paternal feeling for the siill beloved Ishmael, and his future of faith. Hence the intercession for Ishmael, the characteristic feat- ure of which is, a question of love, whether the son of the long-delayetl hope, should also hold his share of the blessing, bas may, indeed, include so far the granting of the prayer of Abram ; it may mean, still, nevertheless. [IJetter, as Jacobus, indeed, as ad- dressed to the transient doubt as to Isaac, which may lie In Abraham's prayer for Ishmael. Indeed, on the contrary, Sarah is bearing thee a son. — A. G.] But the nineteenth verse distinctly declares that the son of Sarah should be the chief heir, the peculiar bearer of the covenant. Closer and moic definite distinctions are drawn inver. 2(). — Twelve princes shall he beget (see ch. xxv. 12-16). — At this set time. The promise is now clearly revealed eveu in regard to time ; and with this the revelation of God for this time ceases. 4. The compliance with the prescribed rite of circumcision (vers. 28-27). The prompt obedience of Abraham [This prompt obedience of Abraham re- reals his faith in the promise, and that this laughter was joyful and not unbelieving. — A. G.] is seen in his circumcising himself and his household, i. e. the male members of his household, as he was com manded, in the same day. According to the expres- sion of tne text, Abraham appears to have performed the rite uprjj himself with his own hands. DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL. 1. See the General Remarks, and tie Ciitica. Notes upon the double circle of the covenant, and circumcision. 2. El Shaddai. We do not comprehend the whole of this name, if we identify it with Elohim. We make it too comprehensive if we represent it aa including the idea of all the divine attributes, or as an e.xpres.sion of the majesty of God. It is the name of the Almighty, and stands here at the very be- ginning of the announcement of theocratic miracles, lor the same reason, that in the Apostles' CreeO, it designates the nature of God the Father, for the Christian faith. The Almighty God (itavroKpiToifi') is the God of the Theocracy, and of all the miracle.s. He makes the highest revelation of his miractdoua power in the resurrection of Christ (Eph. i. 19 IT.). 3. Before my face. The anthropomorphisms of the Scripture. The soul, head, eyes, arm of God, are mentioned in the Bible. The Concordances give all the information any one needs. It is not difficult to ascertain the meaning of the particular descrip- tions. His face is his presence in the definiteness and certainty of the personal consciou.sness(Ps. cxxxix.) 4. Keil brings the narrower circle of the cove nant into conflict with the wider, as was above re- marked. [Keil puts his argument in this form : Since the grace of the covenant was promised alone to Isaac, and Abraham was to become the father of a mass of nations by Sarah (ver. 16), we cannot in- clude the Ishmaelites nor the sons of Keturah in this mass of nations. Since, further, Esau had no part in the promise of the covenant, the promised de scendants must come alone through Jacob. But the sons of Jacob formed only one people or nation; Abraham is thus only the father of one people. It follows, necessarily, that the mass of nations must embrace the spiritual descendants of Abraham, all who are eV ttiVteoi! 'Agpaafi (comp. Rom. iv. 11, 16) He urges also, in favor of this view, the fact, that the seal of the covenant was apphed to those who were not natural descendants of Abraham, to those born in his house and bought with his money. He holds, also, that the promise of the land of Canaan to this seed for a possession is not exhausted by the fact, that this land was given to the literal Israel but that as the 'ItrpaTjA kuto. aapKo. ai-e enlarged to the *\(Tpa})\ Kara Trvediia, so the idea and limits of the earthly Canaan must be enlarged to the limits of the spiritual Canaan, that in truth, Abraham has received the promise nK-npovoixov aiirhi/ flvac kuithov, Rom. iv. 13, p. 138. — A. G.] Under the seed promised to Abraham of a " multitude of nations," the descendants of Esa-u should not be understood; on the contrary, the spiritual descendants of Abra- ham Tnust have been intended, and reckoned with the people of Israel, which constitutes, indeed, bul one nation. But we must always clearly distin guish between the promise, " in thy seed shall be blessed all the families of the earth," and the prom ise, "fiom thee shall spring a mass of nations,' through Ishmael and Isaac, and these shall all bt embraced in the covenant of circumcision, the one as bearer of the covenant, the others as associates and sharers in the covenant. Otherwise, indeed, even the spiritual seed of Abraham m*t be circum cised. But as circumcision is the type of the new birth, so the mass of nations which should spring from Abraham, is the type of his spiritual descend 126 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. ints, and in the typical sense, truly, he is here the father of all believci-s In the typical sense, also, the promise of Canaan, and the pioinise of tlie eter- nity of the covenant, have a higher meaning and importance. The reinarl. 200. — A. (i.] — Which was behind him. — The Angel of the Lord was placed with his back towarls the door of the tent. But it greatly ilreiigthens the real objective character of the niani- fujtation, that Sarah also hears, and indeed heai'S doubting, the promise of the Angel. — According • [Klesh-mcftt was not ordinary fere. See Pict bible, ud BciiB, NitCK, vol. 1. ]), 280.— A. O.) to the time of life.* — " The time of returning to life," is the return of the same time in the next year, Time returns to life again apparently in the similar appearances of nature. Thus one form of time in nature expires after anotlier, and becomes living again in the next year. — Wherefore did Sarah laugh. — Although Sarah only laughed williin herself^ and behind Jehovah and the tent door, yet Jehovah observed it. Her later denial (although, indeed, sha had not laughed aloud) and her fear, prove that her laugh proceeded from a bitter and doubting heart Keil, however, is too severe when he says " that her laugh must be viewed as the laugh of imhelie/," and Delitzsch, when he describes it as the scoff of doubt. It is sufficient that there is a distinction between hei laughing and that of Abraham. The Scripture says (Heb. xi. 11) that she was a believer in the promise, and the fact of her conception is the evidence of her faith. [It thus becomes evideut that one oljject in this manifestation, the drawing out and completing the faith of Sarah, has been accomplished. The qtiestion, Is anything too hard for the Lord? is the same which the angel Gabriel used when aimouncing to Mary the birth of Jesus. Mary bowed in faith, while Sarah laughs in doubt. But the words here used, with the reproof administered to her laugh, seem to have called out and strengthened her faith. See WoKDSWouTH, p. 84; Baumgarten, p. 207. — A. G.] [Delitzsch closes his exposition of this pas- sage with the suggestive words: "This confidential fellowship of Jehovah with the patriarch corresponds to that of the risen Lord with his disciples. The patriarchal time is more evangeUc than the time of the law. As the time before the law, it is the type of the time after the law," p. 286. — A. G.] 2. The announceme-nt of the judgment upon Sodom anA Gomorrah, and Abraham^s intcrcessori^ pnnier (vers. 16-32). — And the men rose up from thence.f — The travellers depart from Ili'liiun in the direction of Sodom, i. e., over the mountain to the valley of the Jordan. Abraham acci)mi).inies them. There is a wonderful union of the state of visions and of the actual outward Ufe. We do not forget that this condition was habitual in the life of our Lord, and that it is reflected in the history of Peter (Acts, xii- 11, 12) as it is also in that of Paul. According to tradition, Abraham accompanied them as far as " the place Caphar-Barucha, from whence Paula looked through a deep ravine to the Dead Sea," " the solitude and lands of Sodom." Robin- son thinks this is probably the present village Bni Na'im, about one and a half hours eastei'ly from Hebron ["Bib. Researches," voh ii. p. 18'.). — A. (i.] (Von Raumer, "Palestine," p. 183).— Shall I hide from Abraham. — The reason why God would an- nounce to Abraham, beforehand, the judgment upon Sodom, is given in the following woi'ds. There is at first great regard to the excellence of Abraham, but connected with this, however, a reference to hia destination as the father of the people of promise; he must understand the judgments of God in the * [Literally, livinp time. Muhpht : " Socminsly tht limP of birth when the chilJ romes lo manifest hfe," tv. :U0.— A. O.] t [.lacdlfus has a Btri.»rfp: note here upon the oonnejtion of w'liat follows with what precedes. ** 'i'liese are v^nly the rigtit and Ifft hand niovemrntB. Ttiorofords are ill thoil pl'opor antithesis, as scttinf? forth the ilivino character and counsel. The ri^ht and loft hand of the JudRe ure for the opposite parties. I.ife eternal is for the one, and overla.st- itifj punishnient for the other. " Matt. xxv. 46. All bist.cij is full of this antithesis.— A. G.l CHAP. XVIII. 1— XIX. 38. 48» irorld. because he must unilerstaiid the redemption. [All the principles of the divine providence in its .elationa to the sins of men appear here ; Ids for- bearance and patience, his constant notice, the deciding test, and the strictness and righteousness of the judgment, and hence Abraham is told here, that these same principles might operate upon the minds of the people of God in all ages. — A. G.] For the judgment cannot be understood without the redemption, nor the redemption without the judg- ment. The "natural event" of Kuobel thus be- comes to Abraham and his children, a divinely-com- prehended event, and caimot remain a dark mystery ; it presupposes his spiritual and moral significance. But on this account especially, the event, as a judg- ment, is of peculiar importance, in order that, hke every following judgment, it may prove a monitory ex;imple to the house of Abraham — the people of God. — For I have known him. — Luther, follow- ing the Vulgate, / know tliat he, etc. Thus the good behavior of Abraham is (in an Arminian way) made the cause of the divine knowledge. But the IJnb is opposed to this. The knowledge of Jeho- vah is fore-determined, like TTpuywuiaKeiii, Rom. viii. 29, and thus one with the eVAeyeffdai, Ep. i. 4. Keil: "In preventing love he sees (ST'), as in Amos, iii. 2 ; Hosea, xiii. 5," which, however, can- not be included in the mere acknowledgment of Abraham. [The word includes knowledge and love. Sec Pb. i. 6 i xxxi. 8 ; 1 Cor. viii. 3 ; xiii. 12. Baum- ^ARTEN, p. 208. — A. G.] Kurtz explains this pas- lage strangely. God has given the possession of the and to Abraham, therelbre he would be sure of his lousent in this arrangement as to a part of the land. iEiL : " The destruction of Sodom and the neigh- boring cities should serve as an 'enduring monument of the divine punitive righteousness, in which Israel Bhoidd have constantly before its eyes the destruc- tion of the godless. Finally, Jehovah unveils to Abraham, in the clearest manner, the cause of this destruction, that he might not only have a clear and perfect conWction of the justice of the divine pro- cedure, but also the clear view that when tlie meas- ure of iniquity was full, no intercession could avert the judgment. It is both for the instruction and I warning of his descendants." But still more cer- tainly, also, at first, to give occasion to the prayer of Abraham, and thus show to his children what position they must take in regard to all the threaten- ing judgments of God upon the world. — The cry of Sodom. — It is right to refer to ch. iv. 10 for the explanation of these words, and hence the cry which is meant is the cry of sins for vengeance or punish- ment. Outbreaking offences against the moral na- ture, as murder and lusts, especially imnatural lusts, abuse and pain nature, and so to speak, force from it a cry of necessity, which sounds throughout the world and ascends to heaven.* The infamy of podom and Gomorrah in the world, is not excluded from this tendency and result, but forms only the reflex, or one element of the cry. The "'S gives the etronge.st emphasis to the utterance. [Baumgarten and Keil render it mdeal. The cry of Sodom, in- deed it is great — their sin, indeed it is very grievous. But the usual force of the ''I , for, because, gives a good sense. It is for or because the cry is such, that the Lord comes down to test and punish. — A. G.] * fit is the moral demand wtiich sin makes for piuiisb- neiit. BvsB : " Not«s," vol. i. p. 297.— A. G.l — I will go do^wn noir. — The anthropomorphi* expression include.^ also a divine *hought or |iuipose. •lehovah could not be uncertain whether the cry ol Sodom and Gomoirah contained the truth, but it was still a question whether Sodom, by its conduct against the last deciding visitation of G-;d, woiila show that its corruption placed it beyond any help or salvation. The translation of Luther, ''wlieihei it has done according to tlie cry," does not meet thf demands of the text. It must become eviden, through its last trial, whether it has reached the limit of the long-suffering patience of God Thus it is not specially to convince himself, but to mtroducs the final decision. According to Delitzsch and Keil, the flis must be taken as a noun, as in Isa. x. 23, not as an adverb, as Exod. xi. I, " i^^3 '^-?? i ** bring to an end, here to denote the most extreme corruption, in other passages used to express th« utmost severity of punishment (Nah. i. 8 f ; Jer iv. 27 ; V. 10)." KeU. — I will know. — A sublime, fearful expression of the fact, tliat Jehovah will at l.ist introduce for the godless a decisive test, which according to their situation is a temptation, the judgment which in their case hardens, and the judg- ment for tlie hardening. It will issue at the last, aa they themselves have decided. Patience and anger both have definite, sharp limits. — And the men. — The two angels who accompanied Jehovah in the form of men. It is observable that here it is the men simply, and then in cli. xix. 1 it is the two an- gels. This order presupposes a very clear conscious- ness as to the distinction between the one chief person and his two companions ; a distinction which Delitzsch misses, according to his view of the Angel of the Lord. Here, also (ver. 22), the two angels disappear, as they go farther, while Jehovah remains at the place, in the Angel of the Lord ; in (ch. xix. 1 7 ) on the contrary, the two angels receive an in- crease through an undefined, but evident, new appearance of Jehovah. It is with reference to the later assault of the Sodomites, that the angels are here described as men. Their departure to Sodom is in fulfilment of the word of Jehovah : I will know. They depart to introduce the final decision. They depart, but Abraham remains standing before Jeho- vah, upon that height whence the vale of Sodom could be seen (ch. xix. 17), and addresses himself to prayer. The Jewish conjecture, that Jehovah remains standing before Abraham, is a wretched way of bettering the connection, which presupposes the distinction between the one Jehovah and the two angels before Jehovah. — And Abraham drew near. — The UJJ^ designates especially the nearness to Jehovah, and more especi:illy the venturesome [Rather the bold. Heb. iv. 16 ; x. 22.— A. G.], me- diating nearness in the priestly and beUeviiig dispo- sition which the prayer implies and contains (Jer. XXX. 21). That Abraham in his prayer thought especially of Lot, is evident, but that he interceded for Lot only, is an assumption which wrongs not only the divine thought of this prayer but the text itself Abraham would not then have ceased with the number ten, and his prayer also would havf taken the form of an ambiguous circumlocution. Keil is correct in his remark against Kurtz, Abrs ham appeals in his prayer, not to the grace of tha covenant, but to the righteousness of Jeho\ah. But he is incorrect when he rejects the position of Cal- vin : "Common mercy towards tb» fre r.a'ions" impels Abraham to his prayer, and on the contrarj 436 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. ■ brings into prominence the love springing from faith ; for the one of tliese does not exclude the other. Luther admirably explains his heartfelt de- sire: " He asks six times, and with so great ardor and atfection, so urgently, that in the very great and bre:ithless interest with which he pleads for the miserable cities, he seems as if spealiing foolislily." In the transactions of Abraham with God, the press- ing earnestness on the part of Abraham, and the forbearance on the part of Jehovah, stand out in clear relief. Abraham goes on from step to step, Jehovali grants him step by step, without once going before his requests. He thus draws out from Abra- ham the measure and intensity of his priestly spirit, while Abraham, on his side, ever wins a clearer insight as to the judgment of God upon Sodom, and as to the condition of Sodom itself. — The first prayer or petition. Foolish, apparently presuming in form, sacred as to its matter ! God, as he has known him as the righteous one, must remain the same in his righteousness, and cannot, in any exercise of his punitive providence, separate his almighty power from his righteousness. The prayer is a pious syllo- gism. Major proposition : Jehovah cannot sweep away the righteous with the wicked. (The empha.sis lies upon the sweeping away. The prayer itself proves that the righteous suffer through the wicked, indeed, with him and for him.) The minor premise : there might be fifty righteous ones in Sodom, i. e., righteous, guiltless in reference to this destructive judgment. Inrwcenl children are indeed not intend- ed here, but guiltless adults, who might form some proportionate counterpoise to the rest. The ennclu- tion : If it should be thus, the judge of the world could not destroy the cities, for righteousness is not the non plus ultra of strength, but power conditions and limits itself through right. Fifty righteous, five [twice five ?] in each city (the singular is used here because Sodom represents all the five cities, or the pentapolis appears as one city, whose character and destiny is decided in the conduct of Sodom) of the pentapolis, would be sufficient salt to save the city. Five is the number of freedom, of moral develop- ment.— Seconel petition. The lowly, humble form of the second prayer, corresponds with the bold form of the first, for Abraham has now heard that Jeho- vah will spare it for the sake of fifty. — I have taken upon me (ventured) to 8peak unto the Lord. — This is not merely to pray unto the Lord. He has ventured the undertaking, to exert a definite infiuence upon Jehovah, i. c, on the supposition of a moral and free relation, boldly he has venttired to speak to him, altliough uncalled. — Which am but duBt and ashes. — I)ELiTzscn : " In his origin dust, and ashes at the end." Notwithstanding this crea- ture nature, he has still ventured to place himself in his person. ility over against the personality of Jeho- vah, He has taken the step of faith across the Rubicon, from tlie blind, creaturely subjection to Jehovah, into the free kingdom of his love, — Per- adventore there shall lack five. — He does not eay: I'eradventure there are five and forty righteous, but clings to the divine concession. If it is as thou bast said, then the want of five cannot be decisive. The forty-five will compen.sate for the want of five. — TJiird petition. Since he knew now that Jehovah would not insist upon the five, he descends at once to the forty, and urges still that the righteous ven- geance should t)e rcstraiiieif for their sakes until perhaps tliey might l)e foimd. Still from this point oc be ventures onlv to make the supposition, per- adventure there are so many righteous there, with out expressly joining to it the inference wilt thou not spare, etc, ? — Fourth petition. But now, aftA the number forty is iiUowed, Abraham feels that he can take a bolder step, before which, however, h« prays that Jehovah would not be angry. Jehovah had twice yielded the five; he now comes to thirtj, and prays that he would at once yield the ten.— I'"ifth petition. The compliance of JehoviJi with his requests emboldens him. Thus he excuses hll boldness this time by the mere consistency of his words, as he comes down to twenty, — Sixth petitiim. He would venture only one more request, and that not without the deprecatory prayer: Oh, let not the Lord be angry. — He ceases with the ten, since less than two men to each city could not avail tc turn away the destructive judgment. But great as the interceding Abraham appears in bis bold, pet sistent progress in his petitions, he appears equally great in ceasing when he did, although the human motive to bring into the account Lot, his wife, his two daughters, and his sons-in-law, and thus to go on to the number five, was obvious and strong. And thus there is still a distinction between the men begging, which knows no limit, and the prayer whicL is conscious that it is limited through the moral nature or spirit, and, indeed, by the Holy Spirit. When Delitzsch says " that apparent commercial kind of entreaty is the essence of true prayer — is the sacred dfoi'Seia of which our Lord speaks, Luke xi. 8, the importunity (shamelessness) of faith, etc.,' we would underscore and emphasize the apfparent, and appeal rather to the repeated asking than to the bargaining nature, and recollect that the importu- nity, Luke xi. 8, has its full authorization only in the figure, but cannoJ be identified without explana- tion, with what is analogous to it, the full joyfulncss of prayer. — And the Lord went his way : not to avoid (as Delitzsch conjectures) further entreaties on the part of Abraham, tor Jehovah's remaining where he was, and the joyfulness of Abraham's prayer, stand in a harmonious relation. '' The judg-- ment, which now follows, upon the five cities, shows that not ten cp^^S , i, e., not sinless, holy persons, but upriglit, who, thrr-ugh the fear of God and the power of conscience, . id kept iliemselves free from the prevailing sins and crimes of those cities, could be found in Sodonj." Keil. Delitzsch : " His prayer, however, has not fallen to the ground," He refers to the rescuing of Lot and his family. 3, The entrance and sojourn of the two nngels in Sodom, and the completed manifestation of its cor- ruption in opposition to the better conduct of Lot (ch. xix. 1-11). — And there came two angels, — Stier: C'DSbo without the article; the peculiar personal angels who here first appear definitely in the history of the kingdom of God, although the idea of the angel, in its wider sense, had been in existence since ch. iii. They arrive at Sodom at evening, having left Hebron after midday The idea of an actual human journey from place to place is thus complete ; but the inmost central points of the narrative are the two great manifestations, of which the first was given to Abr;iham about midday, and now Lot shares the second at evening. But here the objective character of the manifestation is far more prominent than the possession and extent of the power to perceive the vision, for Lot did not recognize them at first a^ angels, and they appear to have been seen by the Sodomites, unless we ptefei CHAP. XTin. 1— XIX. 88. r.i't Ihe supposition that they had learned from Lot's household of the two shining vouthful forms who had turned in there for the night. [The term which Lot uses in his address, '3TS , shows that lie regard- ed them as men. — A. G.] — And Lot sat in the gate of Sodom. — Knobel well says: "Jeliovah, as the most holy, will not enter the unholy city," while Dehtzsch asserts " that Jehovah came in them to Sodom." That Lot sat in the gate of Sodoin, is mentioned rather to his reproach than to praise his hospitality. [It is a reproach to him that he is in Sodom at all, but his sitting in the gate is not men- tioned here as his reproach. — A. G.] He sits at the gate in order to invite approaching travellers to a lodging for thenighl, and is thus hospitable Uke his uncle. Knobel remarks, ch. xix. 1 : '' This polite hospitality is still practised among the Arabians ; they count it an honor to entertain the approaching stranger, and often contend with each other who shall have the honor. Taversieh, 'Travels,' i. p. 126; BtTRCKHAROT, 'Bedoums,' p. 2S0, and 'Trav- els in Syria,' p. 641 ff. ; Buckingham, 'Syria,' i. p. 285 ; Seetzen, ' Travels,' i. p. 400." " The gate in the East is usually an arched entrance, with deep recesses upon both sides, wliich furnish an undis- turbed seat for the observer ; here below and at Ike gate they gather, to transact business, as there are usually also stands for merchandise in these re- cesses, and to address narrower or wider circles upon the affairs of the ciiy (ch. xxxiv. '20 ; Dent. xxi. 19)." Pelitzsch. — Behold aovr, my lords ('^JiS). — He does not recognize them immediately as angels, which is the less remarkable since the doctrine of angels must first make its way into the world through such experiences, and which is not excluded by the disposition or fitness to perceive visions (Oomp. Heb. xiii. 2). — Nay, but we will abide in the street [i. e., the open, wide place in the gate. — A. G.] (comp. Luke xxiv. 29). — It appears to have been the object of the angels to ascertain the state of the city from the street ; but Lot's hospitable conduct seems, on the other hand, to them a favor- able sign for the city, which they will follow. — But before they lay down. — The wickedness of the city immediately develops itself in all its greatness. < That the old and young should come ; that tliey should come from every quarter of the city [literal- ly the end; see Jer. h. .31. Kkil: "As we sav, to the very last man." — A. G.] ; that they assault the house, notwithstanding the sacred rights of guests ; that they so shamelessly avow their pederastic pur- pose ; that they will not eveu be appeased by Lot, to whom they once owed their salvation (ch. xiv.), and (as one may say, preferred their demonic, raging, uimatural lusts, to natural offences) that they did not cease to grope for the door, after they were stricken with blindness ; this is the complete por- traiture of a people ripe for the fiery judgment. — That we may know them A well-known eu phemism, hut, therefore, here an expression of shame- less effrontery. It is the mark of their depravity that they seek pleasure in the violation of nature, and have their vile passions excited by the look or thcught of heavenly beauty (see Gi>thk's "Faust." ii division, at the close). "The lustful abomina- tion, according to Rom. i. 27 the curse of heathen- Bm, according to Judg. vii. a copy of demonic er- ror, accordmg to the Mosaic law (Lev. xviii. 22 ; xx. 13) an abomination punishable with death, here had no mask, not even the aesthetic glory with which it was surrounded in Greece." Delitzseh. The vici' of pederasty was reckoned among the abominalioni of Canaan, and even the Israelites were sometime* stained with it (Judg. xix. 22). — Behold now, 1 have two daughters. — •' The Arab holds iii? guest who lodges with him as sacred and inviolable, and if necessary defends him with his life (see Rus SEL, ' Natural History of Aleppo,' i. p. .S34, etc.).' Knobel. " He commits sin, seeking to preveu' ai:: through sin." Delitzseh. Keil remarks, " his duty as a father should have been held more sacred.' But it may be questioned whether there is not to be brought into account in Lot ai] element of cunning — a kind of irony — since he could reckon with cer- tainty upon the taste for unnatural lust in tha Sodomites (he so speaks because he knew his peo- ple) ; or whether, rather, the important thing is not found in the supposition that he acted in the confu sion of the greatest amazement and anxiety. [Which woidd naturally be increased if he had dis- covered by this time that they were heavenly visitors. — A. G.] We must take into account, in this whole history, that a premonitory feeling of the destruction of Sodom rested upon their minds, which had re- leased in Lot the spiritually awakened disposition or preparedness for desperate acts of virtue, as it had in the Sodomites the demonic rage in wickedness ; as the same influence luos elsewhere appeared during earthquakes and similar events. In any case Lot could not have miscalculated in the thought of a stratagem in which he relied not only upon the op- position of his sons-in-law, but much more upon the unnatural lusts of the Sodomites.* — He 'will needs be a Judge (Judge and Judge). — See the orig. inal text. " We may thus see that there is a sting in the words of Lot, because he would now reprove their utjnatural passions, as he had indeed done before (see 2 Pet. ii. 7).f — We will deal worse with thee than ixrith them. — " They wouM smite and kill him, but abuse his guests." Knobel. In the words, they pressed sore upo7i the man, the narrator intimates more than lies npon the face of the words. They at the same time attempt to break thionirh the door. The angels inteifered, and the Sodomites were stricken with blindness. It is not natural blindness which is meant, but the blinding in which the spiritual power of the angels works together with the demonic fury of the Sodomites, [cnijp , a blindness produced by dazzling light, probably combining total privation of sight and a confusion or wandering of mind. — A. G.] It marks the excess of their wickedness, the continuance of their abom- ination until the very midst of the judgment, that they do not, even in this condition, cease from seek- ing the door. 4. LoCr comparative unfitness for salvation, hii salvation with difficulty, a?id t]ie entrance of the judgment (vers. 12-29). — And the men said unto Lot. — They reveal themselves now ;is he.ivenly messengers ; and no loss distinctly their calling to destroy the ci ty and their mission to save liiiu and his household (any one related by marriage — son-in- * [Only to these men do nothini;. The form ot the r'O- nouii TLseci, tsxn , is archaic, and is used :ilso in ver. 25 ch. xxvi. 3, 4 ; Lev. xviii. 27 ; Dcut. iv. 42 ; vii. 22 ; xis. 11. Keil, p. 163. Therefore came they under my rocf; viz., iol the purpose of security. — A. G.J t [Baumgai-tenurgesthal nxin 05 should be rendereJ " come hither," mstead of " stand back," on the ground thAt this is the usual meaning of the verb, and that it gives aa equally good sense, p. 211 — A. G.l Vii< GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. law). We regnrd the usual construction, hast thou here any besides 7 son-in-law and thy sons, and thy daughters, and whatsoever thou hast, ftc, as incorrect. 1. Because then son-in-law would precede the sous and daughters, and is used in the singular, i. Because In the words " whatsoever tl.ou hast," sons-in-law, as well as sons and daugh- ters arc included. [The probable reference is to those in the citv and not in the house — any one re- lated :o him.— A. G.]— And the Lord hath sent us. — The Angel of the Lord never speaks in this way. — And Lot went out and spake, etc. — There are two explanations: 1. T^ose taking his daugh- ters, i, e.. who had taken his daugluers to wife. Thus the Septuagint, the Targums, Jonathan, Jewish in- terpreters, Schumann, Knobel, Delitzsch. Accord- ing to this explanation, Lot had, liesides his married daughters in tlie city, two unmarried daughters. 2. DTip^ , those about to accept or take, bridegrooms. Thus Josephus, the Vulgate, Clericus, Ewald, Keil, and others. Knobel quotes (nsjsasn) ver. 15 in favor of the first explanation; but Keil remarks that this does not designate an opposition between the unmarried and married daughters, but between these and the sons-in-law who remained behind. We may add, moreover, that there is no intimation that Lot had warned married daughters to rise up. — The angels hastened Lot.*— Since they were sent to execute the destruction, there does not seem any occasion for the haste, as if it proceeded from some fate — from an agency beyond themselves. But there is a threefold reason for their haste: 1. The zeal of the righteousness of God, since the measure of the iniquity of Sodom was full; '2. their own holy affection ; 3. the conuection of their mis- sion with the preparation of the judgment in the natur^d relations of Sodom. — And while he lin- gered.— It is clear in every way that Lot, from his spiritless, half-hearted nature, which made it difficult to part from his location and possessions, wa-s res- cued with the greatest difficulty. [The Lord being merciful to him, literally, by the mercy of Jehovah upon him, i. e., which was exercised towards him. — A. G.] — And set him dotim. — This completes the work of the two angels in saving Lot, ami their work of destruction now begins. — That he said (see the remarks upon the Angel of the Lord, ch. xii.) — It is " Jehovah speaking through the angel," says De- litzsch. But why then does this form occur first here? Before, the angels had said, Jehovah has sent us. Because tlie ;ip[)roach of Jehovah is not expressly mi'ntioned, Keil also admits here " that the angel speaking, speaks, as tlie messenger of Je- hovah, in the name of God." Upon the giound of the miraculous help given to him, Jehovah calls him now to personal activity in his own salvation. But Lot, on the contrary, clings to the receding forms of the two iingels, and it cannot surprise us, thiit in his agitation lie should confound their ajij>earance and the voice of .Ichovah — For thy life. — Lite and •oul are here one, not merely according to the verbal expression, but in the very idi'a of the situation ; it includes the thought : " Save thy sold." — Look not behind thee. — The cause is given in Loi's wile. it is tlie rfHijioun expi-es-sion for the desire to return, thtj hesitation, tlie lingering, as if one could easily basten from the divine judgment (see Luke ix. G?). Knobel draws analogies from the sphere of lieathen * [At Itif. morning, Tlio dnwn, since the iun rOHO 08 Lot TUtfVd Zour. Jacqbcb: " Notea," vol. ii. p. 23.— A. U.l reli^ons. " In order not to see the divine provi- dence, or working, which is not permitted tlie ey« of mortals. For similar reasons the ancients in completing certain religious usages did not look around them (p. 173)." Certainly the Lord might take into account the holy horror in Lot at the spectacle of the fiery judgment. Still the first word is e.s].lained by the second : Neither stay thru is all the plain; and the second by the third- Es- cape to the mountain. — It is the mountains of Moali, on the other side of the Dead Sea, which are intended. — And Lot sziid unto them: Oh, not so, my Lord. — He could not distinguish the mi- raculous vision of tlie appearance of tlie angels and the miraculous report of the voice of Jehovah which now came to him. He pleads in excuse for his want of energy that fear presses heavily upon him ; and fear weighs upon him iiecause, while he was free from the abominations of Sodom, he was not free from its worldly mind. [The evil, i. e , the destruction which was to come upon Sodom. He feared that he could not reach the moimt;iin. — A. G.] Lot also now becomes, in his own interest, an inter- cessor for others. He points to the Uttle Bela, the smallest of the cities of the pentapolis, and thiid^s it is a small matter for the Lord to grant him this as a place of refuge, because it is so .small, and there- fore exempt it from destruction. The name Zoar was derived from these events. *' Zoar is not to be sought in the Ghor el Mezraah, i. e., upon the penin- sula which here stretches into the Dead Sea (see Is. XV. 5), but rather in the Ghor el Szaphia, at the south-i-astern end of the Sea, in the outlet of the Wady el Ahhsa. This locality is well watered and covered with shrubs and trees at the present time, but is unhealthy. It is inhabited and well cultivated liy the Bedouins, who have here a permanent settle- ment ; and in the winter it is the gathering place for more than ten tribes. Thus Sei-tzen, Burekhardt, Robinson." Knobel. For further references to Zoar, see in Knoiiel, p. IM ; Keil, p. Iij5; and the Bible-Dictionaries. [Robinson, " Researches," ii. p. 480, 648, C61. — A. G.] — The svm was risen upon the earth. — According to Keil, Lot was now just on the way, but the text says expressly, that he had entered Zoar. For the distances in the vale of Sid- dim see Knobel, p. 175.— Then the Loid rained [Heb. caused it to rain. — A. G.] fire from the Lord. — The antithesis which lies in this I'xprcssion, be- tween the manifestation of Jehovah upon the earth, and the being and providence of Jehovah in lieaven, is opposed by Keil. The nin^ n«i? is according to Calvin an emphatic repetition. This docs not agree with Keil's explanation of the Angel of the Lord. Dehtzseh remarks here : There is certainly in all such passages a distinction between the historically revealed, and the concealed, or iinrevealed God (coniji. Hos. i. 7), and thus a support to th« position of the Council of Sirniium : "the Son ol God raioa it down from (iod ihe Father." The decisive execu- tion of the judgment proceeds from the manifesta- tion of Jehovah upon the earth, in ompany with the two angels; but the source of the decree ol judgment lies in Jehovah in heaven. The moral stages of the develoiiment of the kingdom of God upon the earth, correspond with the providence of the Almighty in the heavens, and from the heavens reaehing down into the de|itlis of cosmical nature. — Brimstone and fire. — Keil, in the interest of the literal interpretatiun, misses here tlie religious and syinbolieal expression. " The rain of brimston* CHAP. XVIII. 1.— XIX. 3J>. 4a? And fire was no mere thunder-storm, which kiniiled nto afire the ground already saturated with naphtha. [Whatever may be the explanation of this catastro- phe, whether we suppose, as seems most proliuble, that God used natural agencies, or make more prom- inent and exclusive the storm from heaven, it is clear on either supposition tliat the event was miraculous, the result of the direct interposition of God. Upon the Dead Sea, the ' Notes ' of Bush and Jacobus ; the ' Dictionaries ' of Smith and Kitto ; Robinson : ' Researches ' ; Stanley on ' Palestine ' ; and the numerous books of travels may be consulted. — A. G.] For it caimot be proved from such passages as Pa. xi. 6 and Ezek. xxxviii. 22 that lightning is ever called in the Scriptures brimstone and tire, since these passages evidently refer to the event narrated here. The words must be understood in an entirely peculiar sense, that brimstone with fire, i. e., the burning brimstone, fell from heaven, etc." But the words thus literally understood are not brim- stone with fire, i. e., burning brimstone, but brim- stone and fire. Brimstone cannot mix with fire, in the air, without becoming fire. We might, indeed, think of burning meteors, which stood in reciprocal relations and efficiency with the burning gfound. Knobel adopts the explanation of Josephcs: "An- tiq.'' i. 11, 4; "Bell Jud." iv. S, 4; and Tacit.: " History," v. 7. Fire ;\nd brimstone appear also elsewhere as the instruments of divine punishment (Ps. xi. 6 ; Ezek. xxxviii. 22). The author does not point out more fuUy what was the concern of the two angels in the destruction. But iu analogous cases, when God was about to send evil diseases or pestilences, he used the angels as his instruments (2 Sam. xxiv. 16; Is. xxxvii. 36). Delitzsch : "Not only Sodom and Gomorrah, but, with the exception of Zoar, the other cities of the pentapolis (ch. xiv. 2), as is stated Dent. xxix. 23 (comp. Hos. xi. 8), or jjb it is here, the whole circle, all the plain, was sub- merged iu fire and brimstone ; a catastrophe which also Strabo, Tacitus, and Solinus Polyhistor, fully attest, and which is constantly referred to in the later literature, e. g., Ps. xi. 6 (see Hupfield upon this passage), even down to the Revelation." — But his vrife looked back from behind him.* — Some conclude from tliis expression, that she went • behind Lot, and thus looked back. But the looking back is plainly not more to be understood iu a strict literal sense than the account that she became a pillar of salt. Female curiosity, and the longing for her home at Sodom, led her to remain behind Lot, and delay, so that she was overtaken in the destruc- tion (see Luke xvii. 31, 32). Keil even departs from the literal interpretation in the term, pillar of salt, when he explains : she was encrusted with salt ; resembled a pillar of salt, just as now objects in the neighborhood of the Dead Sea, are soon encrusted from its salty evaporations. This salt-pillar is men- noned as still existing in the "Book of Wisdom," xi: 7, and in Clemens of Rome to the "Cor." U ; Jo- BEPHDS: "Antiq." i. 11, 4, as that which they had ceen. The biblical tradition has here passed into a mere legend, which points out a pillar-like salt-cone, »bout forty feet high, at the lower end of the Dead • [The word here used for look implies a deliberate con- wmplation, steady regard, consideration, and desire ; see Is, Ixiii 3. The Sept. has i-tri^Ki^tv, looked wisttijll}-. WoBDSwoRTH, p. 89. .S'/iC became, ht., she was a pillar of talt. "The dJushii.g spray of the salt, sulphureous rain, •eemii to have sutfoc;Lted her, and then encrusted t'^r whole •ody." Murphy -A. G.] Sea, as this pillar of salt (see Knobel, p. 176 Sektzen : "Travels," ii. p. 240; Lynch; " Report,' p. 183 If.). This salt-cone is connected with th^ salt-mountain of Usdura (Sodom). Robinson : " R& searches," ii. p. 481-485. [Also Grove's article on the "Salt Sea," iu Smith's Dictionary. — A. G.] — And Abraham gat up early in the morning. [That is, the morning of the destruction. — A. G.] — The catastrophe of the judgment was soon com- pleted. The destruction, viewed from its universal aspect and relations, is ascribed to Elohim. But it is God, as Elohim also, who saves Lot, for Abra- ham's sake (see the remarks upon liis intercession). — Out of the midst of the destruction. — A vivid description of the salvation of Lot from the ex tremest peril, in a place which itself lay in the skirta of the overthrow, — a statement which Knobel, with- out the least ground, attempts to prove differs from the earlier account. The destination of this judgment, whose precon- ditions lay in the terrestrial volcanic character of the vale of Siddim (see ch. xiv. 10), for an eternal warn- ing to the descendants of Abraham, i. e., all the mem- bers of the kingdom of God. appears clearly in the constant quotation in the Holy Scriptures. Sodom is alone named, as the most important city (Is. ill. 9 ; Lam. iv. 6 ; Ezek. xvi. 48 ; Matt. xi. 23), Sodom and Gomorrah as the two greatest (Is. i. S), 13, 19, and in other passages), Admah and Zeboim (Hos. xi. 8), and in the " Book of Wisdom " the five cities are named in a vague and general way. The catastrophe, conditioned through the nature of the ground, corresponds with the divine decree of judgment. The fundamental idea is the burniug of the earth, through the tiie from licaven ; but that an earthquake, which are frequent in Palestine, may have been in action, and that volcanic eruptiona might have wrought together with this, is intimated in the expression : All (lie plain was ove.rlhrovm. The Dead Sea was formed through the flowing in of the Jordan, in connection with the sinking of the ground. But there are two views concerning the Dead Sea. According to one (Leake, Hoft, and others), the Jordan before this flowed through the vale of Siddim to the Ailanitic gulf of the Red .Sea. In the other view (Robinson and others), there was an in- land sea, before the catastrophe of Sodom, which forms part of the Dead Sea. For tlie reasons in favor of the latter view, see Knobel, p. 177. A principal reason is found in the f ict that the northern part of the Dead Sea has a depth throughout of nearly 1300 feet, while the southern is only 13 feet deep, is rich in asphaltum, has hot places, and is hot at the bottom. Bunsen: " That nortlurn basin, ac- cording to Ritter's statement (xv. 707, 778), is due to the falling in of the ground ; the local elevation of the southern part, to the peculiar character of the ground." Upon the Dead Sea, see Knobel, p. 177; Keil, p. 165 ; Delitzsch, p. 398 ; and the Diction- aries, especially the article "Salt Sea," in the "Bible Dictionary for Christian People." ["The earlier view is now abandoned, and it has no decisive ground ir the sacred history." Delitzsch, p. 289. See alsa Grove, in S. D. p. 1339.— A. G.] 0. LoV^ departure, and his deseendaii/n (vers. 80- 38). — And Lot went out of Zoar. — ["Lot's res- cue is ascribed to Elohim, as the judge of the whole earth, not to the covenant Go J, .Tehovah, because Lot in his separation from Abraham was removed from I he special leading md providence of Jeho^ 140 GENESIS, OR THE FIKST BOOK OF MOSES. mil." Keil, p. 166. — A. G.] After he had recov- i->recl fioQi the pariilyzing terrors which fettered him in Zo;ir, a calculating fear took possession of him and drove him from Zoar further into the mountains of Moab, in the east. It was an unbelieving fear, fo"- the Lord had granted Zoar to hini as an asylum ; he could not trust that divine promise further. The leeult is, that, poor and lonely, he must dwvU with his two daughters in a cave in those cavernous chalk mountains. Lot is thus now a poor troglodyte. "There are in that region now those who dwell in caves and grottoes (Buckingham and Lynch)." Kno- BEL, p. 178. — And the first-born said to the younger. — [Our father is old. This confirms the assertion of St. Stephen, in which it is implied that Abraham was not the oldest son of Terah ; fbi' Lot was now old, and he was the son of Haran, and Har.in was Abraham's brother. Thus one part of Scripture confirms another, when perhaps we least expect it. Worpswobth, p. 89. — A. G.] The de- sire for posterity led her to the iniquitous thought of incest, which she beUeves excusable because there is not a man in the earth, etc. According to Keil and Knobel, they did not think that the human race had perished, but oidy that there was no man wlio would unite himself with them, the remnant of a region stricken with the curse. Their idea of the world, accoriling to the terms of the narrative, ap- pears to have been sad and gloomy. Wliat did they know of the world, in their mountain solitude ? This deed was worthy of Sodom, says Keil. But there is a distinction and a wide difference between incest and pederasty (see introduction). Knobel thinks that they were represented by the writer as moulded by the mother, who was probably a Sodom- ite ; and, on the other hand, that Lot, as the nephew of Abraham, was more favorably (i. e., partially) represenied. Every one of these points is fiction ! The narrative, Knobel remarks, lacks probability. It assumes that Lot was so inioxicated both times that he should know nothing of what took place, and still, an old man should, with all this, be capa- ble of begetting seed. Keil, on the contrary, says it does not follow from the text that Lot was in an unconscious state during the whole interval, as the Rabbins have, according to Jerome, described this as an incredible thing, taken in connection witli the issue of the event. Indeed, the narrative says (mly that Lot was in an unconscious state, lioth when his daughters lay down, and when they rose up; in thi^ evening perhaps through intoxication, in the morn- ing through profound, heavy sleep. In any view, a certain measure of voluntariness must be assumed, according to the degree in which he was conscious and therefore his intoxication can only be urged as an excuse, and this a wretched excuse, since the in- toxication was, like the deed ilself immcdiati ly repeated. Psychologically, the reaction from gnat mental effort and tension is to be taken into :icc()unt in pronouncing upcni the pleasures of rest in an Indolent and sensual nature. — Moab. — There are two derivations: ZH'C,J'roin the father, or ia , water (as the xerien virile is eu|iliemistically called in Arabic), for semen and :x. Keil decides in favor of the first derivation, from a reference to the ex- planatory expressions (vers. 32, 34, 36). |.\nd also the analogy of the ■er in the New Covenant, and the Marriage Sup- per of the Lamb in the new world. 5. The distinction between the laughing of Abra- ham and .Sarah (see above). In ch. xxi. 6 there ajijiears still another, a third laugh, in order to deter- mine the n.ame Isaac (comp. v. 9). The laughter of a .joyful faith, liie laughter of" a doubting little faith, an; in the name of the son of promise, as mdeed at that of every child of the promise. 6. The initiation of Abraham into ihe pur|io8e» of (iod. In ch. xviii. 17, "the Septna. has the ad dition of rov ttoiSos /xov (^"1-") to ano 'A/3/»aa^, f04 which I'hilo reads tov ci>i\uu m'"' (comp. James, ii. 23). There is scarcely any passage in which this ^•nns or ^zrik (Isa. xli. 8 ; 2 Chron. xx, 7), would be more litthig than in this. Abralmm is the friend i< Jehovah (among the Moslems it has become a sur name; chalil Allah, or merely cl-chalil, from whicik CHAP. XVIII— XIX. l-8\ 44 ilebroD 5 also called Beit-el-clialil, or simply EI- tnalil), and we have no secrets from a friend." De- litzscli (comp. John XV. 15 if). The first reason is, that God has chosen .\braham, and that he, as the chosen, has the di'stinaiion to found in his race for all time, a tradition and school of the revelation of God, of righteousness and judgment. The doctrine of the election first appears here in its more definite form. [God says, I know him, but also that he will command, &c. We oughi- not to overlooli how early family relations, instructions and discipline, assume an important place in the progress of the kingdom of God ; and what a blessing descends upon those who are faithful as parents. "Family religion is God's method for propagating hi.« church. Tliis would lead him to exercise a careful parental au- thority for controlling his house in the name of God." Jacobus. — A. G.] 7. A further and more peculiar reason, why God reveals to Abraham the impending judgment upon Sodom, lies in this, that not only the history of So- dom, but also the Dead Sea, should be for all time a constituent part of the sacred history, a solemn warn- ing for the people of God, and for all the world. At the same time this history should make illustrious the justice of God, according to which a people are ripe for judgment, when a cry of its iniquity ascends to heaven. 8. Abraham's intercession, in its strength and in its self-Umiiation, is an eternal example of the true position of the believer to the corruption of the world. Upon the self-limitation of intercession see 1 John V. 16. Intercession even falls away from faith and becomes mere fanaticism or frenzy, when it oversteps the limits of truth. Abraham's excuses in his intercession, his prudent progress in his petitions, his final silence, prove that even the boldest inter- cession is morally conditioned. On the other hand, the whole power of intercession and the full certainty that prayer will be answered, appear here most clearly. [See the 29th verse, which makes it clear that Ara- ham's intercession was not fruitless. — A. G.] 9. It is evident from the intercession of Abraham, that the father of the faithful had a very different idea of righteousness from that which regards it as consisting only in the non plus ultra of punishment. • See upon the idea of SiKaios, Matt. i. 19. Moreover, in the reflection, the prudence, and the constancy of the intercession, the Abrahamie or even the Israel- itish character appears here in its true worth and in its sanctified form, as it enters afterward in the life of Jacob at first less sanctified, but at the same fitted for sanctification. But in regard to the thought of Abraham's intercession, we would make the follow- ing remarks: 1. His intercession takes more and more the form of a question. 2. He does not pray that the godless should be freed from punishment, but for the sparing of the righteous, and the turning away of the destructive judgment from all, in case there should be found a sufficient salt of the right- eous among them. 3. His prayer includes the thought that God would not destroy any single righteous one with the wicked, although the number of the right- eous should be too small to preserve the whole. [The righteous, of course, are not destroyed, although they «re often involved m the punishment of the wicked. —A. G.] 10. This history makes the truth conspicuous for jJl time, that the whole depraved world is preserved through a seed of believing and pious men, and that indeed, not acci rding to a numerical, but according to their dynamic majority. Ten righteous wouli have saved Sodom. But when even the salt of th« earth (Matt. v. 13) does not avail to save a people oi a community, then stiU God cares for the sah ation of his chosen, as is seen in the history of Noah, ths history of Lot, and the history of the destruction ol Jerusalem. But the relative mediators who ar« given to the world in the " salt of the earth," poini to the absolute mediator, Christ, who is the centra saving point in the history of the world. [We stand here on the verge of a mo.st striking type of the judg- ment. We know that the storm is gathering and ready to burst, but in the awful silence which pre- cedes it we hear the voice of the intercessor. Thus while the final judgment is preparing, the voice of the true intercessor is heard. — A. G.] 11. The Angels in Sodom. In all such cases there must come a last final decision. See above. 12. The manifestation which was given to Lot, corresponds with that which was given to Abraham, in a way similar to that in which the vision of the cen- turion, Cornelius, at Ccesarea, corresponds to the vision of Peter, at Joppa (Acts x.). The precondition for this connection of the revelations was, doubtless, in both cases, the mysterious bond of a common premo- nition or presentiment of great events. 13. The sin of Sodom runs, as a general charac- teristic, through the heathen world (see Rom. i. 24); still, in this aspect some nations are far more inno- cent or guilty than others. Church history also, it this connection, preserves sad remembrances. Among the causes of the ruin of the Osmanic kingdom, this sin stands prominent whose analogue is found in the sin of Onan (ch. xxxviii. 8.). 14. The description ol the night scene in Sodom is a night piece of terrible aspect and impressiveness. It is plain (from the little prospect of the mass for the gratification of personal lusts, and from the prob- ability that the inhabitants of the city only knew indirectly of Lot's mysterious guests), that the uproar of the .Sodomites was more than half an uprising against the judgment of Lot which they had already experienced, and a tumultuous manifestation that their abominable immorality must be held as a public custom, of which we have a purely analogous event in the uproar of the heathen at Ephesus (Acts xix. 2S ff). All the spirits of villainy, wantonness, and scoffing unbelief are to be regarded as nnfettered. The ripeness of the city for destruction, however, ia not to be viewed directly as a ripeness of the Sodon. ites for damnation (see Matt. xi. 23). 15. The demonic and bestial nature of sin ap- pears in this history in frightful, full hfe, or rather death size. [So, also, its corrupting power. Lot fell its influence, even though he resisted and condemned their (ile practices. The oifer which he makes to save his guests, although made under great confusion, anxiety and terror, shows its influence. — A. G.] 16. Lot's salvation is an image of salvation with the utmost difliculty. But the delay of his fiiint heartedness is raised to its highest power of double heartedness in the history of his wife. She is thf example of a worldly mind, which turns back frora the way of salvation, and through its seeking • ftei the world falls into the fire of juugr-iUt.* In this sense the Lord has set Lot's wife as a warning example * [The lookinff back shows, on the one hand, her doubl and unbelief of the divine warning, and on the other, thai her heart was still cliaging to the lusts of Sodom, and tha she was an unwilling follower of the rwouing angt^s KuKTZ, p. 195. — A, G.* 44^ GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSEi?. (Luke rrii. 22). We may perceive that even Lot was sensibly depressed as to tbe earnestness of liis faitli, through the ridicule of his sons-in-law, who regarded him as a jester. 17. The Dead Sea serves to complete the sym- bolic meaning which is peculiar to the whole land of Canaan. The whole land is an illustration of the divine word, and of sacred iiistory, and thus the Dead Sea in particular, i< tlie gla*s of the divine judgment. As a monument of the miraculous judgment it stands opposed to the Red Sea, which is the monument of the miraculous deliverance. So, likewise, as tbe sea of the old covenant, it stands opposed to Geuessaret, the sea of the new covenant. In the description of the Dead Sea, however, we must guard against those ancient assumptions, of tbe apples of Sodom, etc., al- though some one-sided apologies for these traditions of the Dead Sea have appeared again in recent times. [It is interesting to note how olten this event is referred to in the Xew Testament, not only directly but incidentally. The phrases flee from the wrath to come, unquencliable tire, the description of the sud- denness and completeness of the judgment, and its eternal duration in tlie smoke of their torment, which ascendeth for ever and ever, all have a more or less direct reference to this event. — A. G.] 18. Tbe early rising of Abraham, bis hastening to the place where he stood before Jehovah, and his silent look to tbe smoking vale of Siddim, is a sublime and impressive picture. There stands the mourning priest, lonely and silent in the morning light, as Jeremiah sat upon the ruins of Jerusalem. Now be saw that there were not ten righteous in Sodom, but knew from tbe rescue of Noah from the flood, and felt con- fident indeed that bis intercession had not been in vain. 19. In the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, as in the punitive miracles in Egypt, and in the biblical miracles generally, tbe correspondence between the miraculous divine providence and tbe intellectual and natural conditions upon the earth must not be mis- taken. 20. Lot and his daughters. It is a psychological fact that, in human nature, especially in beginners in the age of faith or those whose sensuous nature is Btrong, after a great tension of the life of faith, of spiritual elevation, great and dangerous reactions oc- cur, during which temptation may easily prove cor- rupting to the man. 21. Moah and Aminon. See the Bible Dictiona- ries. "De Wette, Tuch, Knobel, explain the narra- tive as a fiction of Israelitish national animosity, &c. (See above.) When, however, laterdeljauchery (Num. ii. 25) and impiety (e. p. 2 Kings iii. '.iii tf ) .'ipiiear as fundatiM'tital traits in the character and cnltus ot hotli people, we can at least bold with etjual justice, that these inherited sins came with tliem from tlnur origin, as that the tradition oi their origin has moidded their character." 22. Lofs disappearance. The chastising Itand of God is seen in the gravest form, in tbe fact that Lot is lo.st in the darkness of the mountains of Moab, AS a dweller in the caves. But it may l>e (juestionid irbether one is justified by this, in saying that he came to a bad end, aji Dklitzsch does in a detailed descrip- jon, alter a characteristic outline by F. C. V. Moskiis '^p. 4(>ii, coiiip. Kiel, p. 167). Uis not returning poor and shipwrecked can be explained upon belter grounds. In iiny iimc the testimony for him, 2 I'et. ii. 7, b, must not be overlooked. There remains one Jghl point in bis life, since be sustained tbe assaults of all Sodom upon his house, in the most extreiiM danger of his life. [It may be said, moreover, that hii leaving home and property at the divine warning, and when there were yet no visible signs of the judg- ment, and bis flight without looking back, indicate tlie reality and genuineness of his faith. — A. G.] His two-fold intoxication certainly has greater guilt than tbe one intoxication of Noah. His two-fold sin with his daughters may involve greater dilficnlty than tbe act of Judab. Both analogies show, however that in judging so ancient a character we may easi'.j place them too strictly in modern points of view. True, be appears, in comparison with .\brahain, with whom he once entered upon tbe path of the faith of the promise, in a light similar to that in which Esau appears in relation to Jacob. He might have suffi- cient piety to save his soul, but he was no man of the future, who coiold found a line of blessing ; he wag too much like the mass, too much under tbe senses, and too much involved in respect to worldly things for such a calling. " With tbe history of Lot," De- LiTzscH remarks, " the side line from Haran is com- pleted, and tbe origin of two people who are inter- woven in the history of Israel is related." 23. Tbe destruction of Sodora an example of tbe later destruction of tbe Canaanites. 24. The prudence which, in the life of Abraham, ap pears as a sinful prudence, and yet susceptible of heinj, sanctified, appears in the lives of his kindred as a fimily trait of the children of Therah, in Lot and his daugh- ters, as well as in Laban. But it takes on in them the expression of refined cimning, and thus becomes manifoldly and positively ungodly. Thus Lot himself chose the region of Sodom ; thus he flatteringly ad- dressed the Sodomites as brethren; thus he offers them bis daughters as a substitute, probably from an ironical expression of a prudent foresight that they, controlled by their demonic and unnatural lusts, would reject bis proposal : but his daughters us( criminal cunning to obtain offspring. This ince.st- however, appears in a milder light when set in con trast with the sin of Sodom. 2.5. Passavant. These cities are representej throughout the old covenant as types of the most severe judgments of God (Jer. xli. 11 ; 1. 4i), etc.) And there is again another word in the old cove- nant, a wonderful, mysterious promise, spoken con- cerning these places, which, at the very least, alle- viates the eternity of tbe pain, and for tbe sakt of Jesus Christ, the only redeemer of all mankind, abbreviates the endurance of the Iteavy judgments of the poor heathen (see Ezek. xxxix. 25 ; Jer. xxix. 14; .\lviii. 47 ; Ezek. xvi.). [The passages quoted by no tueaiis sustain the inference which is here drawn from them ; and the inference lies in the face of tbe general and constant testimony of tbe Scriptures. The words of our Lori.1, Matt. xi. 24, place the destiny of these places and of the heathen in its true light. — A. G.] That farther prophetic vision of the seer appears to cast new light upon the f irther fate of Sodom, when be says : This water flows otit towards the ea-st and down into the plain, and goes into the sea (salt .sea), and when it comes into the sea its waters shall become healthful (ch. xlvii. 8 ff. ; 1 Pet. iii. 19 f ; iv. 6). [Tbe following learned and itnpressive note on tlie destruction of Sodom, kindly furnished me by its author, "rill bs read with tbe deepest interest. — A. G.] Note on thk Destuuction of Sodom — Irs Sen DENNV.B8 — The Dekp Impression it hadx on niE A> CHAP. XVIIl.— XIX. 1-88. 44:i ciENT MisD — Its Frequent Mention in the Scrip- cCKES — ^TAriTDS — The Arabian Tradition. — "As the subversion by God of Sodom and Gomorrah." Such is the constant style of reference in the Hible. See Ueut. xxix. 22; Is. xiii. 19; Jer. xli.x. 18 ; Jer. 1. 40; Lam. iv. 6; Amos iv. U. Its ctei cceurriug in t'le same Ibrm of words, shows that it was a prover- bial or traditional saying ; and this reveals to us liow vividly the awful event had stamped itself upon the human memory. It is always described in language of its own. The peculiar Hebrew word is used in the same way of no other catastrophe. 'I'he « ord nsBna denotes utter subversion or reversal, — the bringing ji a thing, and all that belongs to it, in the direct opposite of its former condition. Land has become water, fertility barrenness and salt, beanty deformity, fragrance and freshness a vile and loath- Bome putridity. It is not simply decay and ruin, but an overthrow total and remediless. These cities are thus referred to as a standing warn- ing— a judgment of God visible from generation to generation. It is a region cursed by the Almighty, — doomed ever to bear the marks of its dreadful visita- tion, to which Peter refers, 2 Pot. ii. 6, xaX -irnKas Suiiii- fjiwv nai Vofioppas Tiippaiaai KATA2TP0*I>H KareKpi- yev^ vnoSitjfxa Tedfmuis: "the cities of SoAJ8, is, in all other cases (and these are quite frequent), used solely in its secondary meaning of falsehood icoudng from the primary sense of subversion, turn 444 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES ing wpsile down, tbrouL'h the intermediate ideas of contrariness or opposition, ab inverfendo, perverten- do), in these speci:il usages from the Koran, and oiliers like them, the word ever goes baclc to its primitive Hebrew sense, being taken precisely as "]En and nrsma in the Bible. If the Hebrew verb had had a hoth-pa-hel form, its participle, "EHr'''? • molh-hap-pek = motaffek, would be almost identical with the Arabic word so constantly used for this purpose (in this sense) and lor no other. Evidently it was an archaism in the days of Mohammed, and this accounts for its being used as a projier name, in which form it had become fixed against change and 8ub.stitution. The root is used in the same maimer throughout the Syriac version, but in this branch of the Shemitic it had, in all its apphcations, kept bearer to its old primary sense preserved in the Hebrew. What shows that it was an antique phrase in Arabic, or that i^\ (or "En) had lost the sense of subversion in all other appUcations, and that its employment as a proper name in this particular con- nection came from tradiiional preservation, is the fact that even in translating the Old Testament, the Jew- ish Arabic interpreters never use it, — not even in those places whcie the Hebrew -|Bn and nssna would have immediately suggested it as the more fitting word ; and this, too, notwithstanding that they fretiuently give to an Arabic term a rarer He- brew sense, thus Rabbi Saad does not employ it in this very passage, Isaiah xiii. 19, but uses, instead, the more common Arabic verb, ,_>Jji , to express 'ie sense of overturning which is given by nssnia ; Araljic verb ^iJol , ^^^ letter n (or iC) of the He- orew has been softened into X , but there can be no doubt of the two words being etymologically identi- eal. So, too, in the Koran, sometimes, the Hebrew sense of the antique Arabic sSJiiy^' -, is clearly given in different and more common .\rabic words. As in Surat xv. 73, 74, where, speaking aguin of this very judgment, and the manner of it, it says : "And a sudden, storm took them at sunrise, and toe made the luifhesi parts of it to be the lowest, I gl ;1 ... Iff ^11 & 1,_; 1 » -g* (that is, we turned it apside down), tmd we rained upon them stones of ouming marl " — a volcanic earthquake and a lava shower. This standing epithet occurs, Lam. iv. fi, in the same cOTUiection and in the same way ; that is, in the nature of a proper name, though there it has the form of tlie participle perfect of "En. It is ns^snn ="ID , "Sodom the overturned." Uur English translation of the whole passage is far from being clear : " (jreater than the punishment of the sin of Sodom which was overthrown as in a rnipnieni, BDd no hands alai/ed on her": cn^ n3 ibn xb . In this passage there is an imcertainty as to the ety- mology and meaning of the word ilbn, but that interpretation is to be preferred which i.s most in keeping with the ideas ol' suddenness, or quick »lami, tlwt maliC B4 graphic a feature in all idhi.sions to the event, wliellier Hebrew or Arabic (ieseuius inaki-B "in from i"n (torqucre), and gives it the lense : Jion iminima aunt mamui, " no hands were sent upon, or against her" — meadng, hands of ttj enemy. Rabbi Tanehum's Arabic commentaiy is to the same efl'ect : ''Of Sodom it is said hert, tha there did not come upon her the hand of man, bui she w^as overturved, at one bloii; by the divine com- mand ; the word being the same as that in Jer. xxiii. 19, ' on the head of the wicked shall rush (^psin^) a rushing tempest, bbinrB ^sp (a whirlwind ,s?«n^ or hurled), and also as found Eccles. v. 12, 15 nbin nj'H V", there is a sore evil (an impend- ing or threatening evil) that I have seen under the sun." It may be a question here, however, whether C"'T' refers to the hands of the enemy, or to the hands of the inhabitants of the doomed city. If we place the accent on the ultimate, ihn may be from nbn , and this would give us the rendering, " when no hands were weak in her" — that is, suddenly, when they were in their full strength and security. Or the same general idea mav he obtained from bin , if we advert to its primary sense, which wo find very clearly in the Arabic Jl -^ . It is a curv- ing motion combined with the spiral or oblique Hence the sense of pain as expressed by twisting, wriiiffiiiif (torquere). It is used to denote the most intense anguish, the wringing of the hands in de- spair; which is the language "^niDloyed by the Peschito Syriac version to render knopia (distress or perplexity), Luke xxi. 25. No hniids were wrung in her. So sudden was the storm that there was no time for lamenting over their doom. All this, too, is expressed by the way in which ^ I* ^ the frequent Koranic word, ^^^^.yi , is used when sudden judgments are described, and especially this particular event. It is rendered sometimes, punixh- vient, or pain. It is also used of tli- crasli of the thunder, fragor tonitru ; but in its most literal sense it denotes one sliarp cry or shriek. Or it may be rendered, a shock. Thus in the passage before quoted, Surat xv. 73 : "a sudden storm or shock took them at sunrise" (comp. Gen. xix. 23). The same, verse 83 of the same Surat, "took tlitni early in the morning." Though literally (lei}cifing one suilden scream of terror, it is taken for the eause, the thunderstorm or earthquake that produces it. Thus is it most impressively employed to re|ireseiit the suddenness and surprise of the judgment that came upon those people of Lot, as the Sodomites arc styled, "only one .shock; there was in it no waiting," no recovery. Or it may be rendered. " only one cry, and all was over." The remedilessness, as well as the suddenness, is still more graphically .set forth in the use of similar langiuige, Surat x.xxvi. 25 : "Lo, one cry, and they are all still "' — literally, bicr/it out, .l«t\^L&., extinguished, dead. So, again, Surat liv. 31 : " Lo, we sent upon them one sliock (one shriek) and they are all burnt stubble." In the snme manner is it used of the day of judgment, xxrvi. r)3 : "One shock, or one cry, and they (the risen dead) are all before us." For other similar passages with similar applications, see Koran, xi. 70, 97 ; xxiii. 43 ; .xxix. 39; 1. 41 ; xv. 73, S3 ; hiii. 3. In llie most express terms ). How severely, on the other hand, Zach- arias was chastised for his unbelief (see Luke i. 20.) — A Christian must never measure the promises of God by what seems good to him, but give to the powei of God the preference over his reason (Zech. viii. 6 ; Luke i. 37 ; 1 Pet. iii. 6). — Gerlach : In regard to Sarah. Even her unbelief which lay concealed within her, must be brought out into the light, since it was now designed to confirm her confidence in the prom- ise, which should not be fulfilled without her faith. — Schroder, (Luther): Now there is hospitahty in all places where the church is. She has always a com- mon purse and storehouse, according to Matt. v. 42, and we should all so serve her, and furnish her, not only with doctrine but also with kindness, so that the sjiirit and the flesh may here at the same time find refreshment and consolation (Matt. xxv. 35, 40). — Kambach: Ver. 8. As Abraham's tent is here the house in which the Son of God and his angels are entertained, so is his bosom the common place of rest for the blessed in the other world (Luke xvi. 22). — The power and susceptibility for intuition, and the absorbing and even careful attention to busi- ness, which were separated in Mary and Martha (Luke X. 39), are here seen united in the same person. — That they jnust necessarili/ eat, would be in opposition to their spiritual nature, but the power to eat was given with the human form. — Ver. 9. Now follows, at LuTHKR says, the table talk, that nothing might be wanting in this description, and that the whole world might know that this feast was not so passed as among the monks, who must keep silence at th» table. 2. Section. The revelation of God coneeTing Sodom, and Abraham!'^ hiferce.-inort/ prai/er (vers. 16- 33). — 1 The communing of God with himself befor* 44b GEXESIS, OB THE FIKST BOOK OF MOSES. the revelation (ver. 18), or the revelation of God throughout the truit of the highest divine purpose, as tlie creation of man ; 2. the reason for this revela- tion (ver. lii); 3. its oontents (vers. 20, 21); 4. its results : a. the departure of the men to the judgment (ver. 22) ; b. the intercession of Abraham (vers. 23- SO).— .\bi-alKim the friend of God (child of God, ser- vant of God, the intiuiaie confidant of God). — The cry of the sin of Sodom. — Tlie intercession of Abraham for Bodoin as the first long prayer and intercession com- municated to us : 1. awaliened or animated by the consciousness of salvation which was given to him ; 2, as a pattern for all intercessory prayers, — The great importance of intercession. — Its features: 1. The boldness of faith ; 2. caution m the fear of God ; 3. truthfulness of love. — Even the apparently unavailing intercessions are not in vain. — Starke: Ver. 20. They (the Sodomites) went so far that the greatness of tlieir sin had become a proverb (Is. i. 9 fi'.), and therefore they were destroyed 4ti0 years earlier than the Canaanites. — The sins crying to heaven are espe- cially, in the Holy Scriptures: 1. the shedding of innocent blood (ch. iv. 10 ; Job xvi. 18) ; 2. the sin of Sodom ; 3. the oppression of the people of God (Ex. iii. 7), especially of widows and orphans. (Ex. XX. 22, 27; Sirach. xsxv. 19); 4. the withhold- ing of the hire of the laborer (James v. 4). — There- fore he could not umlerstand by the righteous little ehildren; for, although they are not righteous in their natural state, they could not have committed sins crying to the heavens. — They were, however, included with those destroyed, without, it may be hoped, any injury to their blessedness, or (so will it be added by some in an uncertain way) because Gud saw that they would tread in the Ibotpaths of their fathers. [But the Scriptures never allude to this knowledge of God as the ground of his acts, either saving or destructive. — The same event bears a very different aspect and meaning as sent to the wicked and the good, e. g., death. So with these judgments. — A. G.] The nearer Abraham comes to God in his prayers and intercession, the more clearly he recognizes his nothingness and entire unworthi- ness. A glorious fruit of faith. — The people of So- dom, indeed, could not think what was determined in the purpose of the watchers concerning them, and how Abraham stood in the breach. — Ver. 32. This I will is here repeated six times, to intimate the truth of God, his earnest will, that he does not will the death of the sinner, hut rather tliat he should turn unto him and Uve (Ezek. xviii. 11, 32). — Bib. Tub. : Intercession for a brother believer, even for the god- less, a Christian duty. — Mark this, ye godless, that ye and the world stand only for the sake of the righteous. — We must come before God with the greatest rever- ence, and in the deepest humility of heart bow our- selves before his sacred majesty. — The righteous are highly esteemed In the sight of God. — (Jerlach: Ver. 19. Abraham, I have known him, t. e., chosen in my love. As Amos iii. 2 ; John -wii. 3. Ver. 23. The righteous who dwell together with the godless in any place, restrain the judgments of God. — Zi.n- ZENnoRK : I catmot tell in terms strong enough the blessed privilege of speaking with our Lord. — Cai.- WKK IIaniibui n : Hut in this prayer lie concealed deep mysteries, which render conspicuous to us the worth and importance, in the sight of (Jod, of the righteous in the worlil, and on the oilier hand helps to explain tin* woiidcri'iil jiatience and long suffering of God towards the evil, aud even towards lieaven OTini; siunprB. — Schroder: Calvin: If, therefore, oftentimes temptations contend in our hearts, snA things meet us, in the providence of God, which seem to involve a contradiction, let the conviction 9f his righteousness still be unshaken in us. We musl pour into his bosom the cares which give us pain and anxiety, that he miy solve for us the difficultiei which we cannoi 'k:)lve. — Passava.nt: When I othe* wise can ilo nothing, when I am without any iuflu ence, and free access, without any means or anj power, then still I may do something through the in tercessory prayer. 3. Section. The entrance and ■•th verse is alone fitted for public use. But from this a faint light may be thrown upon the whole night-scene Lot's disap pearance as a dweller in caves. — Lot's history illus- trates the truth, that whoever will build a hotise. must count the cost: 1. His inspired exodus from Haran with Abraham, and journey through Canaan to Egypt, with ever-increasing wealth ; 2. his settle- ment in the valley of Sodom ; 3. his asylum in Zoar; 4. his disappearance from the scene in the caves of the mountains. — How should the pious fear temptations when the mind is unbent after extreme spiiitual tension. — Man falls easily into the sins of the flesh when the ideals of his intellectual life are dissolved and lose their power. f — Ruth a Moabitesa. — Starke : Lot's daughters. The reason which moved them was rather a groundless prejudice thau wantonness of the flesh. (Anxiety lest the human race should perish. It may he, also, that they were only Lot's step-daughters, if he had married in Sodom a widow who was the mother of two daughters). — Cramer : Loneliness in retired places allures not only to good, but also, and much more, to great sins (Eccles. iv. 10). — Whoever will avoid sin must avoid the occasions which lead to it. — [Strong drink the fruitful source of untold degradation and sins. — A. G.] — Gregort I. : There was a moral sense in Lot, but it was confused and disturbed. Intoxication de- ceived Lot, who was not deceived in Sodom ; the flames of lust burn him, whom the flames of sulphur did not burn. — Lcther : Some think that Lot died soon after, from distress and sorrow, before his daughters were delivered, because otherwise he woiUd not have consented that names should be given the children constnnily reniimling him of his in cest. — He who was not deceived in Sodom, drunken- ness deceived ; who in .Sodom, the very school of unchastity, had lived chastely, in the cave was guilty of incest ; suffered shipwreck in the harbor. — Ruth a Moabitess. We may infer from Is. xi. 14 ; Jer. xlviii. 47 ; Dan. xi. 41, that there will be, besides, ♦ [The beauty and fruitfulness of nature attracted him, and he chose it without thinking wliether it would work injruy to his soul. The same power now prevf^nts bin- from earnestly heeding the salvation of his soul. Baumoartcn, p. 213.— A. G.l t [ " Those who have been wondrously preserved froir temporal destruction, may shamefully fall into sin.'* Ja eobus. — A. G ' 44S GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. some conversions from the Moabites to Christ. — The children of Ammon were characterized by similar sins with timse of their brother Moab, and therefore have a similar future. — Drunkenness is the way to all bestial lusts and acts. — (Holy descendants from polluted beds. Judg. xi. 1 ; Heb. xi. 32.)— Sihroder : The thought tliat they sliould remain alone in case of their father's early death was one to them very hard to bear. Then, indeed, tliey would be entirely helpless and without protection in the wide world. If no husband was granted to them, they would at least have children, sons, who could give protection and help. — {Berl. Bibel. : The following riddle has been constructed from the history: My father, thy father, our children's grandfather; my husband, tlj husband, the husband of our mother, and yet one and the same man.) — Baumgakten : This is lua crime of Lot's daughters, that to secure descend- ants, and those of pure blood, they thought incest a small otfen'"e. — Herbergeb • For one evil hour, one must bea: the sword at his side a whole year. — The same: Still even such children (illegitimate and spri ging from incest) should not despair, (iod can do great things even through the illegitimate Jephtha (Judg. xi, 1 fl'.). True repentance makes all well [But true repentance is never separated from triu faith. Faith in Christ and repentance make all well. — A.G.] EIGHTH SECTION. Abraham and Abimeleeh of Oerar. Jiu and Sara/i's renewed exposure throxtgh his human, eaUu- lating prudence^ «s formerly in Egypt before Pharaoh. The Divint preservation, Abraham's intercession for Abimeleeh, Chapter XX. 1-18. 1 And Abraham jotimeyed from thence toward the south' country [the mid-dayl, and dwelled between Kadesh and Sliur, and sojourned [as a Btramger even] in Gerar [lodging-piace, 2 pilgrim's rest]. And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, She is my sister; and Abimeleeh 3 [father of the king, or father-king] king of Gerar sent and took Sarah. But God [Eiohim] came to Abimeleeh in a dream by night, and said to him, Behold, thou art but a dead man [thou diesi, art dead], for the woman which thou hast taken ; for she is a man's wile 4 [is married]. But Abimeleeh had not come near her : and he said, Lord, wilt thou slay 5 also a righteous nation? Said he not unto me. She is my sister? and she, even she herself said. He is my brother : in the integrity of my heart, and the innocency of my 6 hands have I done this. And God said unto him in a dream, Yea, I know that thou didst this in the integrity of thy heart ; for I also witliheld thee from sinning against me : 7 therefore suflfered I thee not to touch her. Now therefore restore the man his wife ; for he is a prophet,'' and he shall pray for thee, and thou shalt live : and if thou restore 8 her not, know thou that thou shalt surely die, thou and all that are thine. Therefore Abimeleeh rose early in the morning, and called all his servants, and told all these 9 things in their ears : and tlie men were sore afraid. Then Abimeleeh called Abraham, and said unto him. What hast thou done imto tis? and what liave I ofTended thee, that thou hast brought on me and on my kingdom a great sin ? thou hast done deeds unto 10 me that ought not to be done. And Abimeleeh said unto Abraham, What sawe.st thou 11 [evil], that thou hast done this thing? And Abraham said. Because I thought [said], Surely the fear of God [Eiohim] is not in this place ; and they will slay me for my wife a 12 sake. And yet indeed she is my sister; slie is the daughter of my father, but not the 13 daughter of my mother; and she became mj wife. And it came to pass when God rElohim] caused me to wander [to go on pilgrimages; a striking plural.' The manifestations of God here and there, caused me to go here and there, pilgrimages] from my father's house, that I said untO her, This is thy kindness which thou .'ihalt show unto me; at every place whither we shall 14 come, say of nie. He is my brotiier. And Abimeleeh took slieep and oxen [smaU and large cattle], and menservants, and womenservants, and gave them to Abraham, an 1 re- 15 stored him Sarah his wife. And Abimeleeh said, Behold, my land is before tlie«= !6 [stand* open to theo] : dwell where it pleasetli thee [is good in thine eyes]. And unto Sarah he said. Behold, I have given thy brother a thousand pieces of silver : behold he is to thee CHAP. XX. 1-18. t49 [for] a covering of the eyes unto all that are with thee, and with all other : ".bus she was reproved * fset right, proved to be a wife, not unm:irriedl. 17 So Abraham prayed unto God [Elohim] : and God [Eiohim] healed Abinielech, and 18 his wife, and his maidservants; and tiiey bare children. For the Lord' had fast closed up all the wombs of the house of Abimelech, because of Sarah, Abraham's, wife. t' Ver. 1. — SSiH . The region south of what was afterwards called Judah. — A. G.l [* Ver. 7.— X^nS , from X33 , to cause to bubble up as a fountain. Keil, Delitzsch, and others derive it from A root t<3 and XD, to breathe, and thus make uabi to mean one inspired — who speaks that which is inbreathed of God. — A. Q. (^ Ver. 13 — ^ypn is plural in punctuation, agreeing grammafically with D^n,X. Vav, however, may be regaided u the third radical, and the verb may then really be singular. Mdrpht, p. 325. — A. G.] [* Ver. 16.— nnD3, 2 pers. fem. sing. Niphal, an unusual form. See the Exegetical note.— A. G.] I' Ver. 18.— Jelio'vah.— A G.l GENERAL PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 1. The present chapter and the following ap- pear to favor strongly the documentary hypothesis. The cases in which the name Jehovah appear.-s (chap. XX. 18 and xxi. 1), have, according to Delitzsch, all the traits of explanatory additions of the complett-r. But Knobel accepts, aside from the text of the origuial writing (chap. xxi. 2-5), a twofold enlargement, which should be ascribed to the Jehovistic writer, but which he must have derived in great part from Elohistic records designed to complete the original record, and only in part from a completing Jeho- vistic record (p. 180, 181). We leave the hypothesis of different records to rest upon its own basis, but shall enquire how far the choice in the names of God may be explained from the text itself, and this with- otit regara to the hypothesis in question. 2. The repetition of the fact that Abraham pro- claims his wife to be his sister has been noticed already. In Knobel's view, the Jehovistic writer has recorded tlie occurrence with Sarah already (ch. lii. 11-20), because he was there an independent narra- tor, which is not the case here. " This conjecture," remarks Delitzsch, " is certainly plausible if one ascribes the Elohistic portions to a peculiar source, but it is equally probable that the same eveut might occur twice in the life of Abraham." Keil, on the other hand, justly brings into prominence the great distinction between the two histories. The tirst dif- ficulty, viz. that Abraham, after having experienced in Egypt tlie reproach of this deed, should here repeat it once more, caunot be removed, if, as Delitzsch holds, Abraham in Egypt had condemned himself to penitence after the reproof of Pharoali ; if even he walked under a general sense that he had done wrong, as Delitzsch and Bauingarten state the case. [It is not insupposible, surely, in the light of experience, that even such a believer as Abraham should have fallen again into the same sin: that he should have repeated the act even when he was walking under the sense of his wrong-doing in the first instance. — A. G.] Our history gives us the key (v. 13) why this act was repeated. Abraham could not make an explanation to Pharoah, concerning the determination to pro- Claim his wife his sister while among strangers, but Abimelech has instilled the necessary confidence in aim, for this confidential explanation. But if this is the case once with the ma\im, the event might, under possible circumstances, have often occurred unless Jehovah had interfered to prevent this ven- ture of an unfounded and exaggerated confidence ; which we have already above distinguisheii from a mere exposure of Sarah. It must be taken into 29 account, moreover, that Abraham had recently r». ceivttd fearful impressions of the wickedness in the world, which naturally filled him with suspicion. The second difficulty consists in this : that Abimelech should have found delight in taking Sarah, who was ninety years old, into his harem. According to Kurtz, the motive lay in her still blooming or now re- juvenated beauty ; according to Delitzsch, he would relate himself by marriage with the rich nomadic prince, Abraham. Beauty and the consideration of rank do not exclude each other; spiritual excellence and greatness have often an almost magical effect. But it is to be observed that here it is not said that the beauty of Sarah was reported to Abimilech. He knew only, it may be, that there was a sister of Abraham in his tent, and brought her to himself. 3. We are here told again that Abraham broke up his tent, and journeyed thence towards the south — the land towards the mid-day (ch. xii. 9 ; xiii. 1). According to ch. xiii. 18, he had a permanent abode at Hebron ; but here he removes from Hebron to the south. This is to be explained upon the ground that, for the northern parts of Canaan, the south designates prei-'minently the land of Judah; but for the land of .ludah, thus for Hebron itself, it denotes the parts towards Arabia Petrea, Egypt, and the western shore upon the Mediterranean. The southern section of Canaan (which was assigned to the tribes of Judah, Simeon, and Benjamin) falls into four distinct parts, through the character of the couutry. The mountains (inn) or highlands form the central part, upon whose westerly slopes lies a hilly country which gradually sinks to the plain (nbsil"), while towards the east the desert (i2"7^) falls ofl' into the valley of the Jordan and the Dead Sea, but towards the south, the mid-day land (a;3.. Josh. xy. 21 ; com- pare above ch. xii. 9 ; xiii. 1 ) tonus, in several distinctly marked teri-aces, a kind of first step to the mountains, from the Petrean peninsula. (See Geioss, in Stud, und Krit. 1848, p. 1080.) Here Abraham descends to the stretch of country between Kadesh and Shur, and remained a long time about Gerar, whose ruina have been recently discovered by Rowland, under tlie name Khirbet-el-Gerar, about three hours south- easterly from Gaza, in the neighborhood of a deep and broad wady, which takes the name D.-churf-cI- Gerar." Delitzsch. Robinson sought Gerar in vain, see ScHRooER, p. 382. " Eusebius and Jerome loc.ite the place about twenty-five Roman miles south from Kleutheropolis, and Sozomen relates that there stood here, very near by a winter stream, a great and re- nowned convent. The name of Marcian, bishop of (ierai (pi'rha|is in the conveut), appears among tb« 150 GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. Bubscribers in the Council of Chalcedon in the year 451." "Gerar, upon the way from Gaza to Elusa, removed aljout three hours from the tirst-nauied place." BuD.'^eii. The mo3t southerly of the five cities of the Philistines was not far from Beersheba. The king of Gerar, Abimelech, had his territory in the lands of the Philistines, according to ch. xxi. 33. In ch. xxvi. 1, he is named directly as a king of the Philistines. According to Bertheau, the reference to the Philistines ia an anticipation, and Delitzsch also finds in ch. xxvi. traces of a later hand, though not recognizing therein an actual anticipation. If n'i|3B denotes the land of wanderers, or of strangers (Ge- seniusl, the name denotes those who came from the coasts into the interior, in distinction from the earlier Canaanites, and the mquiry whether the later PhiMs- tines, of the times of the Judges and Kings, are here meant, is a matter by itself; in any case, the text here intimates that the later confederate cities of the Philistines did not yet exist. Hitzig and Ewald also concede Philistine emigrations into Canaan, or tradi- tions of them, before Moses. Kuobel's view, that Abraham may have left Hebron from a similar anxiety with that which led Lot (to leave Zoar), is arbitrary in the highest degree, since Abraham was in covenant with tlie mightier men in Hebron. Ac- cording to Keil, he went probably to find better pastures. In any case the pasture-ground must be changed from time to time, but this could be done through a ivider range, as we learn from the history of Joseph and Moses. The neighborhood of the scene of the terrible judgment upon Sodom, in con- nection with other unknown motives, may have determined him to change his residence. The birth of Isaac (ch. xxi.) and the offering of Isaac (ch. xxii.) occur during his residence in the further soutli : but then he dwelt (ch. xxiii. 1) again in Hebron, although his return thither from Beersheba, where he had last dwelt (cli. xxi. 33), is not recorded. 4. l^nce, from the promise which was given to Abraham in the oak-grove of Mamre, to the birth of Isaac, we must reckon, according to ch. xviii,, about a year, Abraham must have drawn southwards very soon after the overthrow of Sodom, and the meeting with Abimelech must also have taken place at an early date. But if vers. 17, 18 seem to point tg a louger time, this creates no real difficulty, since the sickness of the house of Abimelech may have lasted a long time after Sarah was restored. More- over, our history illustrates, in two respects, what may introduce the further history of the birth of Isaac. First, we see that Sarah was not faded in her appearance, although according to the usual sup- position her body was dead. Tlien we see how her usual relation to Abraham could be aniirmted and Btrengthened by a new affection resulting directly through the exposure and disturbance to which it had been subjected. EXEGETICAi AND CRITICAL. 1 Abraliam'9 settlement in the Souths ejtpecialti/ tk Oerar. AhimelechU error, uiiaI the eidmoitUioti 0/ Ood (vers. 1-7). — Beti^een Kadesh and Shiir. — Kadesh, sec ch. xiv. 7 ; Slmr, ch. xvi. 7. We must distinguish between this dwelling-place and the peculiar sojovim in Gerar. Schkuder: *' Leaving his herds and servants behind him in this region, he bimself repairs to Gerar." — Abimelech (Father King, or my Father King). A standing title for tin kings of Gerar, as Pharoah was in Egypt and Mel chizedec, or .\donizedec, in Salem (see Ps. xxxiv. \ ) the king the father of the land. — God (Elohiml came to Abimelech. — Itis presupposed that Abime lech had the knowledge of the true God ; he could not have known him as Jehovah. — In a dream by eight. — Knobel finds in this feature, as in similar cases, that these communications are not in accord 'ance with the Elohistic writer. But the supposition is entirely arbitrary. The prophetic dream of the night is generally closely connected with the moral reflections and longings of the day. It is in full agreement with the nature of dreams, that the com- munication should be made in several, not in one single act (see Gen. xxxvii. and xli. ; Matt, ii).— She is a man's wife (married). — Literally, ruled by a ruler, or her lord. His sin was thus marked as an infringement of the married rights of a stranger. The anxious dream appears to have been introduced through the sickness impending over him (see v. ]7).* — Wilt thou slay also a righteous nation? — Delitzsch refers the C5 directly to the adjective right- eous. A nation liowever righteous, i.e., although it is righteous. But why then does he use the term people or nation ? Knobel thinks that the fate of the Sodomites was floating in his mind. In this way tlu.'t chapter is, through a delicate psychological feature, connected with the preceding. Abimelech is conscious of iimocence as to his subjective state. He assumes the right to possess a harem or to live in polygamy, and the right of princes to bring into their harem any unmarried persons of their territory. He is con- scious of a pure heart, and asserts that liis hands aie pure, since Abraham and Sarah, through their own declarations, had rendered it impossible that he should have any intention to interfere with the rights of another. She is my sister. [These incident.s show the truth and the need of Scripture ; — its truth, be cause it does not represent the patriarchs as exempt from human infirmities ; the need of it, because the best of men were not able to make for themselves even a correct standard of moral duty (and how much less of faith) without Scripture. Wordsworth, p. 91. — A. G.] — And God said unto him in a dream. — The transaction contiimes in a new and more quiet dream. God recognizes tlie apology as essentially vaUd, and reveals to him how and why he had kept him from touching the wife of a prophet. With this he points out to him the cause of his sick- ness. The command to restore the woman was en- forced by a threatening. Although he was guiltless as to his subjective state, it is a reproach to him that he acted blindly, and betrayed himsell' into the danger, either of depriving a prophet of his wife, or rather ol' being punished by God with death. [That Abim- elech thought himself innocent, did this, as he says, in the ^aS'-P integrity of his heart, may be ex- plained from his moral and religious standpoint But that God recognizes his deed as .sucli, and stil says to him tliat he can only live throMah the inter- ces.sion of Abraham, thus that his sin was one woilhy of death, proves that God regards him as one who was fitted to have, and ought to have, deeper moral views and piety. This is intimated in the change of the names of tiod in the narrative, and noticed in th« • (The term, however, may mean, dead a«t« urigrenv which is rendered probable by ver. 17. God healea Abim» lech. Jacobus.— A. G.l CHAP. XX. 1-18. 15; text Keil, p. lt>8. — A.G.] That is to aay, the spirit of ■■<. higher moral stamlpoiut comes to him iii his dream, and opens to him not only the cause of his sickness, but also that divine preservation secured by the sickness, as well as his duty and the d^inger of death in wliich he was still moving. With this he receives au enlargement of his religious knowledge. " At tirst c-'nbs (without the article) the Godhead in a general sense appears to him (ver. 3) : but Abime- lech recognizes in the appearance the Lord "'J"'!?., upon which tlie narrator introduces OTl'bsn the personal and true God, as speaking to him (ver. 6.) — For he is a prophet. — The spirit of prophecy had been present from the beginning in the Scripture, but here the name prophet occuis for the tirst time. How could this aggravate the error of Abimelech, that Abraham, whose rights he ignorautly had vio- lated, was a prophet ? Knobel explains that the sin of violating the rights of the chosen of God, which he had in idea committed, was a sin against God liimself. Since every sin is a sin against God himself, it must still be asked, how far this shows the danger of greater guilt y for the text cannot be explained under the idea of a partiality ot God for Abraham. But Abimelech held Abraham and Sarah as the ordi- nary nomads of his time, and thought theretore that he could blindly lay his liands upon them ; he thus resisted the dim impression, which they must have made upon him, of a higher calling and aim. A prophet should be received m the name of a prophet ; the sin against the divine in the prophet was a sin igainst the divine in his own conscience, and thus in I special sense a sin against tiod. — And he shall pray for thee. — Abraham had already appeared as I royal warlike hero, in his conflict with the Eastern iings. We have learned to recogiuze him as a priest, especially in his intercessory prayer for Sodom : here he appears preeminently as a prophet. But here intercession appears as the most obvious func- tion ol the prophet.* The attributes of the prophet and the priest are thus still inwardly united in one, as this mdeed is evident from the altars he erected. 2. jf7ie atonement uf Abiinelceli (vers. S-Itj). — And called all his servants (courtiers). — It marks the frank, open character of this God-fearing king, that lie humbles himsell by communicating the events of the night, before his courtiers. It was humbling in the lirst place to confess tliat, in spirit- ual blindness, he had made a dangerous mistake, and secotidly that he must restore to the stranger his wite. It speaks well also for his household and his court, that the effect of his reverence communicates itself to his servants. — Then Abimelech called Abraham. — He addresses him before his people, for Abraham had not only brought him into danger, but also his household and kmgdoui. He had reason to complain of the conduct of Abraham, as I'haraoh before hun (ch. xii.;. He \i thus also evidently a bold, heioic character, who does not shrink Iroiii declaring against Abraham his injured sense of truth and justice, although he must have regarded him as under the special protection of God. lie does not belong to tiie kmgs who oppose the priests in slavish bigotry. — What hast thou done to us ? — Done til us. Thus he values the unity in which he feels tirat he is bound with his liouseliold and jieople. But he reproaches him especially with this : that he aid brought him into danger c f bringing gnit * iSee Jer. xxvii. 18, referred to by Bujsh.— A. G.] upon himself and his ptople. This, he sa\ !, is iic moial. But since he takes up again the words What have I offended thee? and ask.s. What hast tliou seen? he utters in a discreet 'orin, which concedes the possibility that lie might hav« ignorantly occasioned the wrong of Abraham, liii consciousness that he had himself indeed given no occasion for this deceitful course. Keil atid Knobel explain the words what hast thou seen ? what hast thou in thy eye, what purpose ? DKt.iTZSCH (with a reference to Fs. xxxvii. 37 : Ixvi. l^): **It is preferable to take the word in its usual sense through all time : what evil hast thou seen in me or in us, that thou believest us capable of greater evil '!'' — Abraham said, because I thought (said). — He assumes the antecedent ; I acted thus, becauae he is ashamed. The two grounds of apology Ibllow. The first runs : Because I spake (thought or con- sidered it with myself and with Sarah). [This use of the word Tniss is fully illustrated by Bush, who refers to E.\. ii. 14 ; 1 Kings v. 5 ; I's. xiv. 1. — A. G.] — Surely the fear of God is not in this place. — This S|)ecial motive has its explanation in tlie fact that he had so recently seen the destruction of Sodom. The fear of men which had determined him so to act in Egypt, was awakened afresh by this de- struction. But he palliates the offence of this declara- tion by his second excuse. He explains at first that what he had said was not untrue, since Sarah, as his half-sister, was his sister; and then why, in his mi- gration li-om Haran, he had arranged with Sarah that she should journey with liim from place to place under the name of his sister. [Some suppose that Saiah is the saiLie with Iscah, xi. 2;). Bush holds that Terah had two wives: the one the mother of Uarau, the father of Sarah .and Lot; the other the mother of Abraham. — A. G.] The suppi essed feehng of an end- less, difficult pilgrimage, and of a very dangerous' situation, reveals itself clearly in the expressions of vers. 13, 14. He cannot yet speak to Abimelech of Jehovah, his covenant God. Still less was it neces- sary that he shotdd reveal to him that Jehovah had promised Canaan to him. Thus he says : at the command of God I entered upon my wamJerings. He speaks of his theocratic journeys as wanderings, says Elohitn instead of Haelohim, uses this noun with the plural of the verbs, that he may make him- self understood by Abimelech. " This use of the substantive with the plural verbs is found tin the Pentateuch only in this author, ch. xxxv. 7 ; Ex. xxiL 8; XXX. 4,8; Josh. xxiv. 19. Gksenius, § MB, 2; EwALii, g 318 a,)" Knobel. Keil finds in the words of Abraham, especially in the plural of tlie verb, a certain accommodation to the polytheistic standpoint of the Pliilistine king. Delitzsch, on the other hand, remarks, that the plural connection of Elohim is found in passages which exclude any idea of accommo- dation, 01- of any polytheistic reference ; by which he refutes ^it the same time the explanation of Schel- ling, that the GoAs of the house of Terah are to be understood by Elohim. Under the expression '[Sm C'n'SX [The verb here is not necessarily plural. But if it be, it is only an instance of the literal meaning of Elohim, the eternal, .supernatural powers, coming into view. Mcrpht, p. 328. — A. G.j we understand the fact, expressed with some reser vation, that Hai lohim, through a pluraHty of special niaiiifestations of God, which he received here and there, had caused him to move from place to plac'' and thus, although in the extremest danger which hit 152 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. wanderings could occasion, extended hia providence over him still. When, on the contrary, Abimelech (ch. xxvi. 28) calls God Jehovah, Delitzsch supposes {p. 103), but without certainty, that it is the same person, and besides overloolvS the diS'erence of time, in which a longer intercourse may have made the Philistines laniiliar with tlie -\brahamic ideas. — And Abimelech took sheep and oxen. — He is satis- fied, and acts analogously to the conduct of Pliaraoh (ch. xii.), iti that he makes Abraham rich presents of the ancient nomadic goods. The departure of "Abraham fiom Egypt also seems to find its echo . here. He appears to utter a modest wislt that Abra- ham would leave Gerar. [This seems a forced inter- pretation of the words. — .\.G.J Still he may dwell in his territory where it pleases him. — And to Sarah he said. — " The thousand pieces of silver, i. e., tlie thousand shekels of silver, are not a peculiar present made to Sarah, but the estimated worth of the pres- ent (ver, 14), and designate it as something impor- tant." Knobel. So also Keil. Delitzsch, with others, distinguishes a special present in money, " a truly royal present, since thirty shekels was the piice of a slave (Ex. xxi. 32)." (A thousand shekels of silver after the sliekel of the sanctuary would be about 550 dollars ; according to the ordinary shekel, less. It is not certain which is intended here.) The first interpretation is preferable, as otherwise the second present must have been made to Sarah. — Behold, be is to thee (or that shall be to thee) a cover- ing of the eyes. — This difficult place admits of different explanations. Vitringa ; "If the words are referred to Abraham, the idea seems to be : .\braham, if he professes to be the husband of Sarah, would be in- stead of a veil to those who, looking upon Sarah more mtensely, may be inflamed with love for her. (Thus Ewald; so Delitzsch, p. 404.) We prefer, however, to refer the words to the money received by Abra- ham. As if he says, let this money, paid as a fiue to Abraham, prevent any from desiring thee as I have done. He alludes to the veil usually worn by women. See ch. xxiv. 65." Gesenjus: "This is an expiatory present to thee, for all that has happened to thee, and to .\bram, and she was convinced (of her fault)." Knobel similarly, but still with less fit- ness, and at the conclusion, " thou ait adjudged, i. e., justice is done to thee." Delitzsch and Keil : " This is to thee an atoning present, lor all who are with thee (since the whole family is disgraced in the mis- tress, etc.)" "It is to be explained," says Knobel, "after "'JB "53 to cover one's face, so that he may forget the wrong done (ch. xxxii. 21), D^asuj iJS nS3 to cover the face of the judge, so that he shall not see the right." ilichaelis, Baumgarten, and others, explain the word> to mean a present for the purchase of a veil which she sliould wear in the future. [.VIURi'HT urgis against this that the proper word tor ved ia "■'rs. "the covering of the eyes is a figura- tive phrase for- a recompense or pacificatory offering, in consideration of which an oft'ence is overlooked." And so also .Jacobus. — \. G.] Since Sarah wore no veil in Egypt, but the custom of veiling the face quickly with the mantle soon alter appears in the history of Kebekah (ch. x.\iv. i;.=i), tins thonglit seems qnite probable. But one would then expect a special present to Sarah, besides the one to Abraham. De- litzsch remarks, "this would be bitter imny." lint the irony in tin' expression, I have given (lii/ hrtillier. cannot, however, be denied. The b3-p:<" al.so •grees well with this tlioucht. Besides, it must be considered th.it Abimelech had to relieve himself ol his displeasure as well against Sarah as againsi Abraham. And what then could this mean, "tha' shall be to thee an atoning present, and foi- all witk thee," leaving out of view that here the conjunctiv« T is wanting '! As a covering of the eyes, designed to make good his error in her eyes, the great prescnJ would excite rather only contempt. The atonement belongs truly to the violai ed rights of the husband ; Sarah, who had constantly declared that he was her brother, even when prudent calculation became impru- dent temerity, had well deserved that she also should siifler a reproof Still Abimelech appears to define it as a covering of the eyes only in a figurative sense ; in the sense of the Vulgate ; hoc erii tibi in velamcA oculoruni ad omnen qui tecum sinty et guocungue perp' exeris; vumenioque te deprehensam." Since Sarah wore no veil, which designated her as the wile of a husband (see ch. xxiv. 6; 1 Cor. xi. 10), so the pres- ent of Abimelech, wherewith he expiates his lault, has the eflect of such a veil ; it should for all, and everywhere, be a testimony that she is a married woman. As such shoiUd she now be held every- where, in consequence of his present. With Clericus, therefore, we find here a designed double sense or meaning ; a covering of the eyes as an atonenieTii^ which should^ at the same time, have the effect of a veil. " nnDiai can only be the second person feminine perf. Niph., although the daghesh lene is wanting in n (Gesenihs, § 28, 4, and g 65, 2), for to hold this form for a participle is scarcely possible." etc.f Keil : Since this word may be rendered ad- judged as well asjuMfied, we take it in a nuddle sense, and as designedly having a twofold meaning : con- vinced, placed right. This last word does not belong to the writer, but to Abimelech himself. With the pride of injured magnanimity, he declares that he, through his atoidng present, would provide her with a veil, and designate her as a married woman. For the veil, see Winer. 3. Abraham'' s intercession {^ev^.\'J,\^). "After this compensation Abraham intercedes (ver. 17), and God removes the sickness from Abimelech and hia women. The author does not define the sickness more closely (as in ch. xii. 17 ) ; according to ver. 6 it was such a sickness as suppressed desire Compare the plague of the Plnlistines ( i Sam. v. 6-9 ; xii. 6, 4, etc.)" Knobel. — And God healed Abimelech, and his wife, and his maidservants Thus Abimelech was not only afHicted with some sexual disease, but indirectly, through his inability, his wife also, i. e., his wile in a peculiar sense, the queen ; and his maid-servants, that is, his concubines (see Keil). Yl'hey bare means that they were again capable of procreating children. The verb is mascuhne, because both males and females were involved in this judicial malady. MtTRPHY, p. 320. — A. G.] [This is clear also, siuce the malady was sent to preserve the purity of Sarah. Abimelech was not suH'cred to touch Ler, see ver. 6. — A. G.J Ver. 18 contains the explana- tion -For the Lord (Jehovah) had fast closed up. — [It is .lehovah who delivers Abraham, and pre- * [Wordswortli sup^ONtB all three senses— that of -» t** puiatiun ; of a provision ff r tlic purcljase of a veil ; and ol an ullutiion to the usage of covering a bride with a veil, p 9i.-A. U.| t [If, witli Baumgarten, and according to the aceeiit£,w« coniieet the b3"nX^ with the iaf arms and disarms the hand of God at the same tinoe — (Roos): Thus God does not forsake his own in their need, although there are not wanting faults OD their side. — (Val. Hebberger: We know how to make what is good evil, since we are masters there, but how to make good again what is evil, that is the work of God.) — Because Abraham and Sarah should laugh, they must first weep sound repentance. The martyr-week ever precedes the Easter-week with Christians. NINTH SECTION. The birth of Itaae. IshmaePa expulsion. The Covenant of peace with Abimelech at Beer-tluba. Chapter XXI. 1-34. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 B 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 And the Lord visited Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did unto Sarah as he had spoken. For Sarah conceived, and bare Abraham a son in his old age, at the set time of which God [Eiohim] had spoken to him. And Abraham called the name of his son that was born unto him, whom Sarah bare to him, Isaac [jitzhak; hcoronewill laugh]. And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac, being eight days old [at the eighth day], as God [Eiohim] had commanded him. And Abraham was an hundred years old when his son Isaac was born unto him. And Sarah said, God [Eiohim] hath made me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me. And she said. Who would have said unto Abraham, that Sarah should have given children suck? for I have borne him a son in his old age. And the child grew and was weaned : and Abraham made a great feast the same day that Isaac was weaned. And Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Eg_yptian, which she had borne unto Abraham, mocking. Wherefore she said unto Abraham, Cast out this bondwoman and her son . for the son of this bondwoman shall not be heir with my son, even with Isaac. And the thing was very grievous in Abraham's sight, because of his son. And God said unto Abraham, Let it not be grievous in thy sight, because of the lad, and becaiise of thy bondwoman ; in all that Sarah hath said unto thee, hearken unto her voice; for in Isaac shall thy seed [thy descendants] be called.' And also of the son of the bondwoman will I make a nation, because he is thy seed. And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and took bread, and a bottle of water, and gave it unto Hagar, putting it on her shoulder, and [took with her] the child, and sent her away : and she departed, and wandered in the wilderness of Beer-sheba [seven wells; weU of the oath]. And the water was spent in the bottle, and she cast the child under one of the shrubs. And she went, and sat her down over against him a good way oSJ as it ivere a bow- shot [distant] : for she said. Let me not see the death of the child. And she sat over against him, and lifted up her voice and wept. And God [Eiohim] heard the voice of the lad; and the angel of God" [Eiohim] called to Hagar out of heaven, and said unto her, What aileth thee, Hagar? fear not; for God [Eiohim] hath heard the voice of the lad where he is. Arise, lift up the lad, and hold iiim in thine hand ; for I will make him a great nation. And God opened lier eyes, and she saw a well of water ; and she went, and filled the bottle with water, and gave the lad drink. And God was with the lad ; and he grew, and dwelt in the wilderness, and became an [mighty] archer. And 456 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. he dwelt in the wilderness of Paran [Oesenius : prob. a region abounding in caTeniB] : and hii mother tooi\ hiui a wife out of the land of Egypt. 22 And it came to pass at that time, that Abimelech and Pbichol [moutbofaii; i.e., oom- mimding all] the cliief Captain of his host [general] spake unto Abraham, saying, God 23 [EloMm] is with thee in all that thou doest : Now therefore swear unto me here by Goo [Eiohim] that thou wilt not deal falsely [injure deceitfully] with me, nor with my son, nor with ray son's son : but [rather] according to the kindness [truth] that I have done untd 24 thee, thou shalt do unto me, and to the land wherein thou hast sojourned. And Abraham 25 said, I will swear. And Abraham reproved Abimelech [brought a charge against him] bi- cause [inthecaee] of a well of water, which Abimelech's servants had violently taken 26 away. And Abimelech said, I wot not [have not known] who hath done this thing ; 27 neither didst thou tell me, neither yet heard I of it but to-day. And Abraham took sheep and oxen, and gave them unto Abimelech ; and both of them made a covenant 28 29 And Abraham set [still] seven ewe-lambs of the flock by themselves. And Abime lech said unto Abraham, What 7nean tliese seven ewe-lambs, which thou hast set by 30 themselves? And he said, For these seven ewe-lambs shalt thou take of my hand, 31 that they may be a witness unto me that I have digged tliis well. Wherefore he 32 called that place Beer-sheba ; because there they sware both of them. Thus they made a covenant at Beer-sheba : then Abimelech rose up, and Phichol the chief captain of hia host, and they returned into the land of the Philistines. 33 And Abraham planted a grove [Tamarisk, tree] in Beer-sheba, and called there on the 34 name of the Lord, the everlasting God. And Abraham sojourned in the Philistines' land many days. [' Ver. 12.— In Isaac shall seed be called to thee.— A* G.] I* Ver. 17.— Not mn-i "sblS , as in ch. xvi. 7.— A. G.] GENERAL PRELIMrNAET REMARKS. 1. Delitzsch holds (" not led astray by ch. xxi. 1 ") that ch. xxi. 1-21, forms the fourth Elohistic part of the third section of the life of Abraham. The first part (vers. 1-8, of ch. xxi.) goes back to ch. xvii., unfolds itself with a clear reference to it, and forms one whole with it. The second verse here refers toch. xvii. 21. According to Knobel on the contrary, only ch. xxi. 2-5, belong to the original writing ; tlie rest consistsofJehovistic enlargements, out of records which, at the m»st, may possibly be Elohistic. Since Delitzsch describes ch. xx. also as Elohistic, It is plain that he must assume diflerent Elohistic sources. But out of this assumption the whole arbitrary and artificial hypothesis may be developed. There mtist certainly be some internal reason for the change of the names in the first and second verses. That the name Elohim should be used in the history of the expulsion of Ishmael, and of the covenant of Abraham with Abimelech requires no explanation ; Abimelech does not know Jehovah ; Ishmael walks undei- the general providence of God. The reason lies in the fact that in ver. 2 there is a reference to ch. xvii. 21, while ver. 1 refers to ch. xviii. 14. So likewise it is with the circumcision of Isaac, which Elohim commanded (ver. 4); it embraces in Isaac both Esau and Jacob. Sarali also (ver. 6 ), refers the name of I.saac to the arrangement of Elohim ; since every one in the world (existing imder Elohim), would recognize Is^iac as a miraculously g T2n child — awakening laughter and joy.* * [" 'I'he birth of Isaac is the first result of the covenant, tnd trie first Btep toward itw goal. As itu the germ of the future devflopmi-ii*, and looks to the greater than Isaac — the New Testjtmerit 8oii of Tromise- so it is the practical and personal pledge on God's part, that the salvation of the world •linll be acooiDplUhed." Jaoobus.— A. G.] 2. It is questionable whether we should refer ver. 8 to what precedes, or what follows. Delitzsch fa- vors the first connection, Knobel and Keil the last. They suppose that the feast at the weaning of Isaac gave occasion for the expulsion of Ishmael. But this is not certain, and were it even certain, ver. 8 could, notwithstanding, belong to the conclusion of the historv of the childhood of Isaac. EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL. 1. haac's birth, circumcision, and the feaU at hit weaning. — (Vers. 1-S). — And the Lord (Jehovah) visited ["The Sept. has tVeo-xEiJ/aTo, a word adopted by St. Luke in two places in the song of Zacharias (Luke i. 68-78), who thus intimates the coimection between the birth of Isaac and the birth of the promised seed." Wordsworth p. 93. He refers also to the connection of the song of the bles sed virgin with these exultant and thankful woids of Sarah. See also(ien. xvii. 17-10 ; I.ukeii,21; John viii. 66 ; and Luke i. 44—17. — A. G.] Sarah. — ipB to come to, to visit, to visit with the purpose of aiding, of saving, or with the design to punish, marking the great tran.sititms in the providence of God ; an idea ruiming thronijhout the Scriptures (ch. 1. 24 ; Ex. iii. 10), to express which, according to Knobel, the Elohist uses "3T (ch. viii. 1 ; xix. 29 ; xxx. 20) ; where, however, in the two first cases, the ideas are widely different. The pregnancy of Sarah is traced back to .lehovah, since the conception of Isaac is a fiuit of faith, i. c, of that cod. Both become il- ustrious since they freely subjected themselves to this destination, since they yielded their sons in the futr.re, th» sons of promise, or in the son of proir- ise ; for Isaac has all his importance as a type of Christ, and Christ the son of man is the manifesta tion of the eternal Son. — The visitation of J^arah wai that which Jehovah h»d promised a year belbre. He visits the believer with the word of promise, and visits hiiu again with the word of fulfihnent, Abra- ham must have waited five and twenty years for the promise, Sarah only one year. 2. Isaac: he will laugh, or one will laugh (se ch. xvii. 19). The believer laughs at the last. 3. The sons of old age and miraculously-give» children : the sons of Noah, Isaac, Joseph (ch. xxxvii. ■i), Benjamin (ch. xliv. 20), Samuel, John the Bap tist, and Christ. 4. The little song of Sarah, the sacred joyful word of the mother over Isaac. The first cradle hymn. 5. The feast of the weaning of Isaac. " The announcement, the birth, the weaning of the child. — All this furnishes matter for manifold joy and laugh- ter ; pn2£" , i. e., the laugher, the fulness of joy in his name. Our Lord reveals the profoundest source of this joy when he says (John viii. 5(i), Abraham your father rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it, and was glad. Since Sarah, the wife of one, became the mother of Isaac, she became the mother of Is- rael (Is. li. 2; Mai. ii. 16; Ezek. xxxiii. 24), and since she is the mother of Israel, the ancestress, and, in some sense, the mother of Jesus Christ, who de- rives his flesh and l)lood from Isaac, out of Israel, and in whom Abraham is a blessmg to all the na- tions, the birthday of Isaac, spiritually viewed, thus becomes the door or entrance of the day of Christ, and the day of Christ the background of the birth- day of ls.aac." Delitzsch. Calvin dwells especially upon the circumstance that Sarah nursed her child. " Whom he counts worthy of the honor of being a mother he at the same time makes nurse; and those who feel themselves burdened tiirough the nursing of their chihlren, rend, as far as in them lies, the sacred bonds of nature, unless weakness, or some intii'miiies, form their excuse." It is remark- able that a century after the Genevan Calvin, the Genevan Rousseau should again hold up the sacred- ness of this law of nature, that mothers should nurse their own children, against the unnatural custom at his time of using wet-nurses, although, indeed, he hiniself had fundamentally no right to plead it. 6. The whole context confirms the Hebrew tradi- tion, which finds in the jests of Ishmael the kindred idea of mockery, and upon this rests the confirma- tion of the allegorical explanation of Paul (Gal. iv. ; comp. " Biblework " on G.al. iv. 22-30). [The apos- tle, however, does not say that the history was designed to be typical, but had been used and may be used to illustiate the truth he was discussing. — A. G.] [Ish- mael mocked the child of piomise, the faith of his parents, and therefore the word and puriiose ol' God. His mocking was the outward expression of his un- belief, as the joy of his parents, which gave rise to the feast, was of their faith. It thus reveals his character as unworthy and incapable of sharing in the blessing, which then, as now, was secured only by fdth. Hence, like Esau, Saul, the carnal Juda- izera of the apostle's day, all who trust in them- selves rather than in the promise, he was cast out.- A. G.] 7. Female tact and accuracy in the estimate ol youthful character. Sarah. Ucbekah. Sarah's in tcrfcrence with the order of Abraham's houseliol' CHAP. XXI. 1-34. 16 jannot be without sin, but in this case she meets and responds to the theocratic thought. This fact is re- peated in a stronger form in the position of Rebt'kah over against tliat of Isaac, since she secures to .lacob the right of the first-born. Both fathers must have their prejudices in I'avor of the rights of the natural first-born corrected by the presaging, far-seeing mothers. 8. Abraham rose up early in the morning, espe- cially wlien a command of the Lord is to be fulfilled or a sacrifice is to be l)rought (ch. xxii). 9. Tlie exnul-ion of Hagar. Since Ishmael had grown to nearly sixteen years of age in the house of Sarah, her proposal cannot be explained upon motives of human jealousy. The text shows how painful the n)easure was to Abraham. But the man of faith who should later offer up Isaac, must now be able to ofler Ishmael also. He dismisses hirn, however, in the light of the promise, that his expul- sion confirmed his promotion to be the head of a great nation, and because the purpose of God in reference to Isaac could only become actual through this separation. The separation of Lot from .\hra- ham, of Ishmael from Isaac, of Esau from Jacob, proceeds later in the separation of the ten tribes from Judah, and finally in the excision of the unbe- lieving Jewish population from the election (Rom. X. ; Gal. iv.). These separations are continued even in the Christian Church. In the New-Covenant, moreover, the Jews for the most part have been ex- cluded as Ishmael, while many Ishmaelites on the contrary have been made heirs of the faith of Abra- ham. The Queen of Sheba perhaps adheres more faithfully to wisdom than Solomon. 10. The moral beauty of Hagar in the desert, in her mother-love and in her confidence in God. Ha- gar in the desert an impetishable pattern of true maternal love. 11. The straits of the desert the consecration of the sons of the desert. The terrible desert, through the wonderful help of God, the wells, and oases of God, became a dear home to him. There is no doubt, also, that after he had learned thoroughly by experience that he was not a fellow-heir with Isaac, be was richly endowed by Abraham (ch. xxv. 6), and also remained in friendly relations with Isaac • (ch. xxv. 9). 12. .^bimelech's presentiment of Abraham's fu- ture greatness, and his prudent care for the security of his kingdom in his own person and in his descend- ants. The cliildren of Israel did not attack the land of the Philistines until the Philistines had destroyed every recollection of the old covenant relations. Abmielech ever prudent, honest, and noble. The significance of the covenant of peace between the father of the faithful and a heathen prince (comp. " Covenant of Abraham," ch. xiv.). 13. Abraham gives to Abimelech upon his de- sire the oath of the covenant, as he had earlier sworn to the king of Sodom. " I will swear," the eign of the condescension of the believer, in the re- lations and necessities of human society. Beaiing Mnon the doctrine of the oath. 14. Abraham learns the character of Jehovah in % living experience of faith, according to his varied tevelations, and with this experience the knowledge of the attributes of God rises into prominence. As Elohim proves himself to be Jehovah to him. so Je- hovah again proves himself to be Elohim in a higher tense. God the Exalted is the Coven.ant God for him; God the Almif^^ty performs wonciers fo: him ; God the Eternal busies himself for him in the eterna truth of the Covenant. 1 5. Abraham calls upon and proclaims the nam< of tlie Lord. The one is in truth not to be sepa- rated from the other. The living prayer must vield its fruit in the declaration, the living declaration must have its root in prayer. The faith of Abraham in Jehovah develops itself into a faith in the eternal truth of his covenant, and in the ever green ana vigorous life of the promise. f"He calls upon th« name of the Lord with the significant .surname of the God of perpetuity, the eternal, unchangeable God. This marks him as the mre uml able performer of his promise, as the everlasting vindicator of the faith of treaties, and as the infallible source of the believ- er's rest and peace." Murphy. — A. G.] For th« tamarisk (see Dictionaries of the Bible) and for th« meaning of the desert of Beersheba and the city of tbe same name (see Concordances). 16. Abraham, Samson, and David, in the land of the Philistines. Alternate friendships and hostilitiea Abraham at first gains in South-Canaan a well, then a grave (ch. xxiii.). Both were signs of his inherit ing the land at some future time. 17. Beersheba, honored and sanctified through the long residence of Abraham and Isaac. This city marking the southern limits of Israel in contrast witli the city of Dan as a northern limit was, later, also profaned through an idolatrous service (.\mo? V. 6 ; viii. 14). 18. Passavant dwells upon the glory of the Ara bians in Spain for seven centuries. " Indeed, they still, to-day, from the wide and broad desert, ever weep over the forsaken, crushed clods of that heroic land." But what has Roman fanaticism made of the land of Spain ? He says again: "Arabia has also its treasures, its spice.s, and ointments, herds of noble animals, sweet, noble fruits, but it is not a Canaan, and its sons, coursing, racing, plundering, find in its wild freedom an uncertain inheritance." " Gal. iv. 29 is fulfilled especially in the history of Mohammed." 19. Upon the covenant of Abraham and Abime- lech, Passavant quotes the words. Blessed aie the peace-makers. Sehwenke represents Abimelech as a self-righteous person, but without sufficient reason HOMILETICAI, AND PRACTICAi. See the doctrinal paragraphs. — The connection between Isaac's birth and Ishmael's expulsion. — The joyful feast in Abraham's house. — Haear's necessity ; Hagar's purification and glorification. — Abraham'c second meeting with Abimelech. — .\braham at Beer sheba, or the connection between civilization and the cultus in Abraham's Ufe. An example for Christian missions. 1. Ig^iac's birth {vev. 1-8). Ver. 1. In the prov- idence of God we first experience that he himself visits us. that he gives us hiin.self; then that he visits us with his deeds of salvation " Noble natures regard what they are as one with what they do." It is true of God above all others, that we come to know him in his gifts, and his gifts in his visitation. — The section affords appropriate texts for baptismal discourses. Starke: tbe repeiiuon {as he had spoken, of which /le had spoken) lias the utmost emphasis. The promises of God must at last pass into fitlfil- ment, even when all hope has been lost by men. Hi« proniLses are yea and amen. — Luther: " Mosei abounds in words, and repeats his words twice, ii 102 GENESIS, OR TUE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. irder to bring before our minds the unutterable joy of the patriarch. Tliis joy would be increased also (if it is true, as some say, that the Son of God in iuiman form appeared to Sarah in the sixth week, and wished her joy of her young son, eh. xviii. 10). — H. C. Rambach : Isaac's birth in many respects re.«emhles greatly the birtli of Christ ; 1. Both births were announced long before; 2. both occur at the time fixed by God; 3. both persons were named before they were born ; 4. both were supernaturally (miraculously) conceived ; 5. both births occasioned great joy ; 6. the law of circumcision begins (as to its principle) with Isaac, and ceases in (througli) Christ, Ver. 7. In her joy Sarah speaks of many liseveral) children, when she had borne only one son, who, honover, was better to her than ten sons. — She will say : Not only ha? my dead body received strength from God, to bring a child into the world, but I am conscious of such strength that I can supply its food which sometimes fails much younger and more vigorous mothers. — Sarah did this (nursed her child) although she was a princess (ch. xxiii. 6) and of noble blood, for the law of nature itsell requires this from all, since, with this very end in view, God has given breasts to all and filled them with milk. The Scriptures united these two functions, the bearing of children and nursing them, as belong- ing tu the mother (Luke xi. 27 : xxiii. 29 ; Ps. xxii. 111). Thus tliese two things were reckoned among the blessings and kindness of the Great God (ch. xlix. 25), while an unfruitful body and dry breasts are a punishment from him (Hoseii ix. 11-14). — Ver. 8. (Whether, as the Jews say, Shem, Melchizedec and Selah were present at this feast, cannot be said with certainty.) — Abiaham doubtless had his servants to gbare in tlie feast, and held instructive conversation with them, exhorting them to confidence in God, to the praise of his name. It is a peculiarly spiritual, joyful, and th.iiikrul legist. — Xa enumeration of bib- lical feasts (2 Cor- i. 20). — The blessing of children. Ingratitude, in regarding many such gifts (cliildren) as t punishment. — Feasts after baptism are not opposed ;o the will of God, but they should still be observed ;o Ills honor, with pious people, without luxury, and other poor women in childbed should not be for- gotten.— ScnRiJnER: Ver. 1. He is faithful (Num. ixhi. 19). — Since every birth tlows from (is a gift from) God (Ps. cxxvii. 3), so we may rightly say, that the Lord visits those to whom he sends children. — Ver. 8. Isaac was the son of the free-woman, born through the promise of God (Gal. iv. 22, 23), consequently a type of every child of (ioil, who through the stiength of the promise, or of the gospel, is born to freedom and of a free-woman. (Roos.)— What strange dis- appointments ! The son, who receives from (iod who hears the cries and wishes of men, his name Ishmael (tJod hears) is not the promised one, but the (iromise was fulfilled in the otlier, Isaac, wlio was Darned according to a more common human custom ! [The laughing of Abraham (ch. xvii. 17) lias how- ever a greater spiritual wortli than tlie cry of llagar for help (ch. xvi. 11).J — Passava.nt: Behold, two children of one father and In the same house, reared un- der one discipline, consecrated before the same allar, of like he-arts, borne before God upon the same prayer and thus olfcred lo him, and still so unlike in their minds and ways, in their conduct and aims, etc. ; the dark mvBtcries of nature and grace. — Taube: The birth of Isaac and expulsion of Ishmael an example of what occurred at the Reromiation, and of what must take liluce in us all. 2. IshmaePs removal (ver. 9-21). The th ic Tatit sepnra/io7i.v in their import ; a. Judgment in respect to th^ Jiiii^^x for theocratic purposc^^ but not, li. it respect to a destination to blesftcdncss. — [So Henry, We are not sure that it was his eternal niiu ; it it presumption to say that all those who are left oui of the external dispensation of God's covenant, an therefore excluded from all his meicies. — .\. G.] — The providence of God over Ishmael. — The .\rabiana. — The Mohammedan world. — Mission Sermons. — The external separation presupposes an inward estrange- ment. Starke : Ver. 9. A laughing, jesting, gay, and playlul youth. It may be that Ishmael had reviled Isaac because of his name which he h;id received from a laugh, and had treated him with scorn. — Lasge : Ver. 10. Sarah could not have been without human weakness in this harsh demand ; but the hand of God was in it. — Cramer : The faults and defects of parents usually cleave to their chihlren, hence parents, especially mothers during pregnancy, should guard themselves lest they stain themselves with a grave fault which shall cleave to their children during their lives. — Bib/. Tiib. : The mocking spirit is the sign of an evil, proud, jealous, envious heart ; take heed that thou dost not sit with the scorner (Ps. i. 1) — Bibl. Wirt. : Cases often occur in a family in which the wife is mucli wiser than her husband, hence their advice and counsel ought not to be refused (1 Sam. xxv. S, 17). Polygamy produces great unhappiness. — Cra.mer : There will arise some- times disputes between married persons, even be- tween those who are usually peaceful and friendly. Still one should not give loose reins to his passion, or allow the diflerence to go too far. — Ver. 12. Lange: Here we see that the seed of the bond- woman shall be distinguished from Isaac. — The general rule is, that the wife shall be subject to her husband, and in all reasonable things obey him, but here God makes an exception. ^Since Abraham in the former case had followed his wife without consult- ing God, when she gave him Hagar to wife, so he must now also fitlfil her will. — The comparison of Ishmael with the unbelieving Jews at the time of the New Testament : the haughty, perverse, scoffing spirit of persecution ; the sympathy of Abraham with Ishmael, the compassion of Jesus towards the Jews ; the expulsion and wandering in the wilder- ness, but still under the Divine providence ; the hope that they shall finally attam favor and grace. — Cuamer ; The recollection of his former sins should be a cross to the Christian. — One misfortune seldom comes alone. — £ibl. WtrJ. : There is nothing which makes a man so tender and humlile as the cross, alHidion, and distress. — Gerlach : The great truth that natural claims avail nothing before God, reveals itself clearly in this history. — Isaac receives his name from a holy laughing ; Ishmael was also a lauglier, liut at the same lime a profane scoffer. — Calwer, Hari'l/'iii-h : What we often receive as a reproach, and listen to with reluctance, may contain under the rough, hard shell a noble kernel of truth, which iu deed agrees with the will of God. — ScnHnnKR; (Luther supposes .\braham to invite to the feast all the patriarchs then living; with Melchizedec and the King of the Philistines. ) — Isaac, the subject of the holy laugh, seiTcs also as a laughing-stock of profane wit. — Ishmael is the representjitive of that world in the church yet scoffing at the church. (In the letter tc the (ialulians of the bond-church, in opposition to thi free. — Both, if I may say so, are the sons of laughter CHAP. XXII. 1-19. 46d but in how different a sense. Sarah does not call Ishiaael by his name (a clear sign of her indignation), and shows her contempt by caUing him the sou of this bond-woman. (LnTiiKR : ch. iii. 24 ; Prov. xxii. 10; John viii. 35.)— Ver. 13 Ishmael remained his aon, and indeed his first-born, whom he had long held for the heir of the blessing. It is never easy to rend from our heart? the objects of our dear affec- tions, liut he who must soon offer Isaac ako is here put into the school for preparation. .Micliaclis sees in this removal the evidence that God was displeased with polygamy. — A^er. 14. In many points surely the men of God seem somewhat cold and hard-hearted (Ex. xxxii. 27; Deut. xiii. 6 ff. ; ixxiii. 9 ; Malt. x. 37 ; Luiie xiv. 26). After this distinction was clearly made, Ish- mael himself might draw near again (ch. xxv. 9) and indeed share in the possessions of his rich father. Baumgarten. — The expulsion of Ishmael was a warning for Israel, so far as it constantly relied upon its natural sonship from Abraham. — Thus the Papists today, when they parade their long succession, say nothing mon: than if they also called Ishmael the first-born. — Ver 17. We see moreover here that if father and mother forsake us, then the Lord himself will take us up. (!alvin. — Thksame : Ver. 19. If God withdraw from us the grace of his providence we are as surely deprived of all means of help, even of those which lie near at hand, as if they were far removed from us. We pray him, therefore, not only that he would supply us with what we need, but give us pru- dence to make a right use of it ; otherwise it will hippen that, witli closed eyes, we shall lie in the (nidst of our supplies and perish.* — Passavant : Eagar's marriage was Sarah's own deed, not the ffork of God, and this also made her fearful. Men easily become anxious about their own, self-chosen ways. — Abraham obeys. — The obedience of the pious • [So we do not see the fountain opened for sinners in ibis uorld'i wUdemess until God opens oar eyes. Jam .\braham the aciual xlai/inif of Is;iac. It is no difficulty, in bia view, that God, the true one, who is truth, rontntandM at the beginning of the nairative, what he forbid* at the close, as it was not dillicult to hini to iiold that the a.S6umed angels (ch. vi.) were created sexless, but had in some magical way tf.emselves created tor them- selves the sexual tjower. ( I'liis is the difiicully whinli CHAP. XXII. 1-19. 40S Kurtz overlooks. It is not the difficult}' in reconciling this command with the prohibition of human sacrifices in the Mosaic law, but in reconcilini; the comniami with the prohibition in this history, if the killin<; of Isaac is referred to in both, HengstenbiTg and those who argue with him, urge in favor of their view : 1. That the command relates only to the spiritual sacri- fice of Isaac, here termed a burnt-offering because of the entire renunciation of Isaac as a son by na- ture, which he was to make, so that Isaac was to be deul to him, and then received back again from the dead, no longer in any sense a son of the flesh, but the son of promise and of grace ; and then, 2. the numerous places in the Scripture in which these sac- rificial terms are used in a spiritual sense (e. g., Hos. xiv. 3 ; Ps. xl. 7-9 ; where the same term, burnt- offering, is used, and the Psalmist describes the en- tire yielding of his personality as the sacrifice which God required; Ps. li. 19; cxix. 1()8; Rom. xii, 1 ; PhiL iv. 18 ; Heb. xiii. 16, etc See also the passage 1 Sam. i. 24, 25) ; and finally 3. the force and usage of the word here rendered to tempt. But on the other hand it is urged with great force : 1. That the terms here used are such as to justify, if not re3) derives the name from nxi, to see. It is the Hoph. part, with the abbreviated name of Jehovah, or n^, and signifies the shown or pointed out of Jehovah. The nx^S, 2 Chron. iii. 1, has no decisive weight against this since it may be rendered : " which was pointed out, shown to David," as well as " where Jehovah appeared to David." — A. G.] ITie Samaritans hold Gerizim to have been the place of the sacrifice, but have not altered the text. — And oflfer him there. — For a bnrnt offering may mean as a burnt offering, or, also, with a burnt offering, in and under the sym- bolical presenting of it. — Upon one of the moun- tains.— A clear intimation of the region of Jeru- salem.— Which I will tell thee of. — It is not said when this more distinct designation of the place of ' the sacrifice should be given. The designation is, however, already, by anticipation, contained in Moriah. — And Abraham rose up early in the morning. (See Chap. xxi. 24.) — And saddled his ass. — Girded, not saddled him. The ass wa^ destined to bear the wood upon his covering. Abra- ham sets out with the bleeding heart of the father, ind the three days' journey are, no doubt, designed to give him time for the great conflict within him, and for the religious process of development (see Acts ix. 9). [As far as the matter of obedience was concerned, the conflict was over. His purpose was fixed. He did not consult with flesh and blood, but instantly obeyed.— A. G.] 2. Th-'' mountain and plai;e of the sacrijicr. Vers. 4-10.)— Then on the third day.— He had aow entire certainty as to the place. It is barely intimated how significant, sacred and fearful the place of sacrifice was to him. — Abide ye here irith the ass. — The yonng men or sei-vants, or young slaves, destined to this service, must not go * [Comp. with this history the revelation of God in the mount, recorded in 2 Sam. xsiv. 25 ; 2 Chron. vii. 1-3, and Lnke ii. 22-28.— A. Q.l with him to the sacred mountain, nor be present at the fearful sacrifice. — And I and the lad. — They could easily see from the wood of the burnt-offering, and the fire, and the knife, that he went not merely to worship, but to sacrifice ; but to him the sacrifice was the main thing. — And 'Will worship, and come again to you.— Knohd renjaiks: "The author appears not to have believed that Abni ham would be presented in a bad light, througli such false utterances (comp. ch. xii. 13; xx. 12)." We have already seen what are the elements of truth, in the places referred to, here the sense of the word of Abraham is determined through the utterance of the wish in a'fS, which, according to the form nsiaJSI, might be translated : and may we return again — would that we might. It is the design of the am- biguous term to assure them as to his intention or purpose. [It is rather the utterance of his faith that God was able to raise him finm the dead. See Heb. xi. 19. — A. G.] — And laid it upon Isaac. — From the three days' journey of Isaac, and the service which he here performs, we may conclude that he had grown to a strong youth, like Ishmael, perhaps, at the time of his expulsion (the age at which we confirm). — The fire. — "A glimmering ember or tin- der wood." Knobel.^But where is the lamb? * — Isaac knew that a sacrificial animal belonged to the sacrifice. The evasive answer of the fatlier, trembling anew at the question of his beloved child, appears to intimate that he held the entrance of a new revelation at the decisive moment to be possible. Until this occurs he must truly obey according to his previous view and purpose. — The terms of the ad- dress : My father ! my son ! — The few weighty and richly significant words mark the difficulty of the whole course for Abraham, and present in so much clearer a light, the unwavering steadfastness of his readiness to make the offering. — And took the knife. — The very highest expression of his readi- ness. •)• Nothing is said of any agitation, of any re- sistance, or complaint on the part of Isaac. It is clear that he is thus described as the willing sacri- ficial lamb.:): 3. The iirst call from heai'en (vers. 11-14). — Abraham, Abraham ! — As the call of the Angel of Jehovah stands in contrast with that of Elohim, so, also, the repetition of the name here, to its single use (ver. 1). A clearer, wider, more definite, and further leading revelation is thus described. The repeated call : Abraham ! designates also the ur- gency of the interruption, the decided rejection of tlie human sacrifice. For the Angel of the Lord, see ch. xii. — No^w I know that thou fearest God.^ Abraham has stood the test. The knowledge of God reflects itself as a new experimental knowledge in the consciousness of Abraham. [I know, in the sense of use, declare my knowledge — have made it manifest by evident proof Wordswokth, p. 100 "An eventual knowing, a discovering by actual ex- perinieni." Mcrpht, p. 341. — A. G.'] — Behind him a ram. — ^nx for "tins behind, backwards, is not used elsewhere in the Old Testament, ana from this has ariseL the conjectural reading ^nx, and also numerous constructions (see Knobel, p. 175). * f God ipill provide himse^, "Anotherpropheticspeecli;" and how significant ! — A. G.] t [.\11 the commentators dwell upon the tendemes-i and beauty of the ecene here described. But no words can make it more impressive. — A. G.] 1 r How it ^r'"- g° before ns the Lamb -vho was led to tbi slaughter.— .\^ G.l 468 GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. Geseniis explains the word iu the b;icU?round; but we should observe well that it is said that Abra- ham looked around him, and thus perceived the ram behind his back. Unseen. God mysteriously pre- pares his gifts for his own. He does not receive a positive command to sacrifice the ram instead of his Bcn, altliough he recognizes in the fact that the ram with his long, crooked horns was caught in the thick- et, the divine suggestion. Knobel : " In a like way, through a divine providence, a goat is presented as a sacriticial animal for Iphigenia, whom her father, Agamemnon, would sacritice to Venus at Aulis (EuRip. Iphift. Aiilid. 1.591 fif.)."— In the stead of hil son. * — This expression is of deciding import- ance for the whole theory of sacrifice. The sacri- ficial animal designates the symbolical representation of the person who presents the sacrifice; but this representation in the later ritual of the sacrifices, must be interpreted differently, according to the dif- ferent sacrifices. — And Abraham called the name of that place. — Delitzsch and Keil explain the word nsf", Jehovah observes, or takes care, but reject the explanation of the Niphal, nj<"i^ etc., upon the mount of the Lord it shall be seen, chosen, i. e., be provided, or cared for. They lay aside this signifi- cation of the Niphal, and Delitzsch translates : he appears upon the mount of Jehovah. But the Niphal must here certainly correspond with the Kal, although we could point to no other proof for it. The explanation also, upon the mount where Jehovah appears, is far too general, since Jehovah does not appear only upon Moriah. The expression : " it will be chosen, provided," does not mean he nill care for, but he will himself choose, and hence the Niph*!! ilso must be : The mount of Jehovih is the mc.fitain wliere he himself selects arnl provides his srji-ijice. Moriah is, therefore, indeed, not the mount of the becoming visible, of the revelation of God (Delitzsch), but the mount of being seen, the mount of selection, the mount of the choice of the sacrifice of God — inclusive of the sacrifices of God. [.-Vud thus of Hie KKriJici: — A. G.] For Moriah and Zion, compare the Bible Dictionaries and the topography ol Jerusalem. 4. The second call from heaven (vers. 15-19). The subject of the first call was preeminently nega- tive, a prohibition of the human sacrifice, connected with a recognition of the spiritual sacrifice, ascer- tained, and confirmed through this suggestion of the typical nature of the sacrifice. The second call of tiiu Maleacli Jehovah is throughout positive. — By myself have I sworn. — The oath of Jehovah t (ch. sxiv. 7 ; xxvi. 3 ; I. 24 ; Ex. xiii. 6 ; xi. 33) is described here as a swearing by himself, also, Ex. xxxii. 13; Isa. xlv. 23; Heb. vi. 13 ff. The swearing of Gov by himself, is an anthro- pomorphic expression, for the irrevocable, cer- tain promise of .Ichovah, for which he, so to speak, pledges the consciousness of his own personality, as it imprinlB this promise itself in the perfect seal- ing ot the assurance of the faith of the believing patriarchs. Abraham can only be certain of the oath of God, through its eternal echo in his own heart. Hence this oath is supposed also where the perfeciion of the assurance of the faith is supposed. • [Atiraham offers the ram as a substitute for Isaac. He withholds not his onlv hod in intent, and yet in fact he oflers «»ulwiltulo forhis son. Moepht, p. Ml.— A. G.) ♦ [This is ihe only inntancc of God's sweurinR by himself lit his intercourse with the patriarchs—a proof of the unique Importance of thl» event Wordbwobth, p. 101.— A. U.l Hence, also, Jehovah declares that h« i.ad swon unto Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and it is not alio gether correct, although Keil yields liis assent, when Luther says with reference to Ps. Ixxxix. 36 ; ex. 4, and cxsxii. 11, '*As the promise of tlie seed o. Abraham descends in the seed of David, so the sa- cred scriptuies transfer the oath given to Abraham, to the person of David." Although " there if nothing said in the promise, 2 Sam. vii., and 1 Chron. xvii. upon which these psalms rest, of an oath of God." Knobel. The oath of God revenls itself even in the sealing of the faith, leaving out of view the fact that the promise given to David was much more particular and definite than that which .Abra- ham received. — Saith the Lord (the saying of Jehovah). — [Compare the rendering of the Sept., thou ha4 noi withheld thj son, with the terms of the apostle, Rom. viii. 32. The resemblance is striking, and is one of the ca'ch-icords of which Wordsworth speaks. — A. ti.] A solemn statement of the prom- ise, pointing down to the time of the prophets, nin* cs;, saying of the Lord, occurs elsewhere in the Pentateuch only (Num. xiv. 28) and without Jehovah in the words of Balaam (Num. xxiv. 3-15). In addition to the comparison of the number of the stars of heaven (ch. xv. 5), we have that of the sand upon the sea-shore, the strong figure for an innumer- able mass (ch. xxxii, 13 ; Josh. xi. 4). — Shall pos- sess the gate of his enemies. — The most obvious sense Is this: Israel should overcome his enemies, and capture their cities, since he should seize and occupy their gates. But the (/ate here points to a deeper meaning. The hostile world has a gate or gates in its susceptibilities, through which the be- lieving Israel should enter it (Ps. xxiv. 7-9 1. The following words prove that this is the sense of the words here. — And shall be blessed (shall bless themselves). — The blessing of the nations (ch. xii.) in which they appear still in a passive attitude, be- comes, in its result, the cause of their freely blessing themselves in the seed of Abraham, i. e., wishing blessedness, and calling themselves blessed. — Be- cause thou hast obeyed my voice (comp. ver. 16). — The great promise o.' Jehovah is no blind, arbitrary good, but stands in relation to the tried and believing obedience of Abraham (see James ii. 23). [The closing remarks of Keil on this pas- sage, are as follows : This glorious issue of the temptation so triumphantly endured by Abraham, not only authenticates the historical character of this event, but shows, in the clearest manner, that the temptation was necessary to the faith of the patriarch, and of fundamental importance to his position in the history of salvation. The doubt wbeth. er the true God could demand a human sacrifice, is removed by the fact that God himself prevents the completion of the sacrifice, and the opinion that God, at least apparently, comes into conflict with himself, when he demands a sacrifice, and then actually forbids and prevents its completion, is met by the very significant change in the names of God since God who commands Abraham to offer Isaacs is called Cin'ViKn, but the actual completion of the sacrifice is prevented by rTr\'<, who is identical with the nin-' ■«'?>?• Neither mn"', the God of sal- vation, or the God of the covenant, who gave to Abraham the only son as the heir of the promise, demands the sacrifice of the promised and givei heir, nor a'^nbx, God the creator, who has tie pow CHAP. XXU. i-19. ■m er to give and take away life, but C^n^stn, the true Rod, wliotn Abraliaiu knew ;inil worshipped as his personal God, with whom he had entered into a per- sonal relation. The command (coming from the true God, whom Abraham served) to Weld up his only and beloved son, could have no other object than to purify and sanctify the state of the heart of the patriarch towards his son, and towards his God ; an object corresponding to the very goal of his call- ing. It was to purify his love to the son of his body from all the dross of fleshly self-love, and nat- ural self-seeking which still clave to it, aiid so to glorify it through love to God, who hail given liim his sou, that he should no more love his beloved son as his flesh and blood, but solely and only as the gracious gift and possession of God, as a good en- trusted to him by God, and which he was to be ready to render back to him at any and every moment. As Abraham had left his country, kindred, father's house, at the call of God, so he must, in hi.'j walk before God, willingly bring his only son, the goal of his desires, the hope of his life, the joy of his old age, an offering. And more tlian this even. He had not oidy loved Isaac as the heir of his posses- sions (xv. 2,) but upon Isaac rested all the promises of God, in Isaac should his seed be cafled (xxi. 12). The command to offer to God this only son of his wife Sanih, in whom his seed should become a mul- titude of nations (xvii. 4, 6, 16), appeared to destroy the divine promise itself; to frustrate not only llie wish of his heart, but even the repeated promises of his God. At this command should his faith pei I'ect itself to unconditional confidence upon God, to the firm assurance that God could reawaken him from the dead. But this temptation lias not only the im- port for Abraham, that he should, through the over- ooming of flesh and blood, be fitted to be the father of believers, the ancestor of the Christ of God ; through it, also, Isaac must be prepared and consecrated for his calling iu the history of salvation. .\s he suf- fered himself, without resistance, to be bound and laid upon the altar, he gave his natural life to death, that he might, through the grace of God, rise to newness of life. Upon the altar he was sanctified to God, consecrated to be the beginner of the holy Church of God, and thus " the later legal consecra- tion of the first-born was completed in him " (De- litzsch). As the dirine command, therefore, shows in all its weight and earnestness the claim of God upon his own, to sacrifice all to him, even the most dear (comp. Matt. x. .37, and Luke xiv. 26), pene- trating even to the very heart, so the i^sue of the temptation teaches that the tme God does not de- mand from his worshippers a bodily human sacrifice, but the spiritual sacrifice, the unconditional yielding up of the natural life, even unto death. Since through the divine providence Abraham offered a i«m for a burnt-offering, instead of his son, the ani- tnal sacrifice was not only offered as a substitute for ihe human sacrifice, and sanctioned as a svmbol of the spiritual sacritice of the person himself, well pleasing to God. but the offering of human sacrifices by the heathen, is marked as an ungodly t^eAodpTj^- Keia, judged and condemned. And this comes to pass through Jehovah, the God of salvation, who restrains the completion of the external sacrifice. Hence, this event, viewed with respect to the divine preparation of salvation, wins for the church of the Lord |)rophetic significance, which is pointed out witli p culiar distinctness in the place of this sacri- fice, the mount Moriah, upon which, under the lega economy, all the typical sacrifices were brought to Jehovah, upon which, also, in the fulness of time, God the Father, gave his only-begotten Son an atoning sacrifice for the sins of the world, in order, through this one true sacrifice, to raise the shadow- ing image of the typical animal sacrifice to its truth and real nature. If, therefore, the destination ol Moriah, as the place for the offering of Isaac, with the actual offering of the ram in his stead, should be only at first typical, with reference to the signifi- cance and oljject of tlie Old Testament sacrifice, still this type already, also, points down to that in the future appearing antitype, when the eternal love of the Heavenly Father, itself, did what it demanded here from Abraham, namely, spared not his only-be- gotten son, but gave him, for us all, up to that death ac- tually, which Isaac only endured in spirit, that we might die with Christ spiritually, and with him rise to eternal life (Rom. viii. 32; vi. 5, etc.), pp. \11- 179.— A. G.] DOCTEINAI, AND ETHICAL. 1. The ruling thought in this whole narrative, is the perfection of the obedience of faith of Abraham, not merely, however, in the sacrifice of his son, but also in his readiness to perceive tlie revelation of Jehovah, which forbids the killing of his son, and causes the symbolic killing of the sacrifice p.oviiled as the seal and confirmation of the sjtiritual sacrifice. Faith must prove itself in the inward hearty conces- sion of the dearest objects of life, even of all our own thoughts, as to the realization of salvation, pres- ent and future, to the providence of the grace of God. But it cannot complete itself with reference to this salvation, without purifying itself, or allowing itself to be purified from all traditional, fanatical ideas, or misconceptions of faith. In the completion of faith, the highest divinity coincides with the purest humanity. The sacrifice of I.s.aac is, therefore, the real separation of the sacred Israelitish sacrifice from the abominations of human sacrifices. " These sacrifices, especially of children, were customary among the pre-Hebraic nations of Palestine (2 Kin. xvi. 3 ; Ps. cvi. 38), among the kindred Phoenicians (PoRPHTR. de abslin. ii. 56 ; ErsEB. Procpar. ev. i. 10, and Laodd. Const, xiii. 4), among their de- scendants, the Carthaginiaus (Dion. XX. 14, Plctarch, etc.), among the Egyptians (Dion. i. Ss, etc.), among the tribes related with Israel, the Moabites ami Am- monites (2 Kin. iii. 27) who honored Moloch with them (Lev. xviii. 21 ; xx. 2), appear also in the Ar- amaic and Arabian tribes (2 Kings vii. 31 ff ), as well as in Ahaz among the Israelites (2 Kings xvi. 3 ff.), hut were forbidden by the law (Dent. xii. 31), and opposed by the prophets (Jer. vii. 31 ff.). They were thus generally spread througli the eidfns: of the nations in contact with Israel, but were eniiieiy for- eign to its legally established religion." Kuobel. According to Hengstenberg, the human sacrifice does not belong to heathenism in general, but to the darkest aspect of heathenism {Beitrage iii. p. 144). KfKTZ believes that he gives the correction (p. 210) The fact that the spirit of humanity among thf Greeks and Romans opposed the human sacrifice (see Lanqe : Positive D ^ginatik, p. S62), loses its fore« with him, since he ascribes this opposition to the ro ligious and rationalistic superficialty of their times ; the human sacrifices are, indeed, a fearful madness, but a m idness of doubt as to the true sacrifice, tV 470 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MObES. hopelessness as to finding the true atonement. But the true atonement is even in the death of Christ, the obedient concession of Christ to the judgment of God ; and the crucitixion of Christ analogous to ihe Moloch-sacrifice, must be distinguished from it both on the side of Juduism and of the world. The entire perversion of the lact that the religion of Jehovah abhors and rejects the human sacrifice, as it has been introduced by Vatke and Von Bohlen (the religion of Jehovah stood originally upon the same plane with the Moloch service), and has been com- pleted by Baumer, Kurtz has examined and exposed in a most satisfactory way (p. 204 ff.). [The arbi- trariness and blasphemy of Daumer, and the boldness with which he makes his assertions in the face of all history, render his work unworthy of any serious refutation. And Kurtz justly treats it with ridicule. — A. G.] Ghillany's essay : " The Human Sacri- fice of the Old Hebrews," may be, also, consulted here, but is essentially one with Daumer. 2. The sacrifice of Isaac has an inward connection with the expulsion of Ishmael, which will appear more clearly if we recollect that the age of both at the time of these events must have been nearly the same. Thus must Abraham expiate in the history of Isaac, the human guilt which lay in his relation to Ishmael. But as he had surely doubted a long time as to the choice of Ishmael, so also a doubt intrudes itself as to the literal external sense of the divine command in regard to Isaac ; a doubt which can no more prejudice or limit the divine revelation than perhaps the doubting thought of Paul upon the way to Damascus, but rather serves to introdvice the new revelatio:<. [The narrative of Paul's conversion will not bear oct th's comparison. He does not seem to have been in any 'lo.'bt. but was, ae he himself says, conscientious. He 'e.My thought that he ought to persecute the "^i'-'uvh i,'' God. — A. G.] 3. The ditJ'iircl'o.- between the divine — -uiled command and Ab.'il-aui's misconception of .t is similar to the distin.'tioL bt'ween the infallible con- science* and the falliblt mistaken judgement of conscience, which has not been sufficiently noticed in tlieology. Thus also Peter, on his way from Joppa to Csesarea, with the divine commission to convert Cornelius, might ha^-'e connected with it the misconception that he must first circumcise him, but the further revelation tears away the misoonce|i- tion. The stripping away of the erroneous and unessential idea.< of the time, belongs also to a sound development of faith. 4. The b'lrnt-oft'ericg of Abraham appears here .kS the foundi'tion and central point of all the typical Kacrificcs in Is.-ao'. Its fundamental thought is tlie spiritual yieldiu',- cf the lifr, not the taking of ihe bodih life. It recei"e:: its wider form in the Passover lamb, in which the dis-ision of the offerings is already intimated, viz., the thauk or peace-offcrir.g and the consecrated killing on the one hand, and the sin- and guilt- (trespass) offering and the imprecatory offering on the other. The peculiar atonement oH'cr- Ing is a higliur centralization and completion, in which the whole system of ofl'erings points to tljat which is beyond and above itself. 6. The mountain of Jerusalem receives, tht^^gh llie offering of Abraham, its preconsecration to its * [This asBumoB what, to Bav the \enet, is a matter of loutit, !iiul M (l|(aiiiKt Iho general faith of the Churrh, that the coniii:ica''c itttelf hu8 not uuflcT* d in tho ruins of tlio tall. Ther«* 18 ^oul d for the distinction, but wo cannot hold [hut tile conf«iimc»» is infalhb'^,— A. O 1 future destination as the later mount Movlab upot which the temple stood, the preconsecration of thi historical faith in God, which transcends the urt historical faith in God of Melchizedec. 6. The Angel of the Lord gives the more accu rate and particular definition of that which Elohin has pointed out in the more general way. T. The obedience of faith which Abraham rea- ders in the sacrifice of Isaac, marks the historical perfection of his faith, in a decisive test. It marks the stage of the New Testament Soxi/i-fi, or sealing (se* the Bibleivork upon James). 8. The typical significance of the sacrifice ol Isaac is so comprehensive that we may view it, in som« measure, as embracing all Old Testament types, jusi as the sacrifice of Abraham itself may be regarded aa including the whole Mosaic system of sacrifices. The sacrifice itself is the type of the sacrificial death of Christ, and indeed, juro>lia lowed, who is (iod's Lamb and not man's— CHAP. XXII. I-I9. the Lamb of God's providing and from his own bosom. His only-begotten and well-beloved Son, the man — the God-man." Jacobus. And this great doctrine, running through the whole system of sac- rifice, culminates in the sacrifice of Christ — the imiocent in the stead of the guilty. — A. G.] 10. Delitzsch ; " The concession unto death at the threshold of the preliminary history of the new- humanity is not completed, but merely a prefiguration, for Isaac's death would have been useless, but the concession unto death at the threshold of the history itself is completed, because the fulfilling and per- fection of the death of Christ is the passing of himself, and with him of humanity, into life. Judaism believes diflFerently. It sees ui the sacrifice or bind- ing of Isaac an act serviceable for all time, and bringing Israel into favour with God. Where the Church prays for the sake of the suti'ering and death of Jesus Christ, the Synagogue prays for the sake of the binding of Isaac " (p. 418). 11. T/u oath of Jehovah. It is not merely the basis for the oaths of men, but: 1. The expression of the absolute sell-determination, consciousness, and faithfulness of the personal God ;* 2. The ex- pression of a corresponding unshaken certainly of faith in the hearts of believers ; 3. The expression of the indissoluljle union between the divine promise and the human assurance. 12. The n^ime Moriah')' points out that as God himself perceives (selects) his sacrifice in the readi- ness ot an obedient heart to make the sacrifice, man should wait in expectation, and not make an arbitrary and abominable sacrifice. 13. W. HoFF.MANN: " Until now we hear only of the bruiser of the serpent, of a conqueror, of a bless- ing of the nations, of a dominion ; in short only the image of a great king and dominion, could present itself to human thought as the form in which the divine salvation should reach perfection. But now sorrow, concession, death, the rendering of self OS a sacrifice, enter into the circle of the hope of nalvation, and indeed so enter that the hope of sal- vation and the sacrifice belong together and are inseparable." 14. The completion of the promise.^ As the whole history of the sacrifice of Isaac is typical, so ,also is the expression of the completed promise. It refers beyond Israel, to the innumerable children of Abraham by faith, and the conquest of the world, promised to them, appears both in the aspect of a contest, as in that of the solemn feasts of victory and blessing. 15. We cannot say directly that Abraham sacri- ficed Isaac as a natural son, that he might receive liim again sanctified and as a spiritual son. For Isaac was given to him as the sou of the promise from his birth. But lie aacrificed him in his present corporeal nature, that h'S might receive him again as the type of a second, new, and higher life. Thus Israel must sacrifice its ideas of the present kingdom of God in order to gain the true kingdom of God • [An oath with God is a solemn pledring of himse'f in »I1 the unchantreableness of his faithfulness and truth to ti>; fulfilment of the promise. Murphy, p. 311. — A. G.l The Mount of the Lord here means the very height ftf the trial into which he bringa his saints. There "he will certainly appear in due time for their deliverance. MTmvHT, p. 341.— A. G.) t (In this transfendent blessing, repeated on this mo- no?ntous occasion, Abraham truly saw the day of the seed at the woman, the seed of Abraham, the Son of man. MOKPHY, p. 342.- A G.l which is not of this world. The want of this idef of sacrifice betrays the most of them into unbelief through Chiliastic dreams. It happens similarly to all who, in the sacrificial hour appointed by God will not sacrifice their inherited ideas that they maj gain a glorified form of faith. On the other hand every arbitrary external sacrifice i? regarded and judged as a self-chosen service of God. 16. The meaning of the ram in the sacrifice of Abraham is not to be lightly estimated. It deeig nates figuratively the fact, that Chiist also, in hi« sacrificial death, has not lost his own peculiar life, but, a.v t/ie hadlnc/ shepherd of /tin fork, has only sacrificed his old temporal form of a servant, in order that through his death he might redeem them from death, the fear of death, the bondage of sin and Satan, and introduce them into a higher, deathless life. [In the person of Abraham is unfolded that spiritual process by which the soul is drawn to God He hears the call of God, and comes to the decisive act of trusting in the revealed God of mercy aiic truth, on the ground of which act he is accounted as righteous. He then rises to the successive acts of walking with God, covenanting with him, communing and interceding with him, and at length withliolding nothing that he has or holds dear from him. In all this we discern certain primary and essential charac- teristics of the man who is saved through acceptance of the mercy of God proclaimed to him in a prime- val gospel. Faith in God (eh. xv.), repentance towards him (ch xvi.), and I'ellowship with him (ch. xviii.), lire the three great Itirning-points of the soul's returning life. 'They are built upon the effec- tual call of God (ch. xii.), and culminate in unre- served resignation to him (ch. xxii.). With wonder- ful facility has the sacred record descended in this pattern of spiritual biography, from the rational and accountable race to the inchvidual and immortal soul, and traced the footsteps of its path to God. Mer- PHY p. 342.— A. G.] HOMILETICAl AUD PRACTICAIj. Through the traditional exegetical interpretation the sacrifice of Isaac has often been used homileti- cally without due caution. What Kurtz in his worit asserts with confidence we often hear also from the pul])it — God commanded Abraham to kill his son Isaac. Thus a gross sensuous interpretation in fact transforms a history which is the key to the nature of the whole Old-Testament sacrificial system, which presents in a striking light the humane aspect of the theocracy in contrast with heathenism, into an of- fence to the human and Christian feeling, i. e., an offence which is burdensome and injurious to a lim- ited and contracted theology, but must be carefully distinguished from the ofieuces or ditliculties of un- belief. We make this remark notwithstanding Kurtz thinks that he nmst administer to us a rebuke for similar utterances (p. 206). Luther also has already spoken of the difficulty in treating this passage cor- rectly.— Ver. 1. The testing or trying of Abraham, as lull of temptation : 1. As a temptation ; 2. as a testing. Or : 1. The sacrifice of God ; 2. Abraham's oliedience of faith. — Ver. 2. Abraham's sacrifice : 1. The command of God; 2. the leading of God; 3. the decision of God ; 4. the judgment of God. — Ver :i. Abraham's obedience of faith: 1. Faith as the soul of obedience : 2. obedience as the full preser- vation of laiili. — Abraham's sealing. — Ver. 16. Th« «72 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. oath of God: 1. What it means; 2. as it perpetu- ates and generaUzes itself in the sacraments ; S. to whose advantage it will be. — The silence of Isaac. — Ver. 4. .Abraham's journey to Moriah an image of the way to all true saerifiee; 1. The journey thither; 2. the journey home. — Moriah, or tlie meeting of God with the sacrificing belicTer: 1. God sees; 2. he if seen, appears ; 3. he cares for, provides ; 4. he himself selects his sacrifice ; 6. he gives to man in an eternal form what he has taken from him in a temporal form. St ARK k: (Moses does not relate the peculiar time of tliis svvere test of Abraham's faith. Some place it in I lie thirteenth, others in the fifteenth, and still others in the thirty-fifth or thirty-seventh year of Isaac. Because iu this whole transaction Isaac was a type of Christ, and he finished the work of redemp- tion, through his death, in the thirty-third, or accord- ing to others th" thirty-fourth, year of his age, it may well be thought that in this year also Isa;ic was led out as a sacrifice. — The existing incorrect use of the typology still runs through the misconceptions of Passavant and Schwenke. He is three and thirty years old, says Schwenke; and Passavant says lie was grown up to be a mature man.) — Some reckon ten temptations wlierein Abraham's faith was put to the test, among which this was the last and most se- vere : 1. When he must leave his fatherland at the call of God (ch. xii. 1), etc.— Ver. 2. (Ofri this mountain alter the flood, wldeh time had thrown into ruins, but was again rebuilt by Abralmm.) — Upon ver. IS. The LXX render, in the thicket, Subek. They regarded it as a proper name, Wiiich bIiuwb the ignorance of the Heljrew language • flsaoc'fl dolivoranfifi woa a p:irublo or figure, viz., of GhriiirH I isurrection. WuRDSwoaTn, p. 101.— A. U.] in the Greek commentators, after the Babyloniaj captivity. Starke records the fact, that some " Pa pists" refer the expression of Christ upon the cross lama sabacthnni, to this tiush .^abek, and that Athft nasius says, Plaiita Sabek tst veneraitda <"/*«./•.— Com parisiin of the sacrifice of Isaac with the death and resurrection of Jesus (1 I'or. x. 13). Ver. 10. Lange: God knows the right liour, indeed, the right moment, to give his help. — Bi.bl Wirt, : If our obe dience shall please God, it must be not merely ac- cording to examples without command, but in accord ance with the express word of God. — HM. Tub. . Ver. II. When we cannot see on any side a way of escape, then God comes and often shows us a won- derful deliverance. — Hall : The true Christian motto through the whole of life is : The Lord sees me. — Ver. 15. The last manifestation of God with which Abraham was directly honored, which appears in the Holy Scriptures. — The oath of God : just as if ha had sworn by his name, or by his life. In place of this form of speech Christ uses very often the Verily. — John xvi. 20. — What one gives for God, and to him, is never lost. [Not only not lost, but received back again in its higher form and use. Even so every child of Abraham must hold all that is most precious to him as the gift of God's grace; must first yield to God the blessings which seem to come to him as to others, as mere natural blessings, and then receive them back as coming purely from his grace. — A. G.] I.isco: What could better teach the Jews the true idea and aim of the whole sacrificial service (the perfect yielding to God) than the history of Abra- ham ? Ver. 6. Thus Jesus bare his cross. Ver. 18. The great blessing is Christ who brings blessings to all nations (Acts ill. 25 ; Gal. iii. 8). — When God brings a dear child near to death, or indeed calls it a" ay, he thus proves us iu a like way. — Gerlach . The name Moriah signifies, shown, pointed out. by Jehovah, and refers especially to the wonderful pointing to the ram, through wliich Isaac was saved, since this was for Abraham the turning-point of tlip liistory, through which God confirmed his promisa and crowned the faith of Abraham. — Ver. 12. God hwioa : he knows from experience, from the testing, that the man remains faithful to him, since without the test his faithfulness is uncertain. He foreknew it, in so far as he foreknew the result of the trial. — Calw. Hand.: God naturally lays such severe trials not upon children, but upon men. — Abraham kept his faith in God, as Jehovah through his act ; now also God will approve himself to Abraham, as Jeho- vah.— This same promise appears lieie for tlie third time (ch. xii. 3 ; xviii. 18) as a reward for Abraham's obedience and triumph of faitli. — Each new well- endured trial of faith leads to greater slrenffth of faith; the fruitoi faith yields iiouri-shnient again to faith itself. — The act of faith on the part of Abra- lmm hire described, is held, not ojily by Jews and Christians, but even by Mohammedans, as the very acme of all his testing, and as the most complete oliedicnce of his faith. — .SiHRiiDKit; Ver. 1. He ia constantly ieailing us into situations in which what lies concealed in the heai-t must be I'cvealed. — The devil tempts that he may destroy ; (iod tempts that he may crown (.\rabrose). — The tcTiiptation has as a presupposition, that (lod has not yet been perfect!)' foriiied In us (Uengstenberg). — The idea of the sac- rifice (1 Sam. i. 25). And they .slew the bullock and briinght the child to Eli (comp. Hos. xiv. 2 ; Micah vi. 7 ; Ps. xl. 7-9 ; li. 19). — Eor this wljole his*i)iy, sei CHAP. XXII. 1-19 478 the similar history (Judg. xi.). That Abraham him- self is the priest, and his own heart, his own deepest loTe, and all his blessing, is the sacrifice, this consti- tutes the severity of the test (Krummacher).* — Ver. 5. We cannot regard these words as mere empty words ; it is rather the word of hope which had not forsaken Abraham (Baumgarten; also Gerlach). — According to the Epistle to the Hebrews, an intima- tion of the hope of the reawakening of Isaac. " But then, indeed, some one objects, the very severe and weighty thing in the sacrifice is taken away." Strauss repUes to this by an allusion to the painfulness of the death-beds of children to their parents, even when they are assured of their resurrection. — It is a more wonderful faith which supports itself even to the issue which he did not see, as if he saw it .(Strauss). — Ver. 9. The son is silent before the father, as the father before God, and the child obeys the parents as the parents obey the Lord (Strauss). — A sacred contention finds place here. One elevates himsrlf above human nature ; to the other to resist the father seems more terrible than death (Gregory Nyssa). Ver. 1 2. The apostle (Rom. viii. 32) takes up again the last words of the Angel, and thus indi- cates the typical relations of the event. — Ver. 13. The entire Levitical system of sacrifices is only an extension of this sacrifice of the ram (Richter). — It is remarkable that the ram is destined among the Greeks and Rom^ins as the substitutionary sacrifice in the gravest cases (Baumgarten). It happens at first according to the ordinance, that God by virtue of his concealed providence places and controls what may serve us, but it follows upon this that he stretches out his hand to us, and reveals himself in an actual experience (Calvin).— Ver. 18. The blessing given to the nations in the seed of Abraham, they shall them- selves come to desire and wish (Baumgarten). Abra- ham's obedience is named here as a reason of the promise. This is, too, a new reason (Baumgarten). ■ — (Abraham's obedience is, however, not so much a reason of tlie promise as of the sealing of the prom- ise through an oath.) — The promise is the promise of the covenant. On the one h;ind it rests funda- mentally upon the grace of God, on the other it is introduced for Abraham through the obedience of faith. — Abraham receives the name of the father of • behevers through this completion of his faith (Baum- garten). ((Certainly also through the whole develop- ment of his faith.) — Ver. 16. There is a constant ref- erence to this passage, as to the solemn, great, and final explanation. Thus in ch. xxiv. 7 ; xxvi. 3 ; Exod. xxxiii. ! ; Numb, xxxii. 11 ; Deut. xxix. 13 ; xrx. 20 ; xxxiv. 4 ; Luke i. 73 ; Acts vii. 17 ; Heb. * I What God required of .\braham was not the Bacrifiee i( laaao, hot the mcr\/la o/ himte{f. Wobdbwobib, p. 97. -A. a.) vi. 13 (Drechsler). — It claims our notice still, thai the Jews hold the binding of Isaac (vir. 9) a,'» a eat isfaclion, and use in prayer the words. Consider th« binding of thine only one (see above). " Indeed, one hundred and sixty millions of Mohammedanf also read in their Koran to-day. This truly was i manifest testing " (Zahn). — Robiuson's description of Beersheba. — Schwenke: The Lord knows how tt reward his own. — Passavant : Abraham journeyi the first, the second, the third day in silence. — Pre- cious school of faith, the highest, the most sacred school, how art thou now so greatly deserted ? — Abraham has become the father of Christians. — Ver. 14. God sees, he will see, choose. — Reflection upon the children of Abraham. — The future of Israel, of behevers, etc. — (Passavant closes his work with these reflections.) — W. Hoffmann: The consecration of the promise through sacrifice : 1. The concession of the promised son ; 2. the new reception of the prom- ised son. — According to this history God tempted Abraham. There the key is placed in your hand. It was said indeed before, that the purpose of God was not to secure an external offering, but an inward sacrifice, etc. In this inbeing of the internal and external, in this interworking of the divine and hu- man, of the eternal and the earthly, there lay a severe temptation, a constant inducement, to the believers of the Old Tesiament, to rest satisfied with the mere external, the mere shell, the sweet kernel, the fruit of life itself being forfeited, to go on in security indeed oftentimes to grow proud of their possession. — Ver. 1. In how many ways he enters the family and calls to the fatlier Abraham ! and when you know the voice of the Lord, thus answer : Here am I. — Upon Isaac. Almost entirely a feeble repetition of what has appeared in the lite of Abraham. Ver. 9. But he lay upon the altar in full consciousness and in si- lence. There he lay himself, as a dumb sacrificial lamb, at the feet of God. This is sufficient for a lifetune of more than a century, and imparts to it, con- tents, and a character, which admit of no exchange for the better. — He gives Isaac to him in another way than that in which he had called him his own at first. The whole glory of a wonderful future sur- rounds the head of Isaac— Taube : The obedience of faith, or how first in the yielding of that whicli ia most precious faith is tested : 1. God brings us to this proof at the right time ; place yourselves there- fore in his hands, as Abraliam ; 2. these tests are very severe, and will ever grow more severe in their progress, for they demand the death of self ; 3. these tests have a blessed end for the tried and approved believer; therefore let us follow the footsteps of Abraham. — Heuser: The way of Abraham to thi sacrifice. — The offeiing up of Isaac: 1. In its his- torical detail ; 2. ir. its inward typical meanin^f. 474 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. ELEVENTH SECTION. l%t gorrowt and joys of Abraham's domestic life. 7%« account and genealogy of those at homft, Sarah's death. Her burial-place at Hebron ; the seed of the future inheritance of Canaan. The theocratic foundation of the consecrated burial. Chapter XXII. 20— XXIII. 20. 20 And it came to pass after these things that it was told Abraham, saying [what follows] 21 Behold, Milcah, she hath also borne children unto thy brother Nahor ; Huz [see oh. x. 23; i light sandy land, in northern Arabia] his first-born, and BuZ [a people and region in western Arabia] ■^2 his brother, and Kemuel [the congregation of Gild] the father of Aram. And Chesed [the name of a Chaldaio tribe], and HaZO [an Aramaic and Chaldaic tribe ; Gesenius ■ perhaps for min , vision] and Pildash [Furst: aJX nis , flame of fire], and Jidlaph [Oesenlus: tearful; Furst : melting away 23 pining], and Bethuel [Gesenius : man of God. Fiirst : dwelling-place or people of God]. And Bethnel begat Rebekah [Eibkah, captivating, ensnaring ; riirst : through beauty] : these eight Milcah did 24 bear to Nahor, Abraham's brother. And his concubine, whose name was Reumah [Gesenius: raised, elevated; Furst: pearl or coral], she bare also Tebah [Ffirst : extension, brtadth ; a locality in Mesopotamia], and Gaham [Gesenius : having flaming eyes ; Fflrst : the black ; an Aramaic, dark- colored tribe], and Thahash [thenameof an uuknowu animal : badger, marten, seal?], and Maachab [low-lands ; a locality at the foot of Hermon ; used besides as a female name]. Ch. XXIII. 1. And Sarah was an hundred and twenty and seven years old : these were 2 the years of the life of Sarah. And Sarah died in Kirjath-arba [city of Arba] ; the same is Hebron in the land of Canaan : and Abraham came to mourn for Sarah, and to weep for her. 3 And Abraliain stood up from before his dead, and spake unto the sons of Heth, 4 saying, I am a stranger and a sojourner [not a citizen] with you: give me a possession of 5 a burying-place with you, that I may bury my dead out of my sight. And the children 6 of Heth answered Abraham, saying unto iiim. Hear us, my lord : thou art a mighty prince [a prince of God] among us: in the choice [most excellent] of our sepulchres bury thy dead : none of us shall withhold from thee his sepulchre, but that thoii mayest bury 7 ihy dead. And Abraham stood up, and bowed himself to the people of the land, even 8 to the children of Heth. And he communed with them, saying, If it be your mind [soul, soul-desire] that I should bury my dead out of my sight, hear me, and entreat for 9 me to Ephron [Fflrst: mon- powerful, stronger] the SOU of Zohar [splendor, noble]. That he may give me the cave of Machpelah [Gesenius: doubling; Fflrst: winding, serpentine], which he hath, which is in the end of his field ; for as much money as it is worth [full money] he 10 shall give it me for a possession of a burying-place [hereditary sepulchre] among you. And Ephron dwelt [sat] among the children of Helh. And Ephron the Hittite answered Abraham in the audience [ears] of the children of Heth, even of all that went in at the 11 gate of his city, saying. Nay, my lord, hear me : the field give I thee, and the cave that is therein, I give it thee ; in the presence of the sons of my people give I it thee : 12 bury thy dead. And Abraham bowed down himself Ijefore the people of the land. 13 And he spake unto Ephron in the audience of the people of the "and, saying. But if thou wilt ijive it, I pray thee, hear me [give me hearing] : I will give thee money for the 14 field; lake it from me, and I will bury my dead there. And Ephron answered Abra^ 16 ham, saying unto him. My lord, hearken unto me : the land is worth four hundred '6 shekels of silver; what is that betwixt me and thee? bury therefore thy dead. And Abraham hearkened [followed] unto Ephron; and Abraham weighed to Ephron the silver which he had named in the audience of the sons of Heth, four hundred shekels of silver, current money with the merchant. 17 And the field of Ephron, whicli was in Mnchpelah, which was before Manire, thu field, and th*? cave which was therein, and all the trees which were in the field, that wen 18 in all the borders round about, were m.ade sure fstoud] Unto Abra'.am for a possession CHAP. XXII. 20— XXin. 20. 475 m tlie presence of the children of Heth, before all that went In at the gate of his city. 19 And after this Abraham buried Sarah liis wife in the cave of the field of Machpelah 20 before Mamre : the same is Hebron in the land of Canaan. And the field, and the cave that is therein, were made sure unto Abraham for a possession of a burying-place bj the sons of Heth. KXEOETICAIi A>T) CRITICAL. 1. Survey. The two sections wliich we have here placed tog*i>er, with the following and the last sec- tions of the life of Abraham, Ibrm a contrast with his previous history. The revelations from God, the wonderful events of his life, cease, tor Abraham's life of faith is completed with the sacrifice of Isaac. To tlie wonderful completion of the faith of Abraham there is now added the purely natural and human per- fection of Abraham. Its history is certainly much shorter, but it is at the same time a proof that the miraculous in the Old Testament does not stand in anv exclusive relation to the natural and human. .\ mytholop;y seeking to produce effect, would have closed the life of the father of the faithful with some splendid supernatural or heroic events. It is, on the other hand, a trait of the true historical charac- ter of the tradition here, that it closes the life of Abraham in the way already stated. But at the same time the true christological character of the Old Testament history, wherein it forms ihe intro- duction to the New Testament manifestation of the God-man, discovers itself therein, that the history of the life of Abraham does not close abruptly with uis greatest act of faith, but that from and out of this act of faith there proceeds a natural and human progress of a consecrated and sanctified life, a course jf Ufe into which even the second marriage of Abra- ham does cot enter as a disturbing element. A ter- mination of this kind has already appeared in the life of Noah, appears later in the life of Jacob ; and has its New Testament coiraterpart in the history of the forty days of tli'- risen Christ. But as in the Ufe of Jesus, so in the lil'e of Abraham, the events after the great contests of faith are not without importance. The two sections which we have combined under this point of view, the family sorrows and family joys of Abraham point downwards to the history ol Isaac ' and Israel. From the son of Abraham there must now be a family of Abiaham, and to this the family genealogy nf the house of Nahor serves as an intro- duction. This genealogical register first names Re- bekah, and thus lays the ground for the mission and the wooing of the bride by Eliezer (ch. xxiv.\ a history iu which also the wooing of his bride by Jacob is introduced through the mention of Laban. But as the history of the family of Abraham is intro- duced through the record of the house of Nahor, so also is the first possession of Abraham and his descendants in Canaan introduced by the narrative of the death of Sarah. The burial-place in the cave and field of Machpelah, are made a point of union for the later appropriation of Canaan by the people of God, just as in the new covenant, the grave of Christ has introduced for Christians the future possession of the earth ; a method of conquest which unfolds itself through the graves of the martyrs and the 5rypts of Christian churches throughout the whole world. "The testing of the faith of Abraham is completed with the sacrifice of Isaac, the end of his divine calling ia fulfilled, and henceforward the his- tory of his life hastens to its conclusion. It is alto- gether fiiting that there should follow now, after thu event, a communication to him concerning the family of his brother Nahor (ch. xL 27 ff.), which is joined with so much appropriateness to the sacrifice o( Isaac, since it leads on to the history of the marriaga of the heir of the promise. The KTi ~5 (comp. ch. ii. 29) also points to this actual connection. As Sarah had borne a son to Abraham, Milcah also bare sons to Nahor. X^n C5 of ver. 24 refers back to ver. 20." Keil. — Schroder: "This paragraph is merely a continuation of ch. xi. 27 ff. As ch. xix. 37, 38, brought the side line of Haran to its goal and end, so here the side fine of Nahor is continued still further, a testimony, moreover, that Moses never loses tlie genealogical thread of the history." 2. Ch. xxii. 20-24. Kriobel holds the number twelve of the sons of Nahor, as also of the sons of Ishmael (ch. xxv. 13 ff.) for an imitation of the twelve tribes of Israel. It is unjustifiable to infer from such accidental, or even important resemblances, without further grounds, that the record is fiction. It is certainly true also, that of the sons of Nahor, as also of the sons of Jacob, four are the sons of a con- cubine. StiU, as Keil observes in the history of the sons of Jacob, there are two mothers as also two con- cubines. Keil also opposes, upon valid grounds, the view of Knobel, that the twelve sons of Nahor must signify twelve tribes of his descendants ; thus, e. g., Bethuel does not appear as the founder of a tribe. " It is probably true only of some of the names, that those who bore them were ancestors of tribes of the same name." Keil. — Huz his first-bom. — He must be distinguished from the son of Aram (ch. x. 23), and from the Edomite (ch. xixvi. 2S). Knobtl holds that he must be sought in the neighborhood ot the Edomitcs. — And Buz " also, since this trilie i<; mentioned (Jer. xxv. 23) in connection with Dedan, and Thema, and since Elihu, the fourth opponent of Job, belonged to it (Job xxxii. 2)." Knobel. — Kemuel — " Is not the ancestor or founder of the Aramaic people, but an ancestor of the family oi R;im, to which the Buzite, Elihu, also belonged, since C-i!< stands for en." Keil. — Ohesed. — The chief tribe of the Chaldees appears to have been older than Chesed, but he seems to have been the tbunder of a younger branch of the Chaldees who plundered Job (Job i. 17). — Bethuel, the father of Rebekah (see ch. xxv. 20). — Maacha. — Deut. iii. 14 ; Josh, xii 5, allude to the Maachathites. At the time of David the land Maacha was a small Aramaic kingdom (2 Sam. X. 6 -8 ; 1 Chron. xix. 6). " The others never appear again." Keih For conjectures in regard to them, see Knobel, p. 194. For the difference in the names Aram, Uz, Cbasdim, see Delitzsch, p. 42'J. 3. Gerljch: " The German word ' A''^sw«6 ' sig- nifies a woman taken out of the condition of service, or bondage, and this is the meaning of the Hebrew term. Besides one or more legal wives, a man might take, according to the custom of the ancients, one from the rank of slaves, whose children, not by Abraham, but by Jacob, were made sharers alike with the le- gally bom (naturally, since, they were held for th» 4r^ GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. ■doj-ted children of Rachel ami Leah). It was a kind of lower marriage, as with us the lunrriage ' on the left,' * tor the concubine was bound to remain faithful (Judg. six. 2 ; 2 fam. iii. 7), and any otlior man wlio went in unto her, must bring his trespass oflering (Lev. six. 20); the father must treat tlie eoncniiine of his son as his child, and the son also, after the contraction of a marriage witli one of W^ial rank, must still treat her as his concubine (Ex. «ii. 9-10)." 4 Cli. 23. Sarah^s death and buHal in the cavf vf Machpelak, purchased with the adjoining fieldy bi/ Abraham , from the children of Heth as a possession of a b'lryinff-place. Knobel and Delitzsch find in the anti(|ue and detailed method of statement, and snnilar traits, the stamp of the characteristics of the fundamental Elohistic writing. The more truly the human side of the theocratic history comes into re- lief, this peculiar, pleasant, picturesque tone of the narrative appears, as, e. g., in the next so-called Je- hovistic chapter. The division of this section into two parts, the one of which should embrace only the two first verses, Sarah's death (Delitzsch) is not in accordance with the unique, pervading method of statement throughout the whole. Sarah's grave was the cradle of the Abrahamic kingdom in Canaan. The scene of the narration is in Hebron (now El Chalil). When Isaac was born, and also at the time of his sacrifice, Abraham dwelt at Beersheba (ch. xxii. 19). At Isaac's birth Sarah was ninety years old (ch. xvii. 17), now she has reached 127 years, and Isaac is thus in his 37th year (see ch. xxv. 20). "Between the jouraey to Moriah, and Sarali's death, there is tiius an interval of at least 20 years." De- litzsch. During tliis interval Abraham must have changed his dwelling place to Hebron again. The mention of this change of residenee may have ap- peared, therelbre, superfluous to the writer, and fur- ther, it may be that even during his abode at Beer- sheba, Hebron was his principal residence, as Knobel conjectures. — The years of the life of Sarah. — The age of Sarah was impressed on the memory of the Israelites through this repetition, as a number which should not be forgotten. Keil ; " Sarah is the only woman whose age is recorded in the Bil}le, because, as the mother of the seed of promise, she became the mother of all believers (1 Pet. iii. 6)." — Kirjath-Arba, the same is Kebron (see ch. xiii. 18)— The name Kiijath-Aiba, i. e., city of Arba, is marked by Keil after Hengstenberg as the later name (coming after Hebron), since the Anakim had jot ilwrli there at tlie time of the patriarchs, but Delitzsch. on the contrary, according to Josh. xiv. 15, and Judg. i. 10, views it as the earlier name. Since, however. Num. xiii. 22, the city at the very blooming periled of the Anakim, was called Ilebrnn, »nd, indeeil, witli reference to its being fduniled ueven years before Zoan (Tanis) in Egypt, it seinis clear that while the time mentioned in the books of Joshua and .luilgcs, was an earlier time, it was not the carliist, and the succession in the natnes is this : Hebron, Kirjath-.\rba, Hebron, El Chalil (the friend of God, viz., Abraham). It Is still, however, a (pies- tion whether Hebron may not designate specially a • [Tho alltuion is to a Geilnan law or cui-fom, In rcpird u> mflrriiiBTC Itctwprn persons of unoquiil niiik, and tlie ofl- iprint? of hUch a inamiit'e. — A. O.] ['I'he r,/)nrutiiiii' wiu* a secor.rlaiT or lialf-wife, and iimnnir the Hebrews tier i)OMitlon was welf definpd, and was not re- eardtd as illr>j^ilininte. Her po-ition was not that of ii niis- tresi, as we use tlic ttirro concubine.— A. G.) valley city of this loc;ility, which belonged to tht Hittites (see ch. xxxvii. 14, where Hebron is de^ertljeii as a valley), the name Kirjath-.\rba, on the contrary, the mouutain and mountain city, belonging to the Anakim. The Incality seems to favor the supposi- tion of two neighboring cities, of which one could now use the valley city as the abode of Abraham for the whole locality, and now the mountain city. W« have coufe.'isedly to accept such a relation beiween Sichem and the neighl)ormg town Sichar, in order to meet the difficulty in John iv. 5. Delitzsch explains the change of names through a change of owners. E\en now Hebron is a celebrated city, at the sami time a hill and valley city, although no longer, great and populous, situated upon the way from Beer- sheba to Jerusalem, and about midway between them (7-8 hours from Jerusalem), surrounded by beautiful vineyards, olive trees and orchards ; comp. the arti- cles in Winer's "Dictionary," Vo.s Raumer, and the various descriptions of travellers. [Robi.nson's description (ii. 431-462) is full and accurate, and leaves little to be desired. — A. G.] — In the land of Canaan. — This circumstance appears here con- spicuously in honor of Sarah, and Irom the import- ance of her burial-place. — And Abraham came. — The shepherd prince was busy in his calling in the field, or in the environs. It is not said that he was absent at the death of Sarah, but only that he now sat down by the corpse at Hebron, to complete the usages of mourning (to mourn for Sarah, and to weep for her), and to provide for her burial. — From be- fore his dead (corpse). — From before his dead. * He had mourned in the presence of the dead , now he goes to the gate of the city, where the people assembled, where the business was transacted, and where he could thus purchase a grave. — To the sons of Heth. — The name, according to Knobel, appears only in the Elohistic writings. [This at- tempt to define and characterize particulai- points of the liook by the use of special names, lu'caks down so often that it may be regarded as no longer of any serious importance — .\. G.] — A possess'ou of a burying-place with you. — It is, as V. C. V. Moser remarks, a beautifnl scene of politeness, simplicity, kindness, frankness, humility, modesty, not un- mingled with some shades of avarice, and of a kind of expectation when one in effecting a sale, ihrowi himself upon the generosity of the purchaser." De- litzsch. The delicate affair is introduced by the modest request of Abraham. As a stranger and a sojourner f he had no possession, thus even no Ijiiry- ing-plaee among them. He therefore asks thnt they would .sell him a piece of ground for the purpose of a burial-place. — Thou art a mighty prince (» prince of God). — That is, a man td whom Hod ha.ecanie the "ife ol Isaac, and an ancestress of thi' people of tlod." Knobel. The documentary hypothesis falls into perplexity here, since, Bccoi ding to cb. xxiii. indch-xiv. 19, t>^» CHAP. XXIV. 1-67. 483 (ymdamental writing must have related this mairiafie. It relieves itself with the conjecture tliat the hrief Elohistic narration has been displaced hy this longer Jehovistic narrative. Knobel finds in the fact that the mission proceeds from Abraham, and the report 'b maile to Isaac, although he has no real ground for the conjecture, as also in similar cases, the tiaces that the narrative is not genuine. [VVhicli is njuch the same as if he had said, since the narrative is not constructed as I think it should have been, it cannot be genuine. — A. G.] It may be divided into the fol- lowing particular portions : 1. The arrangement of the theocratic journey for the bride, the spiritual image and character of the bride (vers. 1-9); 2. the journey for the bride, and the choice of the bride (vers. 10-21); 3. the entrance into the house of the bride (vers. 22-33) ; 4. the wooing of the bride (vers. 34—49); .5. the rewards for the bride (vers. 50-54) ; 6. the bridal journey (vers. 64-61); 7. the meeting of the bridegroom and the bride (vers. 62-67). EXEGETIOAL AND CKITICAl. 1. The arrangement of the theocratic journey for the bride (vers. 1-9). — And Abraham. — The mo- tives for his arrangement : 1. After Sarah's death his age warned him to provide for Isaac's marriage. 2. the blessing of Jeliovah warns him, he must now through the marriage of his son, do his own part, that the blessing might be preserved. His faith and his acts of faith must correspond to the promise of blessing of Jehovah. Isaac could not marry a Canaanitess, but only a Shemitess, one who was of equal birth in a theocratic point of view. It might possibly be from his own ancestral home, and the account which he had received of the home of Nahor, favored his hope. He could not think of Lot's daughters — Unto his eldest * servant. — It IS usually inferred from ch. xv. 2, that Eliezer of Damascus is here meant. Gerlach says it is not probable, because he is not named. For the same reason the Calwer Handbuch concludes that he is intended, because otherwise the servant would be named in so important a mission, and this inference < is just. Eleazer was pecuharly fitted lor this nns- sion, as an old man in the school of Abraham (more than 60 years had elapsed since ch. xv. 2). Eleazer thus stands for all time as the type of all pious and prudent bride-wooers. He is a steward or ruler of the whole hou'^e, thus a trusted servant. [The word servant like the word elder, is an official title. Busli refer.^ to Gen. xl. 30 ; Ex. xii. 30 ; Deut. ixxiv. 5 ; Heb. iii. 5 ; and for elder to Gen. 1. 7 ; Ruth iv. 2 ; Tim. v. 17.— A. G.] Still the present mission of Abraham is so important, that he lays him under the obligations of an oath. — Put thy hand under my thigh. — This usage in the oath is referred to only in one other place (ch. xlvii. •>»). The person who took the oath, was to place his hand under the thigh of him to whom it was given. Some refer this rite to a heathen idea or imagina- tion. "It points to the generating member, whicli, ts the organ ci the generative strength of nature. • [Here the terrn elder approaches its official sigrnitlcii- tion. Mdrpht, p. 353. — A. G.] [** The e/(f«r was not a title of age, but of offict. It piissed In'o the Church, coming down to us from the Jewish CLarch." Jacobus. — A. G.J had a kind of sacredness among the ancients, and U the Phallus (or Bacchus) worship, had a kiml of re- ligious honor ( Arnob. advers, Gent. 5), e. g. : amon^ the Egyptians (Hkrod., ii. 48 ; Plitarch ; Theo- noRET), among the Syrians (Lucian), at times even among the Hebrews (1 Kings xv. 13 ?). It is record- ed of the Egyptian Bedouin in modem times, that in a solemn iisseveration or oath he |ilaces his hand upon the generative organ (Sonnim. ; ' Travels, ii. p. 474)." Knobel. According to the Jewish ides (wliicli the Targums, Jonathan, Jarchi, Tuch, etc., follow), the rite relates to the generative member in its relations to God, by virtue of circumcision. VoD Bohlen, Gesenius, Knobel, bring together these two ideas or explanations. The explanation of the an- cients, that Abraham, with reference to the promise of the covenant, "had in his mind the promised seed of the covenant, the future Christ," is a mystical and Christian idea, not improperly adduced heie, remarks Delitzsch, although the thought is " usually regarded as belonging to the New Testament (see Strippel- MANN : ' The Christian Oath,' p. 22). It is doubtful whether opKos and opm^., tesiari and tei^ticulua^ stand m a relation referring back to this custom." Since the hand in the oath has always the signification of pledging oneself, we must inquire first of all, what rite-forms of the hand in the person who takes the oath, usually appear. But now Abraham, when he takes the oath (ch. xiv. 22), raises his hand to hi'aven, before those around him, when he worshipped the El Eljon, the heavenly exalted God (comp. Rev. x. 5-6). According to Ezek. xx. 5, the object of the hand is generally to mark the subject in respect to which the obligation is taken. In this idea the Christian oatli is taken upon the gospel, or even upon a chest of relics. Wlien, therefore, Eleazer and Joseph give the oath, in that they place their handa upon the thigh of the one swearing them, the act had a special meaning. The thigh is the symbol of posterity ; in Israel the symbol of the promised pos- terity, with the included idea of the promise. Gen. xlvi. 26 ; Ex. i. 5. Eleazer and Joseph thus must swear by the posterity, the promise and the hope of Abraham and Israel.* This promise should be changed into a curse for them if they did not regard the oath. This oath was required in Eleazer because he did not belong to the house of Abraham, in Jo- seph, because, as a prince in the land of Egypt, he might be tempted to be false to the faith of the promise. It is sufficient to regard the thigh as the symbol of the whole posterity, the generative organ as svmliohcal of the immediately succeeding genera- tion.— By Jehovah [It is not an ordinary marriage which is here about to be made, which would fall under the providence of Elohim ; but ;i marriage which concerns the kingdom of God, and therefore, Jehovah appears in the whole narrative. Keil, p. 183. — A. G.], the God of heaven. — Eleazer knowa the God of Abraham, and the faith of the promise. He should swear by the God of the promises, the God of Abraham, and with this the rite of laying ih'' hand upon the thigh corresponds. — That thou shalt not take a iTife. — Eleazer docs not appear as the guardian of Isaac, now forty years tdd, afttF the death of Abraham (Knobel), but the negation in * [Since the generative virtue in the \ (triirch waj throueh the promise blessed an-l sanctified liv tl»rhoTab, its seat wjis n sacred place, by cont.ict n-ith which tlie pereoa swearing: pl.aced himself in union with Jehovib, the God of the promise Bacmgarten, p. 241. Kurtz legarls the thigh as the seat of strength and firmness. — A- G ' 184 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSBS. bis oa'li designates ouly the negative side of his mis- sion. Since Abraliam had appointed him to gain a bride for Isaac, be might easily, as an old m:in, havu given free play to his own opinion, and viewed a brilliant match in Canaan as advantageous for Isaac's future. Abraham himself certainly exercises a patriarchal and guardian-like care over the patient and yielding Isaac, who, although forty years of age, appears not to have thought of riairiago, but mourned his mother in earnest, devout contemphition. It involves also the definite patriarchal and theo- cratic union under the providence of Jehovah. — Peradventure the woman ■will not be willing. — The servant has not an equal measure of faith with Abraham. Since the journey to Mesopotamia for a Shemitic bride is thus strongly enjoined, and Isaac must not marry a Canaanitess, it appears to him that it may easily happen that he must take Isaac back to Mesopotamia, if he should indeed be married. — Be- ■warethou. — Abraliam opposes him. As the father of faith Ver. 2.— Medan, Judgt, and Midian, one vtho meaturex. Murphy.— A. G.] •• Ver. 8.— lat., Breathed out.-A. G.) 'GENESAl EEMAEK8. The present section is closely connected with the following (vers. 12-18) which treats of Ishmael, and with the whole history of Isaac, under the common idea of the descendarits of Abraham. It introduces 6r3t these descendants in the widest idea of the word : the sons of Keturah. Then those in a narrower sense : the family of Ishmael. .\nd upon these, those iu the most restricted sense : Isaac and his sons. The writer adheres to the same method here which he has followed in the presentation of the tabular view of the nations. He begins in his descrip- tion with those most remote, then proceeds to those nearer, and finally comes to those standing nearest the centre. We cannot, however, make the Tholrdoth (generations) here the place of a division in the history, since the end of the life of Abraliam marks distinctly a section which is closed at the beginning of the history of Isaac ; and thus, as the genealogy of Keturah is interwoven with the history of Abra- ham, so the genealogy of Ishmael is connected with the history of Isaac. Knobel holds that the section ver. 1-18 belongs to the original writing. But it is not Elohistic merely because it contains genealogies, but because of the universal relation of the tribes here referred to. Knobel remarks upon the two genealogies of Keturah and Hagar., that the tribes dwelt in western Arabia and Arabia Petrea, and also in the northern half of Arabia Felix, while the descendants of Joktan (ch. x. 26 ff.) belonged to Bouthem Arabia, at least in the earliest time. " From the Abrahamic horde (?) there were thus divisions who went to the east, south-east, and south, where, however, they found original Arabian inhaliitauts, with whom they mingled and formed new tribes. We are not, therefore, to understand that the tribes here mentioned in each case were descended entirely from Abraham. It is not intended, even, that these tribes alone peopled the regions described ; rather they were inhabited by other tribes also, e. g., Amalekites, Horites, Edomites, and others. The Arabs, who are truly »> very dependent upon the Hebrew traditions, agree essentially with the Hebrew accounts. They ilistinguisb : 1 . Original Arabs in dilferent parts of Arabia; 2. Katanites in Yemen and Hhadramant, and 3. Abrahamite' in Hedjaz, Nejd, etc., but trace back the last-named to Ishmael, who turned his course to Mecca, sind joined the tribe Djorhomites, with whom Bagar herself was buried. (See Ibn Coteiba, ed. bv W-jstonl'eld, pp 18,30 8". AsuLFEnA: Hist. Anteisl.. ed. by Fleischer, p. 190 ff.)" Knobel. [Also articta "Arabia," in Kitto and in Smith. — A. G.] EXEGETICAI, AND CRITICAL. 1. Vers. 1-4. Abraham and Keturah. — Then again Abraham took a wife. — The sense of this statement evidently is : 1. That Abraham took Keturah first after the death of Sarah, and had six sons by her, thus at an age of 137 years and upward (Abraham was ten years older than Sarah, who died aged 127 years); 2. that Keturah, although united with Abraham according to the nature of monogamy, enjoyed only the rights of a concubine (see ver. 6, comp. 1 Chron. i. 32). The first point is opposed by Keil: "It is generally held that the tnarriage of Abraham with Keturah was concluded after the death of Sarah, and that the power of Abraham at so great an age, to beget still six sons, is explained upon the ground that the Almighty God had endowed liis body, already dead, with new life and generative strength, for the generating of the son of promise. This idea has, however, no sure ground upon \\ hich it rests, since it is not said that Abraham took Keturah to wife first after the death of Sarah, 'etc. This supposition is precarious, and does not agree well with the declaration that Abraham had sent sway the sons of his concubines with presents during his own lifetime," etc. Keil appears desirous to save the literal expression, that Abraham's body was dead when he was a hundred years old (Rom. iv. 19) but in the eifort comes into direct conflict with the moral picture of the life of Abraham, who even in hia younger years had only taken Hagar at the sugges- tion of Sarah, m impatience as to the faith of the promise, and thus certainly would not iu later vears, and when there was no such motive, have violated the marriage rights of Sarah by taking another wife.* He might also send the sons of Ketur.ah away from his house before they were from thirty to forty years of age, as he had before sent Ishmael away. The expression as to the dead body evidently cannot be understood in an absolute sense, otherwise the con * [It is not unusual for the author to go back and brinft up the narrative, especially at the close of one section, or a) the beginning of another ; but it is not probable that thii is the case here. We may hold to the literal sense of thi words, that .Abraham's body was dead, i. e., dead astfl off- spring, and yet hold that the energy miraculoui^ly given u ir fir the conception of Isaac was continued after Sarrb' death.— A. G.l 0)2 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. ception of Isaac even could not be spoken of. But if, however, tlieio is a miracle in tlie conception of Isaac, it follows only that the facts of our history are to be viewed as extraordinary, not as Bomeihing incredible. — And she bare him (see 1 Chron. i. 32), — 1. Keturali's sons: Zimrain. Zo^Spuv or ZfM3()«i', etc. in the Septuagint. Kiiobel compares it with ZaBp^i^, the royal city of Ko-aiBoK^A- »rTai, westwards from Mecca, upon the Red Sea, gpokeu of in PtolemjEITs, B, 7, 6, etc. Still he is in doubt. According to Delitzsch they lie nearer the Zemareni (Plin. vi. 32). — Jokshan. — Knobkl : " Probably the Ka-TaavTrai (in Ptolem. vi,,7, 6) upon the Red Sea." Keil suggests the Himjaric tribe of Jakisch, m soutliern Arabia. — Medan and Midian. — Knobi;l : " Without doubt Muo.di'o, upon the east- ern coast of the Ailanitic gulf, and Mu^la^la, a tract to the north-east of this, in Ptolem. vl. 7 ; ii. 27. The two tribes appear to have been united. The Arabian geographers regard a place, Madjain, iis the residence of the father-in-law of Moses." — Ishbak. Knobel : " Perhaps the name is still preserved in Schobeck, a place in the land of the Edomites." — Shuah. — Knobel : " It must be sought in or near the Edomites, since a friend of the Edomite, Job, belonged to this tribe (Job ii. 11)." Other explana- tions may be seen in Delitzsch and Keil. — 2. Jok- shan'x sons : Sbeba. — Probably the Saba;ans men- tioned in connection with Tema (Job. vi. 19). The plunderers of the oxen and asses of Job (Job i. 15). — Dedan. — Named in Jer. xxv. 23, in connection with Tema and Buz, as a commercial people. — 3. T/ie sonx of Dedan: Ashurim, compare with the tribe Asyr ; Letushim, with the Ba7iu Letts ; Le- ummim, with the Banu Lam. — 4. Tlie sons of Midian : Epha. — Named in Isa. Ix. H, in connection with Midian, a people trading in gold and incense. — Epher. — The Banu Ghifar in Hedjaz; Hanoch, compare with the place Hanaki/e^ thvee days journey northerly from Medina : Abidah and Eldaah. "Compare with the tribes Abida and Wadaah, in the vicinity of Asyr." Keil. For the more particular and detailed combination of these names with Arabic tribes, see Knobel, p. 188-190. [The attempt to identify these tribes, and fix their locality, has not been very successful. The more full and accurate explorations of Arabia may shed more light upon what is uow very obscure — although it is prob;ible that in their eternal wars and tumults, their fixed limits, and probably the tribes themselves, have been lost.--A. G.j 2. Vers. 5, 6. AbrahavVs bequests. — All that he had, — i. e., The herds and essential parts of his possessions. Isaac was the chief heir of his legit- imate marriage. This final distinction was previous- ly a suljject of divine appointment, and had been also confirmed by Abraham (cb. xxiv. 36), and finds expression in the arrangements for Isaac's marriage. — The sons of the concubines. — In comparison with Sarah, the misiri'.ss, even Kcturah was a wife of a si'condary rank. This relation of degrees is not identical with concubina'.re, nor with a morganitic marria;;e. It is connected, beyond doubt, with the diversity in the riglit l^f inheritance on the part of the chiliireiL— Gave gifts.— He doubtless established them a.s youthful nomads, with small herds and flocks, tnd the servants belonging with them. — Unto the east country. — To Arabia. [In the widest sense, easl^ erly, ea,>)t, ami south-east. — A. G.J This separation was nut occasioned merely by the necessities of nomadic chiefs, but hlso for the free possession of the inheritance by Isaac (see c'l. xiii. 11 ; xxxvi. 11; Delitzsch thinks that he had al eady, during his lifo time, passed over his possessions to Isaac. Undei patriarchal relations, there is no true sense in which that could be done. But when the necessities of the other sons were satisfied, the inheritance was thereby secured exclusively to Isaac. " The Mosaic, and in- deed patriarchal usage recognized only a so-called intestate inheritance, i.e., one independent of i he final arrangement of the testator, determiued according to law, by a lineal and graded succession. If, therefore, Abraham would not leave the sons of his concubines to go unprovided for, he must in his own lifetime endow them with gifts." Delitzscli. 3. Vers. 7-10. Ahraham'*s ag'\ death^ burial., and grave. — And these are the days. — 'Ihe import- ance of the length of Abraham's life is here also brought into strong relief through the expression which is fitly chosen. Oiie hundred aiid seventy-jive years. — An old man and full of years. — [ Of years is not in the original. Abr^iliam w;is full., satisfied. A. G.j According to the promise ch. xiii. 15, comp. ch. XXXV. 29. — And was gathered. — The expression is similar to that: come to Ids fathers (ch, xv. 15), or shall be gathered to his fathers (Judg. ii. 10), and presupposes continued personal existence, since it designates especially the being gathered into Sheol, with those who have gone before, but also points without doubt, to a communion in a dee[>er sense with the pious fathers on the other side of death. In later days Abraham's bosom became the peciiliiir aim and goal of the dying saints (Luke xvi. 22). — And they buried him. — Ishmael * takes his part in the burial, not as Knobel thinks, because he was first removed after this ; but because he was not so fat removed but that the sad and heavy tidings could reach him, and because he was still a renowned son of Abraham, favored with a special blessing (ch. xvii. 10. — In the cave of Machpelah. — It should be observed with what detiniteness even the buiial of Abraham in his hereditary sepulchre is here recorded. DOCTRINAL AUD ETHICAL. 1. Delitzsch : " Keturah was not, like Ilagar, a concubine during the lifetime of the bride : so far Ahgustin : De civ. dei, xvi. 34, correctly rests upon this fact in his controversy with the opponents of secundce nupliw. But still she is, ver. (> (comp 1 Chron. i. 32), 83jb"'B; she does not stand upon thi> level with Sarah, the pcculiur, only one, the mother of the son of promise. There is no stain, moreover, cleaving to this second marriage. Even the relation to Ketu- rah promotes, in its measure, the divine scheme of blessing, for the new life which (ch. xvii.) came upon the old, exhausted nature and strength of Alu-aham, and the word of promise, which destimd him to be the father of a mass of nations, autheuticaies itself in this second marriage." 2. The second marriage of Abiaham lias also itl special reason in the social necessities and habits of the iiged and lonely nomad. The word (Gen. ii. 24) holds true of Isaac. * [Ishmael, although not the promised need, was vot th« subject of ;i special lilOBsing. Tlie sous of Kutui.ili hud nc particular McsRint;, Lslimael is, therefore, j.rnpeily asBO- ciati.'d with Isaac, in paying the last otlices to tlicii Ucceaswf father. MulirHY, p. atiO.— A. G.] CHAP. SXT. 1-10. 493 8. Physiology speaks of a partial appearance of a certain rejuvenation of life in those who have reached a great age ; new teeth, etc. These piiysio- logical phenomena appear to have reached a lull development in the life of Abraham. We should perhaps hold — tliat these epochs of rejm'enatiou in the course of life appear more frequently in tlie patriarchs, living nearer to the paradisiac time and state. [We must not, however, overlook the fact, that the legener.ition in Abraham's case was super- natural.— A. G.] 4. The Abrahamites in the wider sense, who par- tially peopled .\rabia, must form the broad basis for the theocratic faith of Abraham, and become a bridge between Judaism and Christianity on the one hand, and heathenism on the other. — Gerlach : "All these are heads of Arabian tribes, but they are in great part unkno«Ti. Those who a.-e best known are the (ver. 2) Midiauites, on the east of the Ailanitic gulf A mercantile people (eh. xxxvii. 28) often afterwards at war with Israel (especially Judg. viii.) who in the time of the kings, have already disappeared from the history." Bunsen : " The Arabians are still Saracens, i. e., east-landers (comp. ch. xxix. D." 5. The days of (he years. The life-time is spent in the days of the years, and at its end the years ap- pear as days. [Abraham is now in all respects com- plete as to his life ; he has rendered the highest obedience (eh. .xxii.), he has secured a grave in the land of promise (ch. xxiii.), he has cared for the marri.tge of the son of promise (ch. x.xiv.), he has dismissed the sons of nature merely (vers. 5, 6), and finally he has come to a good age and is satisfied with life. Then Abraham dies. Baumgartex, p. 240.— A. G.] 6. Gathered to his people. The choice of the expression here rests upon a good ground ; Abraham has become a father in an eminent and peculiar sense. Essentially, moreover, the expression is the same with that (ch. xv. 15), cntne to his fathers, lie with the fathers (Deut. xxxi. 16), be gathered with the fathers (Judg. ii. 10). "These expressions do not mean merely to die, for S15 and riTS are constantly joined together (vers. 8, 17 ; ch. xxxv. 29, etc.), nor to he buried in a family burial-place with relatives, "because the burial is expressed still by n:p (vers. 9; ch. XT. 15, etc.), and because they are used of those who were not buried witli their fathers, but in other places, e. g., Moses, David, etc., as well as of those in whose tombs the tii-st one of the fathers was laid, e. g., Solomon and Ahab (1 Kings xi. 4.3 ; xxii. 40)." Knobel. But there is no ground for his a.ssertion, that these expressions, however, are derived from burials in common public grounds, and then trans- ferred to the admission into Sheol. We should not jonfound with this harsh assumption the fact, that a more or less common burial represented perhaps the reunion on the ot'aer side of the grave. But the peculiar church-yards or large public burial-places were unknown to the patriarchal nomads. .Jacob did not bring the body of his Rachel to Hebron. There must have been developed already with Enoch a definite consciousness of the faith of immortality (Heb. xi. 5). Delitzscm : "As the wearmess with life a intf "-nipdiat* DlacB. — A. G 1 194 GKNESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK Of MOSES. ham, and Jacob and Esau in the sixtieth year of Isaac, and in the twentieth voar of his married state, 80 Jacob must have been fifteen years old at tlie death of Abraham.) (Sir. xiv. 16, 17.) — The pious even are subject to death, still their death is held precious by the Lord. — What God promises Ids chil- dren, that he certainly keeps for them (ch. .\v, 15 ; Ps. xxxiii. 4). — To die at a tranquil age and in a tran- quil time, is an act of God's kindness iinil love. — Cramer : The cross and adversity make one yielding and willing to die. — The souls of the dead have theii certain places ; they are in the hand of God., and no evil befalls them (Wis. iii. 1 ; 2 Cor. v. 8).— Lisco ; Faith in immortality is indeed never expressly assert- ed in tlie Holy Scriptures (see however Matt. xxii. 32), but is evert/where assmned, for without this faith the whole revelation of God would be vain and nu- gatory ; the Scripture doctrine of the resurrection of the body includes the doctrine of immortality ; is impossible indeed without this. This truth is set in its fullest and clearest Ught by Christ (2 Tim. i. 10). — Calwer Handbuch: We see, moreover, from these verses, how the Bible relates only the true his- tory. Had it been a myth or poem it would have left Abraham at the highest step of the glory of his faith, and passed over in silence this union with Keturah at the age of a hundred and forty years. Abraham is presented to us as an instance and type of faith, but not as one artistically drawn and beau- tified, but as one taken from actual life, not even as » (superhuman) perfect behever, but as one such. who leaves us to find the first perfect one in hil great descendant, and points us to him. Schroder : The satisfaction with life well agreei with a lieaveidy-minded man (Roos). — To his peopU. The words sound as if Abraham went from one peo- ple to another, and from one city to another. An illustrious and remarkable testimony to the resurrec- tion and the future life (Luther).— Since Abraham himself was laid there (in the cave of Maclipelah) to rest, he takes possession in his own person of llda promised land (Drechsler). [And while his body was laid there as if to take possession of the prom- ised land, his soul has gone to his people to take possession of that which the promised land typified, or heaven. — A. G,] — For the character of Abraham see ScHRiiDEK, p. 44'J, where, however, the image and form of Sarah is thrown too much in the shade. [In the section now completed the sacred writer descends from the general to the special, from the distant to the near, from the class to the individual. He dissects the soul of man, and discloses to our view the whole process of the spiritual life, from the new-bom babe to the perfect man. Tlie Lord calls, and his obedience to the call is the moment of his new birth. The second stage of his spiritual life presents itself to our view when Abraham believed the promise, and the Lord counted it to him foi righteousness, and he enters into covenant with God The last great act of his spiritual life is the surren der of his only son to the will of God. MnRPHi, p 362.— A. G.] B. ISAAC, AND HIS FAITH-ENDURANCE. Ch. XXV. 12— XXVIII. 9. FIRST SECTION. Isaac and Ishmael. Chapter XXV. 11-18. 11 And it came to pass after the death of Abraham, that God blessed his son >iiiM. , and [but] Isaac dwelt by the well Laliai-roi [wells ofthequiokener of vision]. 12 Now [and] these are the generations [genealogies, Toledoth] of I.shmael, Abraham's 13 son, whom Hagar the Egyptian, Sarah's handmaid, bare unto Abraham. And these • are llie names of the sons of Iphmael, by their names according to their generations: the first-born of Ishmael, Nebajoth [heights ; Nabathei, a tribe of Northern Arabia] ; and Kedar 14 [dark skin. An Arabian tribe], and Adbecl. [miracle of God], and Mibsam [sweet odor]. And Mislirna [hearing, report, what is heard], ami Duniall | silence, solitude], and Mas.'iah [bcarinf, burden, 15 uttering what Is said], Hadar [inner apartment, tent], and Tenia desert, uncultivated region], Jetur 16 [Seven I a nomadic village], Naphish [recreation], and Kedemah eastward]; These wre the sons of Ishmael, and these are their names, Ijy their towns [fixed abodes], and by their castles; 17 twelve princes according to t.iieir nations. And these are the years of the life uf Ish- mael : an hundred and thirty and seven years ; and he gave up the ghost and died ; 18 and w:is gathered unto his peoirle. And they dwrdt from llavilali [arcRiouof .\rabia inhab Itod l.y the dcscenrlants of Joctan, uiion the easlem boundary of the IshmacUtes] unt" Slllir [a place east o( EKyi't. in the borders of the desert], that is before Kgy])l, as lllOU goest toward [in the direction of] Assyria : and he died ' in the presence of all his brethren [he settled eastward oi an lus brethren] • Ver. 18.— Lit., he fell down, or it fell to him.— A. 0.1 CHAP. XXV. 11-18. 495 OEKEBAIi REUABSS. Soe the remarks upon the previous section. KXEGETICAi AND CEITICAL. 1. Ver. 11. Isaac after the death of Abraham. — Qod blessed Isaac. — The blessing of Abraham continues in the blessing of Isaac ; this is manifest- ed in his welfare and prosperity, or rather in a grate- ful consciousness wliich refers his welfare to the kindness of God. We read; Elohiin blessed Isaac ; for Isaac, as future ancestor of Edom and Jacob, sustained now a universal relation. In earthly re- spects Edom is Isaac's heir as well as Jacob, or even by preference. — ^By the well Ijahai.roi. — By the well of Hagar. According to ch. sxxv. 27, Jacob met his aged father Isaac at Hebron. Doubtless this city bore the same relation from the time of Abra- ham onwards ; Hebron was the principal residence, Beer-slieba the principal station for overseeing their flocks. At this station Isaac, as steward of his father, had already taken up his abode, and in con- sequence of his love of solitude and seclusion he became so fond of it that now he dwelt here regu- larly, without yielding up the principal residence at Hebron ; he even moved his tent from Beer-sheba farther into the deep solitude of Hagar's well. 2. Vers. 12-16. The Toledoth of Ishnuul. [Upon the documentary hypothesis, each of these phrases marks the beginning of a new document. But if we are to regard each of these documents as the work of a separate author, then this author con- tributes only seven verees to the narrative. This is obviously running the theory into the ground, and shows how unreasonable it is to regard these phrases as indicating any change of author. They open new themes or sections of the history. — A. G.] Here also it is obvious that the Toledoth of Genesis does not begin the separate section of the history, but frequently concludes them. In ch. iv. and v. the first human race, together with the Toledoth of Adam, is dismissed from history. So is it also in ch. X., in respect to the heathen nations, descendants of Japheth, Ham, and Shem. Ch. xl. dismisses the les,' theocratic Shemites, together with their Tole- 4oth. In ch. xxii. 20, the Nahorites, the last of the Shemites and nearest to .Abraham, retire from the history, just as the Haranites, or Lot and his descend- ants in ch. xix. 36 ; and as the Abrahamites de- scending from Keturah, in ch. xxv. ; and in our section the Ishmaelites. After the close of the his- tory of Isaac the Edomites, ch. xxxvi. 1, disap- pear. The theocfacu permits no branch of the human race to vanish out of ils circle of vision mikout fiAng it in its conscinusnesx. In ch. xxxvii. 2 Jacob also retires into the background as compared with the history of his sons. VVith the Toledoth of Ishniael comp. 1 Chroii. i. 28-31. — Whom Hagar the Egyptian. — Besides the names of the twelve sons of Ishmael that here present themselves, there oc- curs also (1 Chron. v. 10) the name of the Hagar- ites, Ishmaelites called after the mother, whose name is no doubt assumed in one or more of the names befoie us. In respect to the frequent occurrence of the name Hagar in Arabic authors, see Kxobel. p. 211. — Nebajoth and Kedar. — Delitzsch : "The Uames of the twelve sons of Ishmael are in part well known. Nebajoth and Kedar are not ordy mentioned together in Is. Ix. 7, but also by Plin.": Blsi. Nat., 6, 7 (A'a4o((E« et Cedrei ; Kaidhir and Ndbat (Nabt) are also known to Arabian historian* as descendants of Ishmael. In respect to the mean- ing of the word Nabalieaiis, both in a stricter and a more comprehensive sense, as also in regard to thei» abodes in Arabia Petrea and beyond, see Knobel, Delitzscli, Keil. — The Kadarenes, described Is. xxL 17 as good bowmen, lived in the desirt between Arabia Petrea and Babylonia (Is. xlii. 11; Ps. cxx. 5). "The liabbins use their name to denote the Ara- bians in general." Knobel. — Adbeel and Mibsam. — In respect to these uames, as well as tt) that of Kedma, we can only reach conjectures (see Knobel). — Mishma (Septuagint and Vulgate : Masma). — Connected by Knobel with yiainaixaviis of Ptol., vi. 7, 21. In Arabic authors we have beni Mismah. — Duma. — Probably Dumath al Djendel, on the bor der between Syria and Babylonia. — Massa. — Ap- parently the same as Mafrai-oi, on the northeast side of Duma according to Ptol., v. IB, 2. — Hadar (a more correct reading, 1 Chron. i. oO, is ""n , as compared with the maritime country Chathth. famous among the ancient Arabians on account of its lances), between Omam and Bahrein. For further informa- tion see Knobel, etc. — Hadar is taken together with Thema, which Knobel connects with Qetiui of Pto!- emy, on the Persian Gulf, or with the Arabic banu Teim, a celebrated tribe in Hamasa, probably differ- ent from the Tema, Is. xxi. 14; Jer. xxv. 23 ; Job vi. 19. — Jetur, Naphisch (see 1 Chron. v. 18). — " Neighbors to the Israelites on the enst side of Jor dan. Knobel refers Jetur to the Iturseans. Th« present Druses are probably their descendants." — • Kedma. — " As a separate Arabic tribe we can only refer it, in its narrower sense, to CTJ? "'ZS , who in Judg. vi. 3, 33; vii. 12, are distinguished from other Arabians, and must have dwelt in the vicinity of the country east of Jordan. Perhaps they are the same with those enumerated with the Moabites and Am- monites in Is. xi. 14 and Ezek. xxv. 4, In." Kno- bel. The sons of the East in a more comprehensive sense denotes the Arabians generally, the Saracens. — By their towns, and by their castles, i. e., their movable and fixed habitations. — Turelve princes according to their nations (Lange ren- ders " to their nations "). — The translation, accord- ing to thtir natiovs, can only mean, as moulded, determined by their nations. We hold, therefore, the expression to mean ; twelve princes chosen for governmg and representing their twelve tribes. 3. Vers. 17, 18. The death of hhmael and the expansion of the Ishmaelites. — The years of the life of Ishmael. — Thi< hale man attained only an age of a hundred and thirty -seven years, while on the contrary, the more delicate appearing Isaac reaches the age of a hundred and eighty yeais. Possibly the natural passions of the one consumed life sooner ; no doubt also the quiet, peaceful, believing disposi- tion of the other, exercised a life-prolonging influ- ence. Ishmael dies, the Ishmaelites spread them- selves abroad. — Prom Havilah unto Shtir. — Havilah, see ch. x. 29. Knobel : " From Chaulan in the sfiuth to the eastern boundary of Egypt." Schur. From Egypt to the east in the direction of Assyria. According to Josephus : " Antiq." i. 12, 4, the Ishmaelites dwelt from the Euphrates to the Red Sea. — In the presence of all his brethren, i. e., Hebrews, Edomites, and the children of Keturah. If we understand by Havilah the Chaulotfeans ontha boundary of Arabia Petrea (Keil), we must assign a diiferent meaning to these words. Keil : *' Froir 4UC GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. ■outheast to southwest." Knobki, : "From south- r.ast to northwest," Delitzsch : " The capital of the Ishmaelitic tribes was llezaz, situated south of Yemeu. From this they spread themselves to the west side of the Siniaitic peninsula, and still further in a northerly and northeasterly direction beyond Arabia Petrea and Deserta to the couiitiies under Assyrian sway.'' [He died. He had fallen into the lot of his inheritance. The Heb. word includes the idea of a deliberate settlement, and an assertion by force of his rights and possessions. Thus the prom- ise uttered before his birth was now fulfilled. — A. G.] DOCTKINAl AND ETHICAL. 1. Ishmael in his development precedes Isaac, as Esau precedes Jacob, as the world gets the start of the kingdom of heaven. It looks well for the devel- opment of Ishmael that he buries his father in com- pany with his brother Isaac, though the latter had been preferreil to him. 2. The twelve princes of Ishmael are also men- tioned as witnesses that God has faithfully fulfilled his promises concerning their ancestor (ch. xvi. In, 17, 20). The Arabs, too, count twelve sons of Ishmai 1. 3. The Ishmaelites, the germ of the .Arabic peo- ple in its historic sigiuficance. The country of Ara- bia. Its history. Mohammed. The mission of the Mohammedans. The mission among the Moham- medans. Since Ishmael did not subject himself to Israel, he has become subject to the Turk. 4. Ishmael's genealogy seems to have been pre- served in the house of Isaac, just as Therah's in the aouse of Abraham, or as the genealogy of the na- tions in house of Shem. The father's house does not lose the memory or the trace of the lost son . 5. How the blessing of Abraham descends upon Isaac. The hereditary blessing in the descendants of Abraham, an antithesis to the hereditary curse in the descendants of Adam generally. The inclination to solitude in the life of Isaac. The nature, rights, and limit of contemplation. Contemplative charac- ters. History of a contemplative life. HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL. See Doctrinal and Ethical. — Isaac the blessed son of a blessed father. The great divine miracle, that the blessing of a saving faith was preserved in one line (in spite of all partial obscurations) from Adam to Christ. — Isaac's inclination to solitary contempla- tion.— Per-haps he believed already that a special blessing was confined to that particular plare, the well of vision. — That Isaac selected Uagur'swell as a favorite spot, testifies to the nobility of his soul (for Hagar was the rival of his mother, and Ishmael was her son). — Ishmael's death; or the robust often die before the feeble. — From Ishmael, a child once lan- guishing and perishing from thirst in the wilderness, God's providence made a great (world-coii(]uering) nation. — We may in fact best comprehend the patri- archal triad by regarding Abraham as constituting especially an example of faith, Isaac an example of love, .Jacolj an example of hope. We have promi- nently iiresented to us the still more predominaiing features : the man of the hmael (Ilagai's well), attests his friendly relation to his slep-brolher. — GiitJiered vnio hia people. A lieauliful and charming description of immortality We are now living among the gross people of this worlil, who seek but little after God, yea, in the verj kingdom of the devil. But when we depart from this wretched life, wc shall die peacefully, and be gath- ered unlo our people, and there will be no distress, no misery, no tribulation, but peace and rest. (Luther). CHAP. XXV. 19-34. 497 SECOND SECTION, Jacob and Esau. Chapter XXV. 19-84. 19 And these are tbe generations' [genealogies] of Isaac, Abraham's son: Abraham 20 begat Isaac : And Isaac was forty years old when he took Rebekah to wife, tb« daughter of Bethuel tlie Syrian of Padan-Aram [from Mesopotamia], the sister to Laban 21 the Syrian. And Isaac entreated tiie Lord [jehovah] for his wife, because she was 22 barren: and the Lord was entreated of liim, and Rebekah his wife conceived. AnQ the ciiildren sti'tggled together [thrust, jostled each other] within her; and she said. If it be 23 so, why am I tLus?^ And she went to inquire of the Lord. And the Lord said unto her, Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people^ shall be separated from thy bowels ; and the one people shall be stronger than the other people ; and the elder shall serve tiie younger [the greater shall aerve the less]. 24 And when her days to be delivered were fulfilled, behold, there were twins in her 25 womb. And the first came out red, all over like an hairy garment;* and they called 26 his name Esau [covered with hair]. And after that came his brother out, and his hand took liold on Esau's heel ; and his name was called Jacob [heel-catcher] ; and Isaac was 27 threescore years old when she bare them. And the boys grew : and Esau was a cun- ning hunter [a man knowing the hunt], a man of the field [a wild rover, not an husbandman] ; and 28 Jacob was a plain ' [discreet, sedate] man, dwelling in tents. And Isaac loved Esau, be- cause he did eat of his venison [game was in his month his ijsivorite food] : but Rebekah loved Jacob. 29 And Jacob [once] sod pottage ; and Esau came from the field, and he was faint. 30 And Esau said to Jacob, Feed me, I pray thee [let me devour greedily], with that same reef pottage [from the red— this red, here] ; for 1 am faint : therefore was his name called Edom 31, 32 [Bed]. And Jacob said, Sell me this day [first] thy birthright. And Esau said, Behold, I am at the point to die [going to die] : and wiiat profit shall this birthright do to 33 me ? And Jacob said. Swear to me this day ; and he sware unto him : and he sold 34 his birthright unto Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and pottage of lentiles; and he did eat and drink, and rose up, and went his way : thus Esau despised his birthright. (* Ver 19.— The mb'in is more than genealogies. See note on ver. 4, ch. ii. — A. G.] [» Ver. 22.— Lit., If so, for what this am I.— A. Q.] , [' Ver. 23.— D'^"3 and D"'T36iiTn as a mantle of hair. — A. G.] I* Ver. 27.— nri , perfect, peaceful, in his disposition, as compared with the rude, roving Esau.— A. G.] GENERAL PEELIMINAET BEMABKS. 1. According to Knobel we have, in the present nuration, as in ch. 26, a mixture of different records upon an Elohistic basis by means of the Jehovistic supplement. It is enougli to say, that in our section the theocratic point of view prevails. [Keil remarks that if the name of God occurs less frequently here, it is due partly to the historic material, which gives less occasion to use this name, since Jehovah ap- peared more frequently to Abraham than to Isaac and Jacob ; and partly to the fact that the previous revelations of God formed titles or designations for the God of the Covenant, as " God of Abraham," " God of my father," which are equivalent in signifi- cance with Jehovah. — A. G.] It introduces the election of Jacob in opposition to Esau. The order of the Toledotli Knobel explains thus : " The author isually arranges them, in the first place, according to 32 the individual patriarchs, after he has recorded the death of the father. Next begins the proper history of the patriarchs, e.g., ch. x. 1 ; xi. 27 : xxv. 13; xxxvi. 1 ; xxxvii. 2. We have already made the re- mark that the Toledoth frequently dispose of a more general sequence of history, in order to pass over to a more special one. DeUtzsch finds tliree "tran- sitions " in the history of Jacob. The first reaching to the departure of Jacob, ch. xxv. 19-xxviii. 9 ; the second to Jacob's departure from Laban, ch. xxxii. 1 (a section, however, in which nothing in regard to Isaac occurs) ; the third, from Jacob's return to the death of Isaac, ch. xxxv. 29. But this section, too, is merely a history of Jacob, except the three verses in ch. xxxv. 27-29. On the other hand it is pre- eminently the history of Joseph and of the rest of the sons of Jacob, which begins at ch. xxxni. 2, where, according to Knobel, the history of Jacob should first begin. In the separate biographies we t86 tiESESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. Me to distingiiish the theocratic stages of the life of the patriarchs, from the periods of their human decrepitude and decease, in which the new theocratic generation already becomes prouiiuent. This history has four secions : Rebekah's barrenness and Isaac's intercession ; Rebekah's pregnancy and the divine disclosure of her condition ; the antithesis in the nature of the sons reflecting itself in the divided love of the parents ; and Esau's prodigality of his birth- right, parting with it for a mess of pottage. In the second section we have the prophetic pruface, in the third and fourth the typical prelude to the entire fu- ture history of the antithesis between Jacob and Esau, Israel and Edom. 2. The points of light in the life of Isaac appear previous to this narrative. These are his child-like Inquiries and his patient silence upon Moriahlch. xxii.); his love to Rebekah (ch. xjxiv.); his brotherly commu- nion with Ishmael at the burial of Abraham, and Ids residing at the well Lahai-Roi (ch. xxv.). Here we now read first of his earnest intercession on account of the barrenness of Rebekah ; then, moreover, of his preference of Esau because he was fond of game. Somewhat later Jehovah appeared unto him at Gerar, preventing him from imitating his father Abraham in going to Egypt during the famine, although he imitates hitn in passing off Rebekah for his sister. In this, too, he differs from Abraham, that he began to devote himself to agriculture (ch. xxvi. 12). He Buffers himself, however, to be supplanted by the Philistines, and one well after another is taken away from him, tmtil he at last retains only one, and finds rest at Beer-sheba. In the second appearance too (ch. xxvi. 24), his deep humility is reflected in this, that he preserves the promise of the blessing, receiving it as he doa^ for the sake of his father Abraham, He now takes courage, and, as Abraham did, proclaims the name of the Lord, and ventures to reprove the conduct of Abimelech. His digging of wells, as well as his tilling the soil, seems to indicate a progress beyond Abraham. But then he is willing to trans- mit to Esau the theocratic blessing of the birthright, though Esau had shortly betbre sorely grieved liim by the marriage of *wo of the daughters of the Hittites, The marked antithesis between Isaac's vision power, his contemplative prominence, and his short-sightedness in respect to the present life, as well as the weakness of his senses, appears most strikingly in ch. xxvii. Rebekah proceeds now with more energy, and Isaac dismisses Jacob with his blessing, who leturns after many years to bury his father. When Isitac blessed his sons his eyes had already become diin, yet many years passed before he died (from his one hundred and tiiirtieth to his one hundred and eightieth year). Delitzsch exagger- ates Isaac's weakness as aiilking him in everything a mere copy of Abraham. " Even the wells he digs are those of Abraham, destroyed by the Philistines, and the names he gives to them are merely the •Id ones renewed. He is the most passive of the three patriarchs. His life flows away in a passive i)uiet- ness, and ahuost the entire second half in senile tor- pidity (I). So passive, 80 secondary, or, so to speak, BO sunken or retired is tne middle period in the pa- triarchal hi.story." We have referred to the points in which lie does not imitate Abraham, but is himself. Ue does not go to Egyjit during the I'amine, as Abra- ham did ; ho begins tlie transition fr(Jm a nomadic to and agricultural life, he digs new wells in adililion lo the old ones, he lives in exclusive niouogamnus wedlock, and even in his preference of Esau, the giime, surely, is not the only motive. If the extent. right of the firstborn impressed so deeply his passiT< character (especially in connection with the lobust, striking appearance of Esau, seeming to fit him par- ticularly to be heir of Canaan) ; there can be n« doubt, also, that he was repelled by traits in the earlj life of Jacob. But most especially does he appeal to have had a feeling for those sufferings of the first- born Ishmael, which he endured on his account. And hence he appeared willing to make amends to Esau, his own firstborn, a fact to which, at least, liia dwelling at Hagar's well, and his brotherly union with Ishmael, may point. It is evident that the ar- dent Rebekah, by her animated, energetic declara tions (ch. xxiv. 18, 19, 25, 28, 58, li-t, 65 ; ch. xxv. 22), formed a very significant complement to Isaac, confiding more in the divine declarations as to her boys than Isaac did, and therefore better able to appreciate the deeper nature of Jacob. But when Isaac, through his passiveness, fails in the perform- ance of his duty, the courageous woman forgets her vocation, and with artifice counsels Jacob to steal the blessing from Isaac— a transgression for which she had to atone in not seeing again her favorite son after his migration. And even if Isaac was short- sighted respecting his personal relations in this world, yet the words of the blessing attest that his spiritual sight of the divine promises had not diminished with his blinded eyes. It had its ground, moreover, in the very laws of the psychical antithesis that Isaac, so feeble in will and character, was attracted by the wild and powerful Esau; while the brave, energetic Rebekah Ibund greater satisfaction in union with the gentle Jacob. In the assumed zeal of her faith for the preservation of a pure theocracy among the patri- archs, she too excels Isaac. We should bear in mind that they were Jews who relate so impartially the Nalioritic Rebekah's superiority over the Abrahainic Isaac. [" Consenting to be laid on the altar as a sacrifice to God, Isaac had the stamp of submission early and deeply impressed on his soul. Hence, in '.he sj^ii'itual aspect of his chai-acter, he was the man of patience, of acquiescence, of susceptibility, of obedience. His qualities were those of the son. as Abraham's were those of the fiither. He carried out, but did not initiate ; he followed, but did not lead ; he continued, but he did not commence. Accord- ingly the docile and patient side of the saintly charac- ter is now to be presented to our view." Mukpht, p. 367 —A. G.] EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL. 1. Vers. 19-21. Rebekah's barren uens, and Isaac's intereessian. — Fadan-Aram. — Levcd, plain of Aram: Hosea xii. 12, it reads, field of Aram. Ch. xlviii. 7. Padan, Mesopotamia. Keil limits the name to the large plain of the city of Haran, surrounded by mountains, following the conjectures of Knobel, who, however, regards I'ailan-Aram as a specific Elohistic expression, .\ccording to others, Mesopotamia is divided into two jiarts, and here the level country is distinguished from the moun- tainous region. But this does not ap|)ly to Uaran. To one travelling from Palestine to Mesopotamia across the mountains, Mesopotamia 's iiu extensive plain. According to ver. 2B, Isaac J-aited twenty years for offspring. This was a new trial to liini, though not to Abraham, who still lived. Sittec the line of the blessing was to pa.s.s through Isaac, lii» intercession was based upon a divine foundation ic CHAP. XXV. 19-34. 4»S Jehovah's promise. [For his wife, with reference to, literally before ; which Luther says is to be explained spiritually, indicating the intensity of his prayer, the single object before his mind. — "Entreated ihe liOrd. The seed of promise must be sought from Jehovah, so that it should be regarded, not as the fruit of nature, but as the gift of divine grace." Keil, p. 191.--A. G.] S X srs. 22, 23. RebekaKs pngnancy, and the ihvim explanation, of her condition. — The Hebrew exDression ISSln"' denotes a severe struggling with each oiber. Knobel will have it that this feature was derived from the later enmities be- tween the Israelites and Edomites, and quotes ch. iv. H; xvi. 12; xix. 30. "In like manner, ac- cording to Apollod., 2, 2, 1, Acrisius and Proetus, two brothers, had already quarrelled with each other in the womb of their mother about the dominion." That Buch intimations and omens can have no real existence is regarded a.'^ a settled matter in the prejutiices of this kind of criticism. — Why am I thus 7 — We see again the character of Uebekah in this very ex- pression. According to Delitzsch. she was of a san- guine temperament: rash in her actions, and as easily discouraged. We would rather regard her words as an ill-humored expression of a sanguine- choleric temperament. It does not mean : why am I yet living? (Delitzsch, referring to ch. xxvii. 46, Knobel, Keil), but why am I so I i. e., in this condi- tion. [Why this sore and strange struggle within me ? — A. G.] — To inquire of the Lord. — According to 1 certain .Jewish Midrash, she went to Salem (so Knobel). According to Dehtzsch, she went rather to Hagar's well ; at all events, to a place sacred on sccount of revelations and the worship of Jehovah. Luther thinks she went to Shem, others to Abraham or Melchizedek, just as men inquired of the prophets in the time of Samuel (1 Sam. ix. 9). The prophet nearest to her, if she had wanted one, would have been Isaac. The phrase " she trent " no doubt means she retired to some quiet place, and there re- ceived for herself the divine revelation. For in the patriarchal history sacred visions determined as yet Bacred places, nor is it different at present. [Still the phrase seems to imply that there was some place and mode of inquiring of the Lord. Perhaps, as Theodoret suggests, at the family altar. — A.G.] Ac- cording to Knobel, she received the experience indi- cated as, in general, a .si^n of ill omen. Delitzsch thinks she saw in it the »iiger of Jehovah. However, we must not too sharpiy interpret her ill humor, on account of the mysterious, painful, and uneasy con- dition, and the alarming presentiment she may have bad of the contentions of her posterity. That she ■"as to be a mother of twins she did not know at t'lis time. — Two nations. — The divine answer is a rhythmical oracle. (See Delitzsch.) [Two nations are in thy womb ; And two people from thy bowels shall be separated ; And people shall he stronger than people ; And the elder shall serve the yoimger. Wordsworth. — A. G.] KTith the prophetic elevation the poetic form appears »l80. It appears very distinctly from this oracle, that they would differ from the very womb of the mother. Since Esiu's liberation is not predicted here, Knobel regards this as a sign that the author lived at a time before Edom threw off the yoke of Judah. We know however, how the theocratic prophecies gradually enlarge. The meaning of this cb-icurt revelation, clothed as it was in the genuine form of prophecy, and which so greatly calmed her, she saw in a certain measure explained in the relations that had existed between Isaac and Ishmael. 3. Vers. 24-28. T/ie birth of Ihe twini Th. ayitithesis of (heir 7iature, and the divided pc. tiali/^ of the parents toitmrds their children. — Behold, there 'were twins. — The fulfilment of the oiacle in its personal, t'unJamental fonn. — And the first came out red. — Of a reddish fiesh color. Hi'! licjdy, like a garment of skins, covered with hair. (Luxuri- ance of the growth of the hair.) In the word "'Jians there is an allusion to cns , in the word ^SiU there is an allusion to I'S'i) . " Arab authors deriva also the red-haired occidentals from Esau." KnobeL Both marks characterize his sensual, hard nature. — And his hand took hold on Esau's heel. — De- litzsch : " It is not said that he held it already in the womb of his mother (a position of twins not considered possible by those who practise obstet- rics), but that he followed his brother with such a movement of his hand." Knobel contends against the probability of this statement, since, according to a work on obstetrics by Busch, the birth of the second child generally occurs an hour after that of the first one, frequently later. The vcri/ least that the expression can convey is, that .Jacob followed Esau sooner than is generally the case; upon his heels, and, as it were, to take hold of his hrel. Since the fact, considered symbolically, does not speak in his favor ; since it points out the crafty combatant who seizes his opponent unawares by the heel, and thus causes him to fall, there is the less ground for unagining any forgery here. The signification of the name " Jacob " is essentially the s.ame with " suc- cessor," as Knobel conjectures. Jacob's cunning seems to have been stripped from him in his life's career, deceived as he had been by Laban, and even by his own sons, whilst there remains his lioly pru- dence, his deeper knowledge, and his incessant look- ing to the divine promise. — A cunning hunter.— Esau developed himself according to the omen. — Because he did eat of his venison. — Literally, " was in his mouth." — And Jacob vras a plain man. — en ir^X. Lcther: a pious man. Kno- bel : a blameless man, i. e., as a shepherd. " Hunt- mg, pursued, not for the sake of self-defence or of necessity, but for mere pleasure, as with Esau, the author regards as something harsh and cruel, espe- cially when compared with the shepherd-life so highly esteemed by the Hebrews " Isaac's fond- ness for venison, however, cannot be fully explained by this. Gesenius emphasizes the antithesis of gentle and wild. Delitzsch explains on , " with his whole heart " devoted to God and the good, etc. Keil, more happily, as " a disposition inclmed to a domes- tic, quiet life." The most obvious explanation of the word in this place points out a man, modest, correct, and sedate, in contrast with the wild, un- steady, roving, and proud manner of Esau's life. Jacob was modest, because he adhered to the custom of his father, and stayed near the tents. — Becauit h- did eat of his venison, lit., was in his mouth. Thii weakness of the patriarch was not his only motiv« in bis preference of Esau, but it is particularly men- tioned here on account of the following narrative. In like manner, Haman was a melancholy, indolenf man, fond of good living. 600 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. 4. Vers. 29-34. The typical prelude of the histor- ical antithesis between Jacob and Esau. — Jaoolj sod pottage. — A dish of lentiles, see ver. 34. — Peed me. — Lit., "let me swallow," .in expression lor eal- ng greedily, usb. According to Knobel, Esau, by reason of his greediness, was not able to thinii of the name, " lentiles," but points them out by the words, " that Red ! " At the most, " that Red " might express his strong appetite, excited by the in- viting color. The addition T^'T) o^sn is generally interpreted: ' from that same Red." The repetition in the original show^ that his appetite was greatly excited : " Let me swallow, I pray tliee, some of that Red, that Red there ! " We question, however, whether he did not say rather: Feed wUh that Red, me the Red one. Thus by a rude, witty play upon words, he would have introduced the fact of his afterward having been called " the red one." At all events his name is not to be deduced from the red pottage. " In the words 'JiTaTX and isa above there is indicated a different relation of the names C■i^X (red-brown) and T"i) (hairy), but the one re- ferring to cins , that red, i. e., brown-yellow pot- tage of lentiles, (poiviKiiiuv, is there predominant. Moreover, thousands of names, e. g., among the .irabs (comp. Abdlfeda's Hist. Antei-.tl.), have a like fortuitous origin. But if any one should regard it as accidental that the history of nations for several thousand years should have been connected with a pottage of lentiles, he will not look in vain for simi- lar occurrences in perusing the pages of Oriental history. [Therefore was his name called Edom. There is no discrepancy in ascribing the name both to his complexion and the color of the lentile broth. The propriety of a name may surely be marked by different cii-eumstances. Nor is it unnatural to sup- pose that such occasions should occur in the course of life. Jacob, too, has the name given to him from the circumstances of his birth, here confirmed. — A. G.] It is scarcely necessary to say here, that lentiles (adasi are still a favorite dish in Egypt and Syria." Delitzsch. — Sell me this day. — Knoliel, as his manner is, regards this fact as improbable. He thinks the object of the narrative is to answer tlie question, how the birthriglit descended from Esau to Jacob, and thus erroneously supposes that, according to the Jewish view, the people of God, from Atiam down to Isaac, had always descended from the line of the first-born. Tlie text, however, presents to our view the contrast between Esau's carnal thinking and Jacob's believing sensibility, in the measure of fanatical exaggeration, and according to its conflict so decisive and typical for all time The right of the first-born has its external and inteinul aspects. The external preference consisted in the lieadship over the brothers or the tribe (ch. xxvii. 'JO), and later also in a double portion of the inheritance of the lather. The internal preference was the right of priestliood, and in the house of Abraham, according to the supposition thus far as- sumed, a share in the blessing of the promise (ch. xxvii. 4, 27-29). [Which included the possession »f Canaan and the covenant fellowship with Jeho- vah, and still more, the progenitorship of him in whom all the families of the earth were to be blessed. — A. G.] To acquire a rightful claim to this, was umloubtedly tlie principal aim in the bargaiti, as is ticen immediiuely from the answer of Esau : " I am it the point to d'e ; " and also from the fact that Esau appears not to have been limited in his ex ternal inheritance. It is to the praise of Jacob thai he appreciated so highly a promise extending into the far future and referring to the invisible ; the realization of which, moreover, though he waa un- conscious of it, was already prepared in his very being (either in his natural disposition or in his ele^ tion). The acuteness, too, with wliich he discerned Esau's gross bondage to appetite, deserves no cen- sure. The selfishness of his nature by wliich he so soon estimates his profits and takes advantage of his brother, — this impure motive, as well as a fanatical self-will arising from his excitement in respect to the birthright, through which he anticipates God's provi- dence, is all the more obvious in his cunningly avail- ing himself of the present opportunity. [Yet it must be borne in mind that he laid no necessity upon Esau. He leaves him to accept or reject the proposal. And Esau knew well, though he did not value it, what the birthright included. His own words, " what profit shall it do to me, seeing I am about to die ? " show clearly that he knew that it in eluded invisible and future things, as well as the visi- ble and present. It was because he thus consciously sold his birthright, and for such a consideration, that the Apostle, Heb. xii. 16, calls him a profane person. — A. G.] In Esau of course he was not mistaken. — Behold I am at the point to die. — Esau, in his carnal disposition, seems to regard only the pres- ent and the things of this life, and of the things of this life, the visible and the sensual only. He yields the entire higher import of the birthright, the specific blessing of Abraham, the inheritance of his posterity, the right and land of the covenant, for the satisfac- tion of a moment — and that, too, near his paternal hearth, where he would soon have obtained a meal He is therefore designated (Heb. xii. 16) as /Ss/StjAos or profane. — Swear to me this day. — Jacob's de maud of an oath in this transaction evinces a veri ungenerous suspicion, just as the taking of the oath on the part of Esau shows a low sense of honor.— And rose up and went his way. — As if nothing happeued. Repentance followed later. DOOTErNAL AND ETHICAL. 1. Rebekah's barrenness during twenty years. The sons of Isaac, too, were to be asked for ; they were to be children of faith, especially Jacob. Sa- rah's example appears to occur again. Similar ex- amples: Rachel, Hannah, p^lizabeth. Even when not viewed in the light of the Abrahamic promise of the blessing, barrenness was regarded in the an- cient Orient as a trial of special severity ; how much more so in tliis case. Stakkk : " Barrenness among the patriarchs (Hebrews) was a painful occurrence. It was sometimes the fruitful source of strife (Gen. XXX. 2); tears were shed (1 Sam. i. 7) ; it was con- sidered a reproach (Luke i. 25) ; it was even held foi a curse." Here, however, Abraham could from his own experience comfort them; he Uved fifteen years after the birth of the children. 2. Isaac's intercession. It could be based upon God's promise and Abraham's experience. Jehovah heard him. He giantod more than asked. Instead of one child he received two. Undoultedly Re- bekah sustained his intercession by her prayers. a. Rebekah's pregnancy, her painfiil sensation, her ill-humor and alarming presentiments. The gen- tle story of the hopeful maternal tempeian-ent ii CllAl'. XXT. 19-34. 501 often of the greatest significance in history. Isaac, in acconlance witli his disposition, prays to Jehovah ; Rcbekah, after her manner of feeling, goes and asks Jehov.ih. Undoubtedly she lierself is tlie prophetess to whom God reveals the manner and future of her delivery. Jehovah speaks to her. The word of •evclation, though dark, infuses into her an earnest yet hopeful feeimg of joy, instead of maternal sad- ness and despondency. Two brothers, as two na- tions— two nations, to conteiiil and fight with each other from the very womb of the mothor. The larger, or elder, and externally more powerful, gov- erned by the smaller, the younger, and apparently the more feeble. In these three points the antithesis between Ishmael and Isaac is reflected again. [The Apostle, Rom. ix. 12, dwells upon this passage as »ffording a striking illustration and proof of the doctrine he was then teaching. Isaac was chosen over Ishmael, but further still, Jacob was chosen over Esau, though they were of the same covenant mother, and prior to their birth. The clioice, elec- tion, was of grace. — A. H.] 4. Brothers unlike, hostile; twins even at en- mity, whose physiological unconscious antipathy shows itself already in the womb of the mother — dark forebodings of the yet coming life, bearing witness, however, that the life of man already, in its coming into being, is a germinating seed of a future individuality. This cannot be meant to express a mutual hatred of the embryos, .\ntipathios, how- ever, as well as sympathies, may he manifested in the germinating life of man as in the animal and vegetable kingdom. 5. The relation of prophecy and poetry appears in the rhythmical form of the divine declaration as it is laid before us. Common to both is the elevated lyrical temperament manifesting itself in articulate rhythm. 6. The individuality of the twins is manife.er, seems to be the lery reason why Isaae preferred Esau, and Rebekah Jacb. The gentle Isaac, who was to transmit to one of his children the great promise of the future, even the hope of Canaan, might have considered Esau, not only in his character of first-born, but also in thnt of a courageous and strong hunter, more suitKble to hohl and defend .\braham's prospects ftmo ig the heathen, than Jacob, who was so similar to himself in respect to domestic Ufe. He might, lierefore, imderstand the oracle given to Ret>ekah in a sense different from that received by her ; or h« might doubt, perhaps, its objective validity, opposed as it was to the customary right of successioti. Thai Esau's venison exercised an influence as to his posi- tion towards Esau, is proved from the text. It might be to him a delusive foretaste of the futurt cotiquesti of Canaan. Esau's frank nobility of soul is seen also in his promptly and zealously complying with the request. Rebekah confided in her oracle and understood her Jacob better. But even here there coiiperuteii that mutual power of attraction which lay in the two antithetical temperaments. Without doubt, Esau, the stately hunter, moved about in hia paternal home as a youthful lord ; in whieli fact Isaac thought that he saw a sign of future power. 7. Isaac's taste and Esau's greediness — tht t«" prime features nf a lickerish deportment The weak- ness of the fatner soon increases to the greediness of the son. Isaac's contemplation and weakness as to his senses reminds us of similar contrasts. 8. And Jacob sod potta(je. Every human weak- ness has its hour of temptation, and if we do not watch and pray, it will come upon us like a thief 9. To sell one's birthright for a pottage of len- tiles: this expression has become the established ex- pression for every exchange of eternal treasures, honors, and hopes, for earthly, visible, and moment- ary pleasures. No doubt the motto : Let us eat and drink, etc., is an echo of Esau's expression. Yel we are not at Uberty to regard this moment of aban- donment to appetite as an instance of a frame of mitid continual, fixed ; nor can we refer the divine reprobation, beginning with this moment, to his future happiness. He was rejected relatively to the prerogatives of the Abr.ihamic birthright. Notwith- standing his manliness and placability, he was not a man who had longings for the future, and therefore could not be a patriarch among the people of the future (Mai. i. 3; Heb. xii. 17). Jacob, however, was different ; he knew how to prize the promises, in spite of those faults of weakness and craft, from which God's training purified him. 10. Thus it stood with both children even before their birth. The antithesis of their lives was grounded in the depths of their individuality, that is, in the religious inclination of the one, and the spiritual superficiality of the other. But these funda- mental traits had tlieir ground in the divine election (Rom. ix. 11). Tne fundamental relations become apparent, with respect to both, in a sinfid manner. They become apparent through the sins of both, but they would have appeared, too, without theii sinftil actions, by tiod's providence. The question is about a destination, who was to be the proper bearer of the covenant, not about happiness and perdition. 11. In their next conflict Jacob's ungenerous negotiation increases to fraud. Thence his subse- quent great sufferings and atonement. By the de- ception of I.aban, too, as well as by that of his sons, must expiation be made. The bloody coat of many colors, sent to him by his sons, retninded him of Esau's coat, in which he approached his father. For Jacoli's opinion concerning the sufferings of his life, see Gen. xlvii. 9. Starke: Paul, in quoting these words, Rom. ix. 15, does not spe.ik of an absolute decree to eternal life or eternal damnation. Because God was to establish his church among the posterity of Jacob, and the Messiah was to come through them, Esau's posterity, if desirous of salvation, must turn to the woisiiip of Jacob's God (John iv. '22). Upon the idea of election, see Lanoe's Positive JJo.niatic B02 GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF HOSES. article Ordo Salutis. [Also Tholuck, Meyer, Hodge on the passage Rom. ix. 11. It seems weU-nigh im- possible to escape the conviction that the Apostle here teaches the sovereign clioice of persons, not merely to the e.'iternal blessings, but the internal and spiritual blessings of his kingdom, i. e., to salva- tion.—A. G.] 12. The present prophecy respecting Jacob and Esau is fartlier developed in the blessings of Isaac (ch. xxvii. ). Thus everything was historically ful- filled. For Edom and Idumaea, seethe Bible Diction- aries ; also respecting the prophetic declarations con- cerning Edom. The prophet Obadiah represents Edom as a type of the anti-theocratic (anti-Christian) conduct of false and envious brothers. This typical interpretation no more excludes the preaching of the Gospel iu Idumfea than similar and more definite representations of Babel exclude the preaching of Peter at Babylon. 13. The Hebraic, i. e., the profoundest concep- tion of history, here comes into view again. All his- tory develops itself from personal beginnings. The personal is predoniinaiit in history. 14. The mystery of births ; of the like relation between male and female nature ; of the unlilie but natural relations between the more and less gifted, between noble and common; and of the different d^rees of natural dispositions — a reservation of God, in his decrees of providence. HOMILETIOAJ,Ai!D PRACTICAX. See the Doctrinal and Ethical. The house of a patriarch in its light and dark aspects : a. The di- vine blessing and human piety ; b. human weakness and sin. — Different directions of the parents. Con- trasts of the childreiL — The trials iu the life of Isaac. — Children a blessing, an heritage of the Lord. — The intercession and its answer. — Isa:ic's prayers, Rebekah's inquiries. — Hoping mothers are to incjuire of the Lord. — Twin brothers not always twin spirits. — Jacob and Esau. — The sale of the birthright for a pottage of lentiles. — Edom's character in respect to good and evil. (Saying of Lessing : Nothing in a man is condemned as execrable if he only lias the reputa- tion of honor and integrity.) — Jacob's sin, to human eyes, indissolubly connected with his higher strivings. — It is reserved to the chemistry of God to separate the dross of sin from the pure metal of a pious striving (Mai. iii. 3). — The experience of the pious, a succession of divine purifications. — Hereditary faults. — Jacolj's ha.ste and eager grasijing, the sign of the severe expiatory penitential sorrows of liia lite. — He wislied to acquire externally, what (iod's grace had put into his heart. — The first fault of J;icob a harbingiT of the second. — Hereditary virtues and lereditary vices. — Divine election: 1. X predestina- tion of Jacob's and Esau's theocratic position ; 2. no decree as lo tlieir deportment. — Esau and Jacol); or a frank, noble disposition without subjectivcness, without a desire, and even without a true sense of di- vine tilings ; opposed to an cnthu.siastic feeling for t!ie eternal, yet tainted with self-deceit and diBlioiicsty. — Jacob, a man future. Staukk, Cramkk: The true church is never re- ipccted liy the world as much as tlie great mass of the children of the flesh ; we mu.st uot, therefore, place the bushel by the largest heap. — Bihl. Tub. : thild'-en arc an he-ilage of the Lord (Ps. cxxvii. 3). — Hall : Isaac asks for one son and he receives two — Lange: Married peopla are under obligations t( unite in prayer, especially on important occasions. — Notwitlistanding natural causes, God, as creator, i-e^ serves to himself the closing and opening of th« womb of mothers. This shows his sovereignty ovei the human race (Jer. xxxi. 20). — Rebekali, in hei impatience, may be a type of those who, having been aroused by God, so that a struggle, necessarily painful, takt^i place between spirit and flesh, soon become impatient. — In an unfruitful conjugal life we are to take comfort in this : 1. That God visited with barrennes.s holy people in former times— Sarah, Rachel, Hannah, Elisabeth ; 2. God best knows our wants ; 3. we are not to render an account lor chil- dren, etc. ; 4. to die without children takes away, in a certain degree, the bitterness of death ; 5. the time* are calamitous (Matt. xxiv. 19 1. In times of need we are not to consult soothsayers, but God and his word. — (The struggle of the flesh with the spirit iu the new life of the new-bom ; Rom. vii. 22, 23). — Ver. 2r>. Gen. iii. 16. — Cramkr: Within the pale of the Christian Church we have different classes of" peo- ple : Jews and heathen (John x. 1 6 1, true believers and hypocrites, good and evil (Matt. xiii. 47). God does not judge after the advantages of the flesh, of age, of size and other things which concern the appear- ance.— Bib!. Wirt. : Two churches are prefigured here : one believing the promises of Christ ; the other depending on a carnal advantage of antiquity and extent. These two bodies will never come to an agreement, until finally the true church, as the small- er, will overcome the false by the victory of her faith, and triumph over her in eterual blessedness (1 John V. 4). — 0, children, remember what anxiety you have cost your mothers. — Ver. 28. Langk ; The preference of parents for one or another of their children may have its natural cause, and be sanctified, but seldom does it keep within proper Umits. Proba- bly Esau was more attached to his father, and Jacob to his mother. (Isaac, probably, prefers venison, not as a delicacy, but to make better and economical use of his cattle ; and because wild animals are of no use to the husbandman, but only cause destruction to him.) — Ver. 29. The simplicity of early time. Jacob sitting by the hearth and cooking, which is usually the duty ol' the females. — Ver. 31. The apology for Jacob (Luther and Calvin, indeed, approve of his transaction on the ground of his right to the privilege of the first-born by the divine promise). Though the first-born was highly esteemed among the patriarchs, Christ wnuld not descend from one of the first-born (indicating that he was the true first-born, who was to jjrocure for us the right of the first-born from God). [See, also, Rom. viii. 2fl ; Col. i. 18; Rev. I. 5; Ileb. xii.23. — A. G.] He claims to descend, not from Cain, but from Selh ; not from Nahor, or Ilaran, but from .\braliam; not from Ishmacl, but from Isaac; not from Esau, but from Jacob; not from the seven eliler sons of Jesse, but from David, and from Solo- mon, who was one of David's younger sons. — (Ver. 27. The pennission of hunting on certain conditions : Fii-st, that the regular vocation be not neglected; second, that our neighbor be not injured.) — (Cramkr : In iducating cliihlren we are to pay particular at- tention to their dispositions, observing in what di- rection each one iiiclines, for not every one is qual- ified for all things (I'rov. xx. 11 ; xxii. W). — (iodlesi men, who, for the sake of temporary things, despise and hazard the eternal (Phil. iii. 19). (iKKi.ACH : The birth of many ce'.ebrateJ men ol CHAP. XXVI. 1-22. 603 God, preceded by a long season of barrenness. — Thereby tlie now-born babe is to become not only more endeared to the parents, who tarn their whole attention to it, but is especially to be regarded by them as a supernatural gift of God, and thus become a type of the Saviour's birth from a virgin. — Ttie iH- ••ine prophec)/ : The patriarchs come into view only (?) in reference to their descendants, with whom they are considered as constituting a unity. For the prophecy has not been fulfilled in respect to the Srothers as individuals. — Lisco ; A frivolous con- tempt of an advantage bestowed on him by God. — So, also, an incorsiderate oath (Heb. .\ii. 16). — An immoderate longing after enjoyment sacrifices the greatest for the least, the eternal for tlie temporal. — Calwer Handbuch : Abraham too rejoiced in the birth of these boys ; he lived yet 15 years after their birth, and the narrative of his death and burial has been, for historical purposes, considereii first. When the inherited blessing of the promise is the subject treated of, the mere course of nature cannot decide the issues, in order that all praise may be to God. and not to men. — Schroder: (The Rabbins e.xplain Isaac's faithfulness to Rebekah from the fact of his having been offered in sacrifice to God (1 Tim. Ui. 2). Isaac, to whom the very promise was given, is placed after Ishniael, and Ishmael, possessing a temporal promise only, is put far before him. He is lord over other lords, counts 12 princes in his line, while Isaac lived alone and without any children, like a lifeless clod (Luther). — All the works of God begin painfully, but they issue excellently and gloriously. Earthly undertakings progress rapidly, and blaze up like a fire made of paper, but sudden leaps seldom prosper (Val. Herb.).— Every mother conceals a fu- ture ; every maternal heart is full of presagings. Her bodily pains, she interprets as spiritual throes that await her. — The case of Rebekah presents con- solation to a woman with child (Val. Herb.). — Calvin: Rebekah probably inquired of God in prayer. — Her example should teach us not to give way too much to sadness in distress. We are to restrain, and struggle with, ourselves. — Prophecy (even the hea- then oracles) always assumes a solemn and metrical etyle, etc. The prophet is a poet, as frequently the poet is a prophet. — Her alarming presentiment did oot deceive Rebekah. The struggle within her indi- cated the external and internal conflicts not only of 'er children, but even of the nations which were to descend from them. — This ver. 23 embraco al times ; it is the history of the world, of the church, and of individual hearts, enigmatically expressed (I'oats maile of red camel's hair were worn by poc! people, also by prophets (Zach. xiii. 4 ; 2 Kings L S).)- — The Hebrew Admoni is also connected with Adam ; Esau is a son of Adam, predominantly iu clined to the earth and earthly things. — (Isaac's bod- ily nature appears feeble everywhere ; cli. xxrii 1, 19). Such persons are fond of choice and iinei viands. Wherever Abraham has calves' flesh, buttei and milk, on special festive occasions, Isaac dehghta in venison and wine (ch. xxvii. 3, 4, 25). — In tha Logos, as the first-born of all creatures, the signifi- cation of the first-born, both animal and human, haa its true, its ultimate, and divine foundation (Ziegler). The father is pleased, that Esau, like Ishmai 1, ch. xxi. 2o, is a good hunter, and he regards ii as an ornament to the first-born, who is to have the gov- ernment (Luther). Esau becomes Edom, and there- fore, still the more remains Esau merely ; Jacob, on the other hand, becomes Israel i ch. xxxii. 28). — Ja- cob is the man of hope. The possession that ha greatly desires is of a higher order : hopes depend- ing on the birthright. He never strives after the lower birthright privileges. (It is doubtful, also, whether these were as fully developed at the time of Abraham as at the time of Moses). — I am at the point to die Sooner or later I will have to succumb to the perils to which my vocation exposes me. A tliought expressed more tlian once by Arabic heroes (Tuch). — Esau's insight into the future extended to his death only. — Jacob's request that Esau should swear. He is as eager for the future as Esau is for the present. — (LentUes, to this day, are a very fa- vorite dish among the Arabs, being mostly eaten in Palestine as a pottage. Robinson found them very savory, etc.). — Want of faithful confidence in him who had given him such a promise, it was this that made Jacob wish to assist God with carnal subtilty, as Abraham once with carnal wisdom. — Thou shalt not take advantage of thy bi'other. For the present, no doubt, Jacob obscured the confidence of his hopes, just as Abraham, by anticipation, obscured his prospects. — As Ishmael had no claim for the bless- ings of tlie birthright, because begotten Kara crapKo, so Esau forfeits the blessings of his birthright, not because begotten Kara trdpHa^ but because inclined KaTo. trdpKa (Delitzscb). THIRD SECTION. haae in the region of Abimelech at Gerar. The manifestation of God, and confirmed ptorniae. Bit vnUation of the maxim of his father. The ezpomre of Rebekah. The living figure of a richly blessed, patient endurance. Chapter XXVI. 1-22. 1 And there was [again] a famine in the land, besides the first [previous] famine thai was in the lays of Abraham. And Isaac went unto Abimelech king of iht; Pliilistinet 2 unto Gerar. And the Lord [Jehovah] appeared nnfo him, and said, Go not down into 3 Egypt; dwell in the land which I shall tell thee of: Sojourn [as a stranger] in this hvi 504 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. and I will be with thee, and will bless thee ; for unto thee, and unto thy seed, 1 wiF give all tliese countries, and I will perform [cause to stand] the oath which I sware untc 4 Abraham thy father; And 1 will make thy seed to multiply as the stars of heaven, and will give to thy seed all these countries ; and in thy seed shall all the nations of the 5 earth be blessed [bless themselves] ; Because that Abraham obeyed my voice, and kepi my oharge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws. i, 1 And Isaac dwelt in Gerar : And the men of the place asked him of his wife ; and he said, Siie is my sister : for he feared to say, She is my wife ; lest, said he [thought he], the men of the place should kill me for Rebekah ; because she was fair to look upon. 8 And it came to pass, when he had been there a long time," that Abimelecli king of the Philistines looked out at a window, and saw, aud behold, Isaac ivas sporting with 9 Rgjekah his wife. And Abimelech called Isaac, and said, Behold, of a surety [certainly] she is thy wife: and how saidst thou, She is my sister? And Isaac said unto him, 10 Because I said [l thought]. Lest I die for her. And Abimelech said, What is this that thou hast done unto us? one of the people might lightly' have lien with thy wife, and 11 thou shoulde.st have brought guiltiness upon us. And Abimelech charged all his people, saying, He that toucheth [injures] this man or liis wife shall surely be put to death. 12 Then Isaac sowed in that laud, and received [found, a. a] in the same year an hundred- 13 fold : and [thus] the Lord blessed him : And the man waxed great, and went forward, 14 and grew until he becaTne very great : For he had possession of flocks, and possession 15 of herds, and great store of servants: and the Philistines envied him. For all thewella which his father's servants had digged in the days of Abraham his father, the Philistines 16 had stopped them, and filled them with earth. And Abimelech said unto Isaac, Go from us ; for thou art much mightier tlian we. 17 And Isaac departed thence, and pitched his tent in the valley [arook) valley— wady.— A. G.] 18 of Gerar, and dwelt there. And Isaac digged again the wells of water, which they had digged in the days of Abraham liis father; for tlie Philistines had stopped them after the death of Abraham : and he called their names after [like] the names b}' which hia 19 father had called them. And Isaac's servants digged in the valley [at the bottom], and 20 fomid there a well of springing [living] water. And the herdmen of Gerar did strive with Isaac's herdmen, saying. The water is ours : and he called the name of the wel. 21 Ezek [contention] ; because tliey strove with him. And they digged another well, and strove for that also : and he called the name of it Sltnah [enmity— adversary, Satan wells]. 22 And he removed [brake up] from thence, and digged another well; and for that they strove not: and he called the name of it Rehoboth [wide room]; and he said, For now the Lord hath made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land. [' Ver. 8.— When the days were dr.awn out.— A. G.] [■ Ver. 10.— l3TTD3 , within a little ; it lacks but little, £is the Chaldee renders. — A. G.] GENEEAL PEELIMINAEY REMARKS. 1. The present chapter (xxvi.) is tlie only one devoted exchisiv'ily to traditions coneerninj:; Isaac. The former narratives were, on the one hand, inter- woven with Abraham's history, and, on the other, contained tlie be^inninj^ of the history of Esan and Jacob The section in the fcillowinp cliaptcr, hiit more fully givcTi in the beginning of cl)apti'i- xxviii., forms a eotichision, in which the history of Isaac and that of his sons arc considered as one. This is fol- owed by ch. xxxv. 27, like a melancholy echo ex- tending over Isaac's long and isolated life, during which Rebekah disappears from the scene, deejily grieved on account of her sons. We have liere a Tivid life-picture, taken from the ir]idst of Isaac's oilgrimage, and representing clearly tiie fact fjta/ Tsaac'i com pnnrdTifrnt and. trnnijuiUity draw after Ihem yire lilenititiiiK. This thought, however, per- vades his whole history. lie submits to suffer upon lie riah, and thus receives a nivsterious theocratic consecration as a type of Christ. He waited for fau bride until Abraham's and Eliezer's care procured one for him without his co-operation, and in this he fared well. During Reliekah's long barrenness he seeks no remedy such as Aliiaham did in connection witli Hagar, but finally resoits to prayer, and is richly compensated in the bestowal of twins. During the famine he iloos not go to Egypt, liut, according to Jehovah's instruction, rcminns in Canaan, and here, in the country of tlie Philistines, is most abundantly blessed. He receives in silence the censure of Abimelech for his deceptive statement respecting Rebekah. He is exiled, and departs from Geiar. He yields one well after another to the shepherds Oi the Philistines, ever receding, further and further; and yc't llie king of the Philistines applies to hii7i for an alliance, as to a nnghiy prince. Finally Isaac knows how to reeimcile himself to the strung decei> tion prepiired for Iiini by Rebekah and tJacob, anc even this pliancy of temper is blessed to him, in thai' he is theieby kept in t'"<' riglit theucraiic dirtction CUAP. XXVI. 1-22. 50f His passive conduct, too, at the marriage of hissonsi renders tlie difference between the true Esau and tlie Iheocratie Jacob more distinct. His composure and endurance seem infirmities ; these, liowevei', with all "veakness of temperament, are evidently supported by a power of the spirit and of faith. Tlie moral power in it is the self-restraint whereby, in opposi- tion to his own wishes, he gives up his ha^ty purpose to bless Esau. Isaac learned experimentally upon Moriah, that quietness, traaquillity, and conlideuce in the Lord have a glorious issue. This experience is stamped upon his whole careei. If we judge him from the declarations concerning Rebekah at Gerar, he appeiirs to be the timid imitator of his father ; though the assuming of his father's maxim in this respect m.iy be explained from his modest, suscep- tible nature. But that he does not imitate his father slavishly, is seen especially from the fact of his quiet Buffering without any resistance. This is made evi- dent, too, by the fact that he does not, like Abraham, go to Egypt during the famine. Moreover, he does not take a eoncubiue, as Abraham did; nor hkehim does lie look to divine revelation for the decision re- specting the lawful heir, but holds himself sure of it by reason of the transmitted right of the first-born. New and original traits appear in his transition to agriculture, as well as in his zealous digging of wells. The naming of the wells, taken away from him, has something of humor, such as is peculiar to tranquil minds. His pleasant disposition reveals itself not only in his preference of venison, but by his peculiar manner of preparing, for Abimelech of Gerar, and his friends, a feast, even after the gentle reproof, and before he made a covenant mth him on the follow- ing day. In his vocation, however, as patriarch, he shows himself a man of spirit by building an altar unto the Lord, and calling upon his name (ver. 25). And while there are but two visions mentioned defi- nitely during his hfe (ver. 3, ver. 24), still there fol- lows a higher spiritual life, and^ at the same time^ a further development of the Abrahamie promise through the disposition he manifests in the blessing of his sons. Our section may be divided as follows : 1. Isaac's sojourn in the country during the famine in consequence of an injunction of Jehovah. Re- newed promise (vers. 1-6); 2. Isaac's assertion that • Rebekah was his sister (vers. 7-11) ; 3. Isaac's pros- perity ; his exUe from tlie city of Gerar, and his set- tlement in the valley of Gerar (vers. 12-17); 4. Isaac's patience in what he endured from the Phihs- tiues, and its blessing (vers. 18-22). Knobel regai ds the present chapter as a Jehovistic supplement, mingled with Elohistic elements. [In regard to the numerous points of resemblance between Isaac and Abraham, Kurtz has shown (Gesch., p. 226) that these resemblances are not slavish imitations, but are marked by distinct peculiarities, and moreover, that these similar experiences are not accidental, but on the one hand, as the result of the divine provi- dence, they flow from the same purpose and disci- pUne with the father and the son, and on the other hand, ?.s far as they are the result of human choices, they arise from an actual resemblance in their condi- tion and hopes. Thus all believers in their expe- riences are EiUke and yet tmlike. — A. G.] EXEGETICAL AND CKITICAi. 1. Vers. 1-6. Isaac's abode in the countri/. — A funine. — It is distinguished from the famine in the history of Abraham. Isaac, folloning the exampU of his father, was on the point of going to Egvpt but is arrested by divine interposition. " Isaac'« history commences with the same trial as the liistor) of Abraham " (Delitzsch). This frequent calamifi of antiquity occurs once more in the history of Ja cob. — Isaac went vinto Abimelech. — Xot the on« mentioned ch. xx. 21 (Kimehi, Schum, etc., Del.), but his successor (Knobel). The same may be said of Phichol (ch. xxi. 22). There is here, very proba- bly, a different Abimelech, and with hiin anuthei Phichol. The former is expressly called king. Upon this name Abimelech, as a standing title of the kings, compare the title to the xxxivth Ps. with I Sam. xxi 11. — Gerar. — "The ruins of which, under the name of Kirbet-el-Gerar, have been again discovered by Rowiand, three leagues in a southeasterly direction from Gaza." Del. Isaac mtends to go to Egypt, but according to God's instruction, he is to remain in Palestine as a stranger. — Go not down, — It is characteristic that Abraham received the first divine instruction to depart^ Isaac to remain. God leads every one according to his peculiar necessities. Even in Canaan nothing shall be wanting to him. — All these countries. — Extending the promise beyond Canaan [or rather all the lands of the different Ca- naanitish tribes. — A. G.] — I will be with thee. — A piomise of help, blessing, and protection, especial- ly needed by Isaac. — I will perform the oath.— As for God, the divine oath was absolutely firm, though, on the part of Abraham, it might have been obscured. But since Abraham, on his part, remained true to the covenant, it is renewed to the son by virtue of an oath, whilst in regard to the contents of the promise, it is even eidarged. The one land of Canaan is changed into many countries, the seed multipUed as the stars of heaven, and as the sand which is upon the sea-shore, becomes stars only ; and the blessing of the nations (ch. xxii. 18) becomes in his seed a voluntary blessing of the nations among tliemselves. — Because that Abraham Literally, for that. Abraham's obedience is brought out conspic- uously through the use of the richest deuteronomic terms. To the commendation of obedience in general, follows in strict derivation: 1. the charge; 2. the commandments ; 3. the institutions ; 4. the germ of the Thorah in the plural, r"nn\ [He kept the cliarge of God, the special commission he had given him ; his commandments, his express or occasional orders; his statutes, his stated prescriptions graven on stone ; his law, the great doctiine of moral obli- gations. Murphy, p. 874. His obedience was not perfect, as we know, but it was umeserved, and as it flows from a living faith, is thus honored of God. — A. G.] The motive of the promise empha- sizes the humility and low position of Isaac. He must also, however, render the obedience of faith, if Jehovah's blessing is to rest upon him, and, in- deed, first of all, by remaining in the country. Abraham had to go to Egypt, Jacob must go to Egypt to die there, Isaac, the second patriarch, is not to go to Egypt at all. Notwithstanding the re- semblance to the promise, ch. xxii., the new here is unmistakable. 2. Vers. 7-11. Isaac's assertion respecting Hi- bekah. In the declaraticm of Isaac the event hert resembles Abraham's experience, both in Egypt .and at Gerar, but as to all else, it differs entirely. With regard to the declaration itself it is true that Re- bekah was also related to Isaac, but more distantly than Sarah to Abraham. It is evident from the nar aU6 GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. radve itself that Isaac is not so seriously threatened 18 Abraham, although the inquiries of the people at Gerar might liave alarmed him. It is not by a punishment inflicted upon a heatlieu prince, who perhaps might have abducted the wile, but through the intercourse of Isaac with Rebekah that the true relation became known. That the Abimeleoh men- 'joned in this narrative is the same person wlio, eighty years before, received Sarah into his harem, ippeare plausible to Kurtz and Delitzsch, since it may be talsen for granted that as a man gray with age he did not send for Rebeliah and talie her into his harem. We reject these as superficial grounds. The main point is, that Isaac appears in this narra- tive as a very cautious man, while the severe edict of Abimelech seems to suppose a solemn remem- brance in the king's house of the former experience with Abraham. The oath that follows seems also to show that tlie new Abimelech avails himself of the policy of his father, as well as Isaac. The windows in old times were latticed openings for the light to enter, as found in tlie East at the present day. 3. Vers. 12-17. Imac's prosperity and exile. — Then Isaac sowed. — Besides planting trees, Abra- ham was yet a mere noraad. Isaac begins to pursue agriculture along with his nomadic life ; and Jacob seems to liave continued it in a larger measui'e (ch, xxxvii. 7). " Many nomads of Arabia connect agricul- ture with a nomadic life (see Borkhardt : St/rim, p. 43(1, etc.)." Knobel. This account agrees well with the locality at Gerar. The soil of Gaza is very rich, and in Nuttar Abu Sumar, a tract northwest of Elysa, the Arabs possess now storehouses for their grain (.see Robinson, i. p. "291, 292). Even at the present time, in those countries (e. g., Hauran), the soil yields a very rich produce (Bitrkhardt: "Syria," "p. 463). Knobel. [The hundred-fold is a large and very rivre product, and yet Babylonia is said to have yielded two hundred and even three hundred fold. IIkrod., i. p. 193; Murphy, p. 375. — A. G.] " The exigency of the famine induced Isa^ic to undertake agriculture, and in the very first year his crops yielded a hundred-fold (C^Tl'lS). The agriculture of Isaac indicates already a more perma- nent settlement in Palestine; but agriculture aud the occupation of the nomadic life were first engaged in equally by the Israelites in Egypt, and it was not until their return from Egypt that agriculture became the predominant employment." Delilzsch. — And the Philistines envied him. — Hostilities began in their filling with earth the wells that Abraham dug at Gerar, and which therefore belonged to Isaac. This very act is already an indirect cximlsion, for without wells it is not possible that Isaac should live a nomadic life at Gerar. [The digging of wells was regarded as a sort of occupancy of the land, and as conferring a kind of title to it ; and hence per- haps the envy of the I'hilislines. — A. (i.] "This conduct was customary during wars (2 Kings iii. 25 ; Is. XV. 0). and the .Arabs fill vrith ear'.h the wells along the route of the pilgrims if they lio not re- ceive the toll a.sked by them (Troilo: Orientalixche Ileiaebe^rhreib.. p. 682; Nikbchr: 'Arab.' p. 362)." Knobel. — Go icora. us. — Abimelech openly vents his displeasure against Isaac. He banishes him from his city, Gerar, an. sii-t). Constantine erected a monument in this valley (Sozom. 6, 32). 4. Vera 18-22. lanac's patient behavior under the violation of his rigJUs by the Philistirui. Thi wcl/s. — Digged again the wells. — Behind his bad too, the Philistines fiUed the wells which AbruhaU dug. Knobel infers from verse 29 that the hostilt conduct of the Philistines was not mentioned in the more ancient record ! The discoveries of the wells (vers. 19, 21), too, must be regarded as identical with the digging again, ver. 18 ! — The quarrels about th« wells seem to be connected with views respecting the boundaries of Isaac's place of exile. He is driven further and further by them. " Quarrels about watering-places and pastures are common among the Bedouins (see xiii. 7 ; Exod. ii. 17 ; BtJEKHARDT : ' Syria,' p. 628, and ' Bedouins,' p. US). Among the ancient Arabs, also, severe contests arose about watering-places (Hamasa, i. p. 122 f. 287). In many regions the scarcity of water is such that the Bedouins rather offer milk than water as a bev- erage (.Seetzen, iii. p. 21)." Knobel. Isaac yields without any resistance ; still he erects a monument to the injustice he suffered. The nime of the second well, n:::'^, from the verb 1i:!U, brings to view an enmity maUgnant and satanic. — A weU of springing 'water. — Running water (Lev. xiv. 5, etc.). — Reho- both (ample room ). — The third well was probably situ- ated beyond the boundaries of Gerar ; for it is previous- ly said that he had removed from thence, i. e., from the valley of Gerar. The name Rehoboth indicates that now by the guidance of .Jehovah he hiid come to u wide, open region. Ruhaibeh, a wady, southwest from Elusa, and discovered by Robinson (i. 291 ff.), together with the extended ruins of the city of the same name, situated upon the top of a mountain, remind us of this third well (Strauss: 'Sinai and Golgotha,' p. 149)." Delitzsch. Robinson also dis- covered further north, in a wady, Shutein, perhaps the Sitnah of Isaac. Ruhaibeh is situated about three hours in a southerly direction from Elusa and about eight and a half from Beer-sheba, where the main roads leading to Gaza and Hebron separate from each other. DOCTarNAX AUD ETHICAL. 1. Delitzsch: "This chapter (xxvi.) is composed of these seven short, special, and peculiarly colored narratives, which the Jehovi.st arranged. One pur- pose runs through all : to show, by a special narra- tion of examples running through the first forty years of Isaac's independent history, how even the patriarch himself, though less distinguished in deeds and sulferings, yet under Jehovah's blessing and pro- tection comes forth out of all his fearl'ul embarrass- ments and ascends to still greater riches and honor." His life, however, is not 'the echo of tlie life of .\braham;" but Isaiic's meekness and gentleness indicate rather a decisive progress, which, hke his pure monogamy, was a type of New Testament rela- tions. 2. The events related in the present section hehmg undoubtedly to a time when Esau had not reached the development of all his powers, for other- wise this stately and powerftd hunter would scarcely have submitted so qnietly to the infringements of his rights by the Philistines. 3. The two visions which mark the life of Isaac arc entirely in accordance with his character and hi» point of view. In the first, Jehovah adilres^es him (Jo not diiwn into Egypt; in the seccmd: Fear not The promises, however, which he receives, are fu» CHAP. XXVI. \-22. 50'. ther developments of tlie Abrahaniie promise. For Isaac, moreover, Jehovah's promise." become a divine ootli, i e., to the firmest contideiite of faith in hia breast 4. The three famines occurring in the historv of the three patriaich.i constitute the fixed niainlesia. tions of one of the p:reat national calamities of an- tiquity, from which tlie pious have to suiter together with the ungodly; but in whicli tlie pious always experience the special care of the Lord, ass\iring them that all things work together for good to them that love God. 5. Isaac's imitation of his father in passing his wife for his sister, Incurs the more severe censure of history than the same actions of Abraham, and it has this time for its result the gradual expidsion from Gerar. This ignominy, too, must have tlie more in- clined him to yield patiently to the infringements of his rights by the Philistines; and thus lie is again blessed with the freedom of a new region, so that the word is fulfilled in him : Blessed are the meek ; for they shall inherit the earth. 6. Isaac and Abimelech, sons of their respective fathers, and yet having each a peculiar character according to their individual and finer traits. 7. Isaac, and the signs that appear of a willingness to struggle bravely for the faith, though still suljjecL to his natural infirmities and obscured by them. S. Isaac's energy in his agricultural undertak- ings and in the diligent digging of wells. 9. The filling of the wells with earth, as taken in a spiritual sense, indicates an old hatred of the Phil- istines towards the children of God. 10, And thou shouldst have brought guiltiness upon us. The idea of guilt is the exten.sion of cul- pability over the future of the sinner ; and frequently {as e. g. in public offences) more or less even to those around us. Participation of sin is participation in its corrupting and ruinous results. HOMTLETICAL AUD PRACTICAL. To the whole chapter. How the promises of Abraham descend upon Isaac: 1. As the same promises ; 2. as newly shaped in their development • and confirmation. — Incidents of a life of faithful suffering and rich with blessings, as presented in the history of Isaac : Isaac during the famine ; in dan- ger at Gerar ; as exposed to the jealousy of the Philistines ; during the exile ; in the strife about the wells ; in the visit of Abimelech ; in the marriage of Esau. — How Isaac gradually comes out of his dif- ficulty: 1. From Gerar to the valley of Gerar; 2 from the valley of Gerar to Rehobotli ; 3. fiom Re- hoboth to Beer-ahcba. — Isaac as a digger of wells, a type also of spiritual conduct: 1. In digging again tlie wells of the father that are filled with earih ; 2. in digging new wells. — Isaac and Abimelech, or thi' lions in relation to their fathers ; 1. Resemblance; 2. difference. — The blessing of Isaac in his crops (at the harvest-festival). — Malignant joy, a joy most (ie- itructive to the malignant man himself. [Words- worth, who finds types everywhere, says ; " Here «lso we have a type of what Christ, the pure Isaac, is ioing in the church. The wella of ancient truth bad been choked up by error, but Christ reopened then and restored them to their primitive state and callet* them by their old names," etc., p. 115. — A. G.] Starke: (What Moses narrates in this chaptei appears to ha-e happened before Bsau and Jacob ! were bom {sec ver. 7) [More probably when thej were about fifteen years old, after Abraham's death. — A. G.] Regarding the Philistines and Philistia, see Dictionaries.) The reason why God did not per. mit Isaac to go to Egypt is not given, yet it may have been that Isaac might experience the wonderful providence and paternal c;ire of God toward him. Some (Calvin) assign the reason, that Isaac, becauss not as far advanced in faith as his father Abraliain, might have been easily led astray by the idolatrous Egyptians (the result shows, however, that it was unnecessary this time). — / will, give all the-ie coun- tries. Tliy descendants through Esau shall receive a great part of the southern countries, lying between Canaan and Egypt. — Ver. 5. It does not follow from these four terms, which were frequently used after the law was given upon Mt. Sinai, that Abraham al- ready possessed the law of Moses, as the Jews as- sert. Had this been the case, no doubt he would have transmitted it to his children. Moses, how- ever, chooses these expressions, which were in use in his time, in order to point out clearly to the peo- ple of Israel how Abraham had submitted himself entirely to the divine will and command, and ear- nestly abstained from everything to the contrary in his walk before God. To these four terms there are sometimes added two more, viz., rules and testimo- nies.— OsiANDER : There are no calamities in the world from which even the pious do not sometimes sufter. The best of it, however, is that God is their protection and comfort (Pa. xci. 1). — We are to re^ member the divine promises, though ancient and general, and apply them to ourselves. — Cramer : We are to abide by God's command, for his word is a light unto our path (Ps. cxix. 105). — Thus God sometimes permits his people to stumble, that hia care over them may become known. — To ver. 10. From this we see that the inhabitants of Gerar, not- withstanding their idolatry, were still so conscien- tious that they considered adultery a crime so great as to involve the whole land in its punishment. — - Cramer : Comely persons should be much more watchful of themselves than others. — The woods have ears and the fields eyes, therefore let no one do anything thinking that no one sees and hears him. — Strangers are to be protected. (Since Isaac pos- sessed no property, perhaps he cultivated with the king's permission an unfruitful tract of land, or hired a piece of ground.) — It is the worst kind of jealousy if we repine at another's prosperity without any prospect of our own advantage. Bibl. Tub. : God blesses his people extraordinari- ly in famine. — Cramer: Success creates jealousy; but let us not be surprised at this ; it is the course of the world. — Ver. 17. To suffer wrong, and therein to exercise patience, is always better than to revenge oneself and do wrong. — Christian, tlie Holy Scrip- tures are also a well of living water; dig for this inces.santlv. — Bibl. Tub.: The jealousy and artifice of enemiea catmot prevent or restrain tlu blessing which the Lord designs fcr the f ions. MS GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. FOURTH SECTION. ItacK in Beer-sheba, Treaty of Peace with Abimeleeh. Chapter XXVI. 23-33. 23, 24 And he went up from thence to Beer-sheba. And the Lord appeared unto him the same [first] night, and said, I ' am tlie God of Abraham thy father ; fear not, for I am with thee, and will bless thee, and multiply thy seed for my servant Abraham's sake 25 And he builded an altar there, and called upon [witnessed to] the name of the Lord, and pitched his tent' there : and there Isaac's servants digged a well. 26 Then [and] Abimeleeh went to him from Gerar, and Ahuzzath [possession, occupant ] one of his friends, and Phichol the chief captain [see ch. xxi. 32, commander] of his army 27 And Isaac said unto them, Wherefore come ye to me, seeing ye hate me [hare treated me 28 with hatred], and have sent me away from you? And they said. We saw certainly ^ that the Lord was with thee : and we said, Let there be now an oath betwixt us [on both sides]. 29 even betwixt us and thee, and let us make a covenant with thee ; That * thou wilt do us no hurt, as we have not touched thee, and as we have done unto thee nothing but good, and have sent thee away in peace : thou art [thus art thou] now the blessed of the 30, 31 Lord. And he mad'^ them a feast, and they did eat and drink. And they rose up betimes in the morning, and sware one to another : and Isaac sent them away, and they 32 departed from him in peace. And it came to pass the same day, that Isaac's servants came and told him concerning the well which they had digged, and said unto him. We 33 have found water. And he called it Shebah [seven; here in its signification : oath] : therefore the name of the city is Beer-sheba unto this day. (1 Ver. 24,— "^DDX . The pronoun is emphatic — I the God, eta— A. G.\ [> Ver. 25.— a" . Not the usual word for the pitching a tent, see ver. 17. The term may be chosen with referenc* to the permanence of his abode, or the increase of his family and retinue.— A. G.] [' ver. 28. — Lit., Seeing we have seen.— A. G.] [• Ver. 29.— Lit., If thoushalt. The iisual Hebrew form of an imprecation or oath.— A. G.) EXEGETICAX AKD CRITICAL. To Beer>sheba. — The former residence of Abra- ham (ch. xxi. a:i), and Isaac's fofmer station for his flocks. — The appearance of Jehovah. — A niglit vis- ion ; a form which now enters more dciiiiitely into the history of tlie patriarchs. — Tlie God of Abra- ham, thy father, — In this way Jehovah reminds him of tlie coiisisteiiey of his coyenant I'aitlifiihie.ss, but especially of his covenant witli Abraham. — Fear not. — This encouraging e.iliortatioii no doubt rofeis to the disposition of Isaac. Aliraham nei'deil such an encouragement, after having exposed liimseli to the ri'vonge of tlie Eastern kings on account of bis victory over them. Isaac needs it because of his modest, timid disposition, and on account of tlie en- mity of the Philistines, by whom he was diiven from place to place. Perhaps his heait foreliodcil that Abimelccli would yet follow him. He consecrates his prolongeil sojourn at Beer-sheba liy the erection of an altar, the estabhshment of a regulated worship, and by a fixed .settlement. — Then Abimeleeh went to him. — Hy comparing this covenant act with that between Abraham and Abimeleeh ol (Jirar, the difference appears more strikingly. Abimeleeh, in the present chaptcf, is ^iccompatiicd not only by the chief capt.iin of his army, but also by hisftictid, . e., Ahu/./.iih, his private counsellor. Isaac ani- oiadverts on bis hatred, but not like Abraham, on the wells that had been taken away from him (see ell. xxi. 25). Even in the boasting assertion ol Abimeleeh respecting his conduct toward Isaac — which the facts will not sustain — we recognize, ap- parently, another Abimeleeh, less noble than the former. This appears also in his demand of the im- precatory oath (^n'sxV It is also peculiar to Isaac that he permits a banquet, a feast of peace as it were, to precede the making of the covenant. The same day, after the departure of Abimeleeh, the ser- vants, who had commenced some time before to dig a new well, found water. Their message seems to be a new reward of blessing, immediately following the peaceable conduct of Isaac. Isaac names this well as Abraham had done the one betbre (ch. xxi. 31); thus the name Beer-sheba is given to it also. [It is not sairl tliat this name was lien- given for the fiisttime; but as the covenant concluded was the renewal and confirmation of the covenant of Abra- ham witli tlte previous .-Vbimelech, so the name is the renewal and confirmation of that given liy Abraham. The same name is api)ropriate to both occasions. — A. (J. J The existence of both the.se wells bears wit- ness to the crediliility of this fact. Keil Knobel, of ctmise, regaids this as an entirely ditlerent tradi tion. Hut Itelil/.sch remarks: To all ap]iearancc Isaac, in the natning oi iliis well, followed ihe exam pie of his fa-thcr in naming the wi-11 situiited near it since in other cases he renewed the old nainea of th» CHAP. XXVI. 23- 50? ireUs. — BuxsEN: To swear, to the Hpbrew, signifies, " to take sevenfold," or, " to bind oneself to seven holy things, referring to the Aramaic idea of God as Lord of Seven; i. e., of the seven planets (Sun, Moon, Venus, Mercury, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn)." The remembrance of the seven sacrifices or pledges of the covenant, is far more probable, unless the ex- pression is to be regarded as signifying a seven-fold degree of ordinary certainty. DOCTBINAL AND ETHICAL. 1. Isaac's holy elevation of soul at his retuni from the country of the Philistines to his old home, Beer-sheba, crowned by a promise and a glorious ap- pearance of God. 2. The divine promise renewed ; see above. 3. Isaac at Beer-sheba. He builds an altar to the Lord before a tent for himself In the establishment of the worship of Jehovah, in this testimony to him, as he calls upon his name, and in his preaching, he is a worthy heir of his father. 4. Human covenants are well established, if a divine covenant precedes and constitutes their basis. 6. Isaac in his yielding, his patient endurance and concessions, a terror to the king. 6. Isaac's feast of peace with Abimelech, a sign of his great inoffensiveness. 7. The solemnity of the well, and on the same day with the feast of peace, or, the blessing of noble conduct. 8. Abraham prefers to dwell in the plains (Moreh, Mamre), and he planted trees. Isaac prefers to re- side at wells, and he is fond of digging wells. HOMrLETICAIi AND PRACTICAL. See the Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. The rich contents of the term : God of Abraham. It de- clares : 1. That the eternal God has made a covenant with us imperishable beings (Luke xx. 37, 38); 2. the continuity, the unity, the unchangeableness, of the revelation of Jehovah through all times and de- velopments ; 3. the transmission of the hereditary •blessing from the believing fither to the believing children. — How the expression, in the history of the patriarchs, fear not (ch. xv. 1 ; xxvi. 24 ; xxviii. 15), goes through the whole scriptures until it reaches its full development in the angelic message of the birth of Christ (Luke ii. 10), and at the morning of his resurrection. Starke; Cramer: God always supports his church, and builds it everywhere (Isa. li. 6). What- ever a .Christian undertakes, he ought to undertake b the name of the Lord (CoL iiL 17). When a man's ways please the Lord, he maketh even hi;) cue miusto be at peace with him (Prov. xvi. 7 ; Gen. xxxiii 4). — -Lawful alliances anil oaths :ire permitted (Deut. vi. 13). — Gkrlach : At this place, remarkable, al- ready, during the life of .Abraham, the Lord renewi the assurance of his grace, as afterwards to Jacob (eh. xlvi. 1) ; whilst, in the consecration of individua' phices, he connected himself with the child-like faith of the patriarchs, and satisfied the want to which it gave rise. ScHRonER ; The least thing we sacrifice for th» sake of God, he repays, by giving us himself (Berl Bib.). Whenever Jehovah calls himself God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, he shows, thereby, in each day's revelation of himself to Israel, the ground and occasion of the same in the revelation that is past — thus connecting the new with the old, while presenting the grace shown to the poster- ity, as a necessary consequence of that which hi had covenanted to their fathers' fathers. True re ligion is essentially historical ; history (not fanciful myths) is its foundation and limits. God is our God, because he has made himself our God by repeatec acts in history. In the kingdom of God everything develops and progresses ; there is no past without ii future, nor a future without a past. — Abraham re- ceived the pronuse respecting the Messiah in the name of all the faithful ; if, now, Isaac and every believer be blessed for the sake of Abraham, he ia blessed merely for the sake of the promise that was given to Abraham, and, therefore, for the sake of Christ (Roos). — Isaac is mindful of his sacerdotal office, as soon as he takes up his abode (Berl. Bib.). — The Abimelech mentioned here is more cunning than l:is father, for he pretends to know nothing about the taking away of Isaac's wells by his ser- vants (Luther). — Such is the course of the world. Now insolent, then mean. He who wishes to live in peace with it (which is true of all believers) must bo able to bear and suffer (Roos). — The Abimelech of ch. xxi. uses Elohim, a word proper to him ; the one in the present chapter, not caring much about the affair, says Jehovah, because he constantly heard Isaac make use of this divine name. He accommO' dates himself to the feast of Isaac, as Laban in ch. sxiv. (Rom. xii. 20; Jos. ix. 14; 2 Sam. iii. 20; Isa. XXV. 6 ; Luke xiv. 17.) — The divine blessing of this conciliatory and humble love, did not exhaust itself in temporal things. Isaac contended and suf- fered for the sake of wells ; as to the wells which he digged soon after his arrival at Beer-sheba, it hap- pened on the very day he made the covenant and swore, etc. — The relation, of which the name Beer- sheba was the memorial, had ceased to exist. Bu( by the repetition of the fact, the name regamed iti significance and power, and was the samn w d now SJven for the first time (Henjptenberg). 61U GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. FIFTH SECTION. Isaac's sorrow over &au's marriage vnlh the daughters oj Canaan, Chapter XXVI. 34, 35. 34 And Esau was forty years old when he took to wife Judith [celebra.ed l] the daughtei of Beeri ' [heroic son l Fontanus j] the Hittite, and Bashemath [lovely, Oiria , fragrance, epicy] the 36 daughter of Elon [oak-grove, strength] the Hittite: Which were a grief of mind^ [aheart- Borrow] unto Isaac and Rebekah. (' Ver. 34.— Beeri, of a well.— A. G.] (* Ver. 35. — The margin, lit., bitterness of spirit. — A. G.] KKEGETICAL AND CRITICAL. Esau was forty years old. — Isaac, therefore, iccording to ch. xxv. 26, was about 100 years. — Ac- cording to ch. xxviii. 9, he took Mahalath as his third wife, together with the two mentioned here. These names are mostly different, as to form, from those of eh. xxxvi. 2, etc. The points of resemblance are, first, the number three ; secondly, the name of Bashemath ; third, the designation of one of them as the daughter of Elon, the other as a daughter of Ishmael. In respect to the dissimilarities and their solution, see Kxobel, p. 278, on ch. xxxvi. ; De- LiTzscH, 5i)5; Keil, 229. — Which were a grief of mind. — Lit. : " a bitterness of spirit." Tlieir Canaanitish de.^cent, which, in itself, was mortifying to Esau's parents, corresponds with the Canaanitish conduct. It is characteristic of Esau, however, that, without the counsel and consent of his parents, he took to himself two wives at once, and these, too, from the Canaanites. Bashemath, Ahuzzath, Maha- lath (cli. xxviii. 9) are Arabic forms. DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL. 1. Esau's ill-assorted marriage a continuance of the prodigality in the disposal of his birthright. 2. The threefold offence: 1. Polygamy without tny necessary inducement ; 2. women of Canaanitish origin ; S. without the adrice, and to the displeasure of his parents. 3. The heart-sorrow of the parents over the mis- alliance of the son. — How it produced an effect in the mind of Rebekah, different from that produced in the mind of Isaac. HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL. See Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. Starke : Lange : Children ought not to marry without the advice and consent of their parents. — Cramer: Next to the perception of God's wrath, there is no greater grief on earth than that caused by children to their parents. — Gerlach : Esau may be regarded as a heathen, already and before his ex- pulsion from the line of blessing. — (7alwer Handb,: Took two wives. Opposed to the beautiful example of liis father. — In addition to the trials undergone up to this time, domestic troubles are now added. It is very possible that this act of disobedience toward God and his parents, of which Esau became guilty by his marriage, matured the resolution of Rebekah, to act as related in ch. xxvii. — Schroder : The no- tice respecting Esau, serves, preeminently, to prepare for that which follows (Esau's action). A self-attest- ation of his lawful expulsion from the cliosen gen- eration, and, at the same time, an actual warning to Jacob. — Lamentation and grief of mind appeared when he was old, and had hoped that his trialJs were at an end (Luther). SIXTH SECTION. Isaae't preference for the natural firstborn, and Esan. Rebekah and Jacob steal from him the theocratic blexsing. Exau's blessing. Esau's hostility to Jacob. Rebekah's preparation for the JliglU of Jacob, and his journey with reference to a theocratic marriage. Isaac's directions for tlu journey of Jacob, tine counterpart to the dismissal of Ishmael. Esau's pretended correction of hii Ul'..\1I1. 1-9. 511 3 of my death. Now therefore take, I pray thee, thy weapons [hunting weapons], thj 4 quiver, and thy bow, and go out to the field, and take me some venison ; And make ra« savory meat [tasty; favorite; festive dish. De Wette : dainty dish], SUch as I love, and bring U 5 to me, that I may eat; that my soul may bless thee before I die. And Rebekah heard when Isaac spake to Esau his son. And Esau went to the field to hunt for venison. and to bring it. 6 And Rebekah spake unto Jacob her son, saying, Behold, I heard thy father speak 7 unto Esau thy brother, saying. Bring me venison, and make me savory meat, that I may 8 eat, and bless thee before the Lord before my death. Now therefore, my son, obey 9 my voice [strictly], according to that which I command thee. Go now to the flock [small oattle], and fetch me from thence two good kids of the goats ; and I will make 10 them savory meat for thy father, such as he loveth : And thou shalt bring it to thy 11 father, that he may eat, and that he may bless thee before his death. And Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, Behold, Esau my brother is a hairy man, and I am a smooth 12 man: My father peradventure will feel me, and I shall seem to him as a deceiver; 13 and I shall bring a curse upon me, and not a blessing. And his mother said unto him, 1 4 Upon me be thy curse, my son : only obey my voice, and go fetch me them. And he went, and fetched, and brought the7n to his mother : and his mother made savory meal 15 [dainty dish], such as his father loved. And Rebekah took goodly [costly] raiment of hei eldest son Esau, which were with her in the house, and put I hem upon Jacob hei 16 younger son : And she put the skins of the kids of the goats upon his hands, and upon 17 the smooth [part] of his neck; And she gave tlie savory meat and the bread, which she had prepared, into the hand of her son Jacob. 18 And he came unto his father, and said, My father: And he said, Here am I; who 19 art thou, my son. And Jacob said unto liis father, I am Esau thy firstborn ; I have done according as thou badest me : arise, I pray thee, sit and eat of my venison, that 20 thy soul may bless me. And Isaac said unto his son. How is it that thou hast found it so quickly, my son ? And he said. Because the Lord thy God brought it to me 21 And Isaac said unto Jacob, Come near, I pray thee, that I may feel thee, my son, 22 whether thou be my very son Esau, or not. And Jacob went near unto Isaac hia father ; and he felt him, and said, The voice is Jacob's voice, but the hands are the 23 hands of Esau. And he discerned him not, because . ■? ' 'rnds were hairy, as hia 24 brother Esau's hands: so he blessed him. And he said, J,-c tiiou [thou there] my very 25 son Esau? And he said, I am. And he said, Bring it near to me, and I will eat of my son's venison, that my soul may bless thee. And he brought it near to him, and 26 he did eat: and he brought him wine, and he drank. And his father Isaac said unto 27 him. Come near now, and kiss me, my son. And he came near, and kissed him : and he smelled the smell of his raiment, and blessed him, and said. See, the smell of my son '28 is as the smell of a field which tlie Lord hath blessed: Therefore [thus] God give thee of the dew of heaven, and the fatness of the earth and plenty [the fulness] of corn and 29 wine : Let people serve thee, and nations bow down to thee : be lord over thy brethren, and let thy mother's sons bow down to thee [thy mother's sons shall bow] : cursed be everv one that curseth thee, and blessed be he that blesseth thee. 30 And it came to pass, as soon as Isaac had made an end of blessing Jacob, and Jacob was yet scarce gone out from the presence of Isaac his father, that Esau his brother 31 came in from his hunting. And he also had made savory meat, and brought it unto his father, and said unto his father. Let my father arise, and eat of his son's venison, that 32 thy soul may bless me. And [then] Isaac his father said unto him. Who art Oiou? 33 And he said, I am thy son, thy firstborn Esau. And Isaac trembled very exceedingly [shuddered in great terror above measure], and said. Who? where is he [who then was he] ? that hath taken [hunted] venison, and brought it me, and I have eaten of all before thou 34 earnest, and liave blessed him ? yea, and he shall be blessed. And when Esau heard the words of his father, he cried with a great and exceeding bitter cry, and said unto 35 his father, Bless me, even me also, 0 my father. And he said. Thy brother came with 36 subtilty, and hath taken away thy blessing. And he said, Is he not rightly named [heei-hoidcr, suppianter] Jacob? for he hath supplanted me these two times: he took awa\ my birthright [right of the flrstbom] ; and, behold, now he hath taken awav my blessing 37 And he said. Hast thou not reserved a blessing for /.e . And Isaac a.r.swered and said 612 GENESIS, OR lUE FIRST BUUK OF MOSES. unto Esau, Behold, I have made him thy lord, and all his brethren have I given to hin. for servants; and with corn and wine have I sustained him [ha\o l endowed him J : and 38 what shall I do now unlo thee, my son? And Esau said unto his father, Hast thoubul one blessing, my father ? bless me, even me also, 0 my father. And Esau lifted up hil 39 voice and wept. And [then] Isaac his father answered, and said mlo him, Behold, ihj dwelling shall be the fatness of the earth, and of the dew ol heaven from above 4*^ A.nd by thy sword shalt thou live, and shalt serve thy brother: and [but] it shall come 1,0 pass when thou shalt liave the dominion [in the course of thy wanderings], that thou ghalt break his yoke from off thy neck. 41 And Esau hated Jacob, because of the blessing wherewith his father blessed him. and Esau said in his heart [formed the design], The days of mourning for my [dead] father 4'i are at hand, then will I slay my brother Jacob. And these words of Esau her elder son were told to Rebckah : and she sent and called Jacob her younger son, and kuI- unto him. Behold, thy brother Esau, as touching thee, doth comfort himself, purposing 43 to kill thee [goesatout with revenge to kill thee].' Now therefore, my son, obey my voice; 44 and arise, flee thou to Laban my l)rotlier, to Haran ; And tarry with him a few days 45 [some time], until thy brother's fury turn away ; Until thy brother's anger turn away from tliee, and he forget that which thou hast done to him : then I will send, and fetch 46 thee from thence: why should I be deprived also of you both ". one day? And Rebekah said to Isaac, I am weary of my life, because of the c aughters of Heth : if Jacob take a wife of the daughters of Heth, such as these which are of the daiighters of the land, what good shall my life do me [what is life to me] ? Ch. 5XVIII. 1. And Isaac called Jacob, and blessed him, and charged him, and said imto 2 him, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan. Arise, go to Padan-aram [Mesopotamia], to the house of Bethuel, thy mother's fatlier; and take thee a wife from 3 thence of the daughters of Laban, thy mother's brother. And God [the] Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, that thou mayest be [become] a 4 multitude' of people; And give thee the blessing ot Abraham, to thee and to thy seed with thee ; that thou mayest inherit the land wherein thou art a stranger [of thy pilgrimage], 5 which God gave unto Abraham. And Isaac sent away Jacob : and he went to Padan- aram unto Laban, son of Bethuel the Syrian, the brother of Rebekah, Jacob's and Esau's mother. 6 When Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob, and sent him away to Padan-aram. to take him a wife from thence ; and that, as he blessed him, he gave him a charge, 7 saying, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan ; And that Jacob obeyed 8 his father and his mother, and was gone to Padan-aram ; And Esau seeing that the 9 daughters of Canaan pleased not Isaac his father ; Then went Esau imto Ishniael, and took imto the wives which he had Mahalath [from root nbn , Cecinit. Delitisch derives it from ■'bn , to be sweet] the daughter of Ishmael, Abraham's son, the sister of Nebajoth [heights, nabathaa], to be his wife. [' Ch. XXVII. Ver. 1.— Lango renders " when Isaac was old, then his eyes were dim, so that he ooull not see," M an independent sentence, laying the basis for the following narrative. — A. G.J |» Ver. 42.— Conifortcth, or avengeth. The thought of vengeance was his consolation.— A. G.] (» Ch. XXVIII. Ver. 3.— bn;5 , congregation.— A. Q.) GENERAL PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 1. Knobel, without regard to veree 4fi, and not- withstanding tlie word Elohiin, verse 28, regards our section as a Jehovistic iiarnitive. We have only to refer to the prevailing Jeliovi.stic reference. Re- speciing the origin of our narrative Knobel has given hia opinion in a remarlialde manner, e. g., he cannot though he did not die until forty-three years after- wards. The correct determination of liis age, given already by Luther, is based upon the following cal- culation: Joseph, when he stood before Pharaoh, was thirty years old (ch. xli. 46), and at the migra- tion of Jacob to Egypt he had reached already the age of thirty-nine ; for seven years of plenty and two years of famine had passed already at that time; conceive how an old iinin may hear well, smell well, ; nine years had elapsed since the elevation of Joseph »nd yet be unable to see ! I ! (ch. xlv. B). But Jacob, at that time, was a hundred 2. The time. "Isaac at that time was a hundred ' and thirty years old (ch. xlvii. 9); Joseph, therefore, and thirty-seven years oH, the age at which Ishmael, was born wlien Jacob was ninety-one years; and his half-brother, died, about fourteen years before; since Jo.scph's birth occurred in the fourteenth year R fact which, in con.seqnencc of the weakness of old of Jacob's sojourn in Mesopotamia (comp. ch. xxx. »fe, may have seriously reminded him of death, 25 with ch. xxix. 18, 21, ami 27), Jacob's flight to CHAPS. XXVII.— XXVIIl. 1-9. 5ia Laban happened in his seventy-seventh year, and in the hundred and thirty-seventh year of Is^iac. •^onip. Henostenbkrg: Beitr. iii. p. 348, etc." Keil. 3. The present section contains the history of the distinction .lud separation of Esau and Jacob ; first introduced by enmity after the manner of man, tlien contiimed by the divine judgment upon human .«ins, and established by the conduct of tlie sons. This narrative conducts us from tlie history of Isaac to Jiat of Jacob. The separate members of this sec- tion are the following : 1. Isaac's project ; 3. Rebe- kah's counter-project; 3. Jacob's deed and blessing ; 4. Esau's complaint and Esau's blessing; 5. Esau's Bcheme of revenge, and Rebekah's counter-scheme ; 6. Jacob and Esau in the antithesis of their mar- riage, or the divine decree. EXE0ETICAL AND CEITICAX. 1. Vers. 1-4. — And his eyes were dim. — We construe with the Sept., since we are of the opinion that this circumstance is noticed as an ex- planation of the succeeding narrative. — Thy quiver. —The oiraf \ey., ^bn (lit. hanging), has by some been explained incorrectly as meaning sword (Onke- los and others). — Savory meat. — S'Tas::i: , deli- cious food. But it is rather to be taken in the sense of a feast than of a dainty dish. It is praiseworthy in Isaac to be mindful of his death so long before- hand. That he anticipates his last hours in this manner indicates not only a strong self-will, but also a doubt and a certain apprehension, whence he makes the special pretence, in order to conceal the blessing from Jacob and Rebekah. [Xotwithstandiug the divine utterance before the children were born, un- doubtedly known to him, and the careless and almost contemptuous disposal of his birthright by Esau, and Esau's ungodly connection with the Canaanitish wo- men, Isaac still gives way to his preference to Esau, and determines to bestow upon him the blessing. — • A. G.] 2. Vers. 5-17. Rebekah's counter-project. — Unto Jacob her son. — Her favorite. — Two good kids of the goats. — -The meat was to be amply provided. •so as to represent venison. — As a deceiver (lit., as a scoffer). — " He is afraid to be treated as a scoffer merely, but not as an impostor, since he would liave confessed only a mere sportive intention." Knobel. It m.iy be assumed, however, that his conscience really troubled him. But from respect for his motli- cr he does not point to the wrong itself but to its hazardous consequences. — Upon me be thy curse. — Rebekah's boldness a.ssumes here the appearance of the greatest rashness. This, however, vanishes for the most part, if we consider that she is positive- ly sure of the divine promise, with which, it is true, she wrongfully identifies her project. — Goodly raiment. — Even in regard to dress, Esau seems to have taken already a higher place in the household. Bis goodly raiment reminds us of the coat of Joseph. —Upon his hands. — According to Tuch, tlie skins of the Eastern camel-goat (angora-goat) are here referred to. The black, silk-like hair of these ani- tnalsj was also used by the Rom.ans as a substitute for human hair (Martial., xii 46)." Keil. 3. Vers. 18-20. Jacobus act and Jacob's blesshig posture, but also while lying down ; but the lying posture at a meal differed from that taken upon . bed or couch. It is tlie solemn act of blessing, moreover, which is here in question. — Ho'w is it that thou hast found it so quickly It is not only Jacob's voice, but also the quick execution of his demand, which awakens his suspicion. — And ha blessed him Ver. 23. This is merely the greet- ing. Even "."ter having felt his son, he is not fully satisfied, but once more demands the explanation that he is indeed Esau. — Oorae near now, and kiss me. — After his partaking of the meat, Isaao wants still another assurance and encouragement by the kiss of his son. — And he smelled the smeU of his raiment. — The garments of Esau were im- pregnated with the fragrance of the fields, over which he roamed as a hunter. " The scent of Leba- non was distinguished (Hos. xiv. 7 ; Song of Sol. ir. 11)." Knobel. The directness of the form of his blessing is seen from the fact that the fundamental thought is connected with the smell of Esau's rai ment. The fragrance of the fields of Canaan, rich in herbs and flowers, which were promised to the theocratic heir, perfumed the garments of Esau, and this circumstance confirmed the patriarch's prejudice — And blessed him, and said. — The words of his blessing are prophecies (ch. ix. 27 ; ch. xlix.) — utter- ances of an inspired state looking into the future, and therelbre poetic in form and expression. The same may be said respecting the later blessing upon Esau. — Of a field Tirhich the Lord hath blessed. — Palestine, the land of Jehovah's blessing, a copy of the old, and a prototype of the new, paradise.— Because the country is blessed of Jehovah, he as- sumes that the son whose garments smell of tho fragrance of the land is also blessed. — Therefore God give thee. — Ha-elohim. The choice of the expression intimates a remaining doubt whether Esau was the chosen one of Jehovah ; but it is explained also by the universality of the succeeding blessing. [He views Ha-elohim, the personal God, but not Je- hovah, the God of the Covenaut, as the source and giver of the blessing. — A. G.] — Of the dew of heaven. — The dew in Palestine is of the greatest importance in respect to the fruitfulness of the year during the dry season (ch. xlix. 25 ; Deut. xxxiii. 13, '.% ; Hosea xiv. 6 ; Sach. viii. 12). — And the fat- ness of the earth. — Knobel : " Of the fat parts of the earth, singly and severally." Since the land promised to the sons was to be divided between Esan and Jacob, the sense uo doubt is ; may he give to thee the (■■''. part of the promised land, i. e., Canaan. Canaan was the chosen part of the lands of the earth belonging to the first-bom, which were blessed with the dew of heaven and the fatness of the earth. As to the fruitfulness of Canaan, see Exod. iii. 8. Com- pare also the Bible Dictionaries; Winer; article " Palestine." The antithesis of this grant to tliat of the Edomitic country appears distinctly, ver. 39 A two-lbld contrast is therefore "o be noticed: 1. To Edom ; 2. to the earth in general ; and so w« hare "IS . Ihit to a blessed land belong also blessed seasons, therefore plenty of corn and ^itie — X«el 514 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. people serve thee. — To tlie grant of the theocratic country is aiidoj the grant of a tlieocratic, i. e., spir- itual and political position of the world. — And nations. — Tribes of nations. Not only nations but tribes of nations, groups of nations, are to liow down to him, i. e., to do homage to him submissively. This promise was fulfilled typically in the time of David and Solomon, ultimately and complotelv in tlie world-sovereignty of the promise of faith. — Be Lord over thy brethren. — This blessing was fultilleil in the subjection of Edom (2 Sam. viii. 14 ; 1 Kings xi. 16 ; Ps. Ix. 8, 9). — Thy mother's sons. — His preju- dice still shows itself in the choice of this expression, according to which he thought to subject Jacob, the "mother's" son, to Esau. — Cursed be every one that curseth thee. — Thus Isaac bound himself He is not able to take back the blessing he pro- nounced on Jacob. In this sealing of the blessing he afterwards recognizes also a divine sentence (ver. 33). His prophetic spirit has by far surpassed his human prejudice. [This blessing includes the two elements of the blessing of Abraham, the possession of the land of Canaan, and a numerous oUspring, but not distinctly the third, that all nations should be blessed In him and his seed. Tliis may be in- cludeil in the general phrase, let him that curseth thee be cursed, and him that blesseth thee be lilessed. But it is only when the conviction that he had against his will served the purpose of God in blessing Jacob, that the consciousness of his patriarchal calling is awakened within hira, and he has strength to give the blessing of Abraham to the sou whom he had rejected but God had chosen (ch. xxviii. S, 4). See Keil.— A, G.] 4. Vers. 30^0. Esau's lamentation and Esau's blesdrift. — And Isaac trembled. — If Isaac himself had not intended to deceive in the matter in winch he was deceived, or had he been filled with divine confidence in respect to the election of Esau, he would have been startled only at the decepiion of Jacoli. But it is evident that he was surprised most at the divine decision, which thereby revealed itself, and convinces him of the error and sin of his at- tempt to forestall that decision, otherwise we should hear of deep indignation rather than of an extraor- dinary terror. What follows, too, confirms tliis in- terpretation. He bows not so much to tlie deception practised upon him as to the fact and to the pro- phetic spirit wliich has found utterance through him. AnuusTiNKi De Civitate Dei, 16, 37: " Quis non hie tnaU'iVclioium potius expectarel irati, si hisc no7t nipenia ivspinitinne sed terrenn more i/cnerenlur." Who ? where is he 7 — Yet before lie has named Jacob, he pronounces the divine sentence : the bless- ing of the Lord remains with that man who received it. — He cried with a great and exceeding bit- ter cry.— Ileb. xii. 17.— Bless me, even me also. — Esan, it is true, had a vague feeling that ilie (|nes- tion here was about important giants, but he did not understand their significance. He, therefore, thought the theocratic blessing admitted of division, and was 18 dependent upou his lamentations and prayers as upon the caprice of his father. — Thy brother came with subtilty. — With deception. Isaac' now imli- cates also the human error and .sin, after liaving decided the- ilivine judgment. But at the same time he declares that the (jueslion is only abmit one bless- ing, and that no stranger has been the ri'cipient of this lilessing, but Esau's brother. — Is not he rightly oamed (";n)? — Sliall he get the advantage of me because he was thus inadvertently named (Jacob = heel-catcher, supplanter), and because he then acted thus treacherously (with cunning or fiaudlshall 3 acquiesce in a blessing that was surreptitiously ot> tained ? — He took away my birthright. — Instead of reproaching himself with his own act, his eye is filled with the wrone Jacoli has done him. — Hast thou not a blessing reserved for me ? — Esau is perplexed in the mysterious aspect of this matter He speaks as if Isaac had pronounced an arbitrary blessing. Isaac's answer is according to the truth. He iulbrms him very distinctly of his future then cratic relation to Jacob. As compai'cd with the blessing of Jacob he had no more a blessing for Esau, for it is fundamentally the greatest blessing for him to serve Jacob. — Hast thou but one bless- ing?— Esau proceeds upon the assumption that the father could pronounce blessings at will. His tears, however, move the father's heart, and he feels that his favorite son can be appeased by a sentence hav- ing the semblance of a blessing, and which in fact contains every desire of his heart. That is, he now understands him. — The fatness of the earth.— The question arises whether '"0 is used here in a partitive sense (according to Luther's translation and the Vulgate), as in the blessing upon Jacob, ver. 28, or in a privative sense (according to Tuch, Knobcl, Kurtz, etc.). Delitzsch favors the last view : 1. The mountains in the northeastern part of Idumsea (now Gebalene), were undoubtedly fertile, and therefore called Palastina Salwtaris in the middle ages (Von Racmer, in his Palcestina, p. 240, considers the prophecy, therefore, according to Luther's transla- tion, as fulfilled). But the mountains in the western part of Idumaja are beyond comparison the most dreary and sterile deserts in the world, as Seetzen expresses himself 2. It is not probable that Esau's and Jacob's blessing would begin alike. 3. It is in contradiction with ver. 37, etc. (p. 465) ; Mai. i. 3. This last citation is quoted by Keil as proof of the preceding statement. [The '^ is the same in both cases, but in the blessisg of Jacob, " .after a verb of giving, it had a partitive sense ; here, after a noun of jilace, it denotes distance, or separation, e. g., Prov. XX. 3." Murphy. The context seems to de- mand this interpretation, and it is confirmed by the jiiediction, by thy sword, etc. Esau's dwelling-place was the very opposite of the richly-blessed land of Canaan. — A. G.] But notwithstanding all this, the question arises, whether the ambiguity of the ex- pression is accidental, or whether it is chosen in relation to the excitement and weakness of Esau. As to the country of Edom, see Delitzsch, p. 456 ; Knobel, p. 299 ; Keil, p. 198 ; also the Dictionaries, and journals of travellers. — And by thy sword. — This confirms the former explanation, but at the same time this expression corresponds with Es.au'? character and the future of his descendants. War. pillage, and robbery, are to support him in a barren country. "Similar to Ishmael, ch. xvi. 12, .and the different tribes still living to-day in the old Edomitic country (see Bdukhardt: ' Syria,' p. 82tj ; Rittkr: Brd'.iind , xiv. p. 966, etc.)." Knobel. SeeObadiah, ver. 3; Jer. xlix. 16. "The land of Edom, there- fore, according to Isaac's prophecy, will cnnstitntc a striking antithesis to the hind of Jacob." Ivell. — And shalt serve thy brother. — See above.— And it shall come to pass .\s a ciinsequeme of the riiaming about of Kchim in the temjier and pur- ' pose of a freebooter, he will ultimately shake off thd CHAPS. XXVII— XXVIII. 1-9. 5U Toke of Jacob from liis neck. This seems to be a promise of greater import, but the self-lilicration of Edom fiom Israel was not of long contiiiuano', nor did it prove to him a true blessing. Edom was at first strong and independent as compared to Israel, Blower in its development (N'umb. xx. 14, etc.). Saul first fought against it victoriously (1 Sam. xiv. 47); David conquered it (2 Sam. viii. 14). Tlieu followed It conspiracy under Solomon (1 Kings xi. 14), whilst there was an actual defection under Joram. On the other hanil, the Edomites were agaia subjected by Amaziali (2 Kings xiv. 7; 2 Chron. xxv. 11) and remained dependent under Uzziah and Jotham (2 Kings xiv. 22 ; 2 Chron. xxvi. 2). But under Ahaz they liberated, themselves entirely from Judah (2 Kings xvi. 6 ; 2 Chron. xxviii. 17). Finally, however, John Hyrcanus subdued them completely, forced them to adopt cii-cumciaion, and incorporated them into tiie Jewish state and people ( JosEPHts : "Antiq." xiii. 9, 1; xv. 7, 9), whilst the Jews themselves, how- ever, after Antipater, became subject to the domini on of an Idiunsean dynasty, until the downfall of their state. 6. Esau\'i scheme of revtw/e, and RebeJcah's coimler-scheine (vers. 41-46). — And Eaau said in his heart. — Esau's good-nature still expresses itself In his exasperation toward Jacob and in the scheme of revenge to kill him. For he does not maliciously execute the tlumght immediately, but betrays it in uttered threats, and postpones it until the death of his father. — The days of mourning . . . are at hand. — Xot for my father, but on account of my father; i. e., my lather, weak and trembUng with ige, is soon to die. — Then, and not before, he will ixecute his revenge. He does not intend to grieve ,he father, but if his motlier, his brother's protec- tress, is grievi'd by the murder, th:it is all right, in his view. — These words ■were told. — On account of his frank and open disposition, Esau's thoughts were soon revealed ; what he thought in his heart he soon uttered in words. — And called Jacob. — From the herds. — Plee thou to Laban. — Rebekah en- courages him to this flight by saying that it will last but few days, i. e., a short time. But she looked further. She took occasion from the present danger to carry on the thoughts of Abraham, and to unite Jacob honorably in a iheocRitic marriage. For, , notwithstanding all his grief of mind arising from Esau's marriages, Isaac had not thought of this. But still she lets Isaac firet express this thought. Xor is Isaac to be burdened with Esau's scheme of revenge and Jacob's danger, and therefore she leads him to her mode of reasoning by a lamentation concerning the daughters of Heth (ver. 46). — Deprived also of you both. — Bunsen : " Of thy father and thy- self." Others: "Of thyself and Esau, who is to die by the hand of an avenger." But as soon a.s Esau should become the murderer of his brother, he would be already lost to Rebekah, Knobel, again, thinks that in verse 46 the connection with the pre- ceding is here broken and lost, but on the contrarv sonnects the passage with eh. xxvi. 34 and ch. xxviii. I, as found in the original text. The connection is, nowever, obvious. If Knobel thinks that the char- acter of Esau appears different in ch. xxviiL 6 etc., than in ch. xxvii. 41, that proves only tliat he does BOt understand properly the prevaihng characteristics >f Esau as given in Genesis. 6 Jaiof} an I Esau in the antithesis of thir mar- riagi, or the divine dec ee (ch. xxviii. 1-9). — And Isaac called Jacob and blessed him. — The whole dismissal of Jacob shows that now he regards him voluntardy as the real heir of the .\brahamic bless ing. Knobel treats ch. xxviii. -ch. xxxiii. as one section (the earlier history of Jacob), whose fnnd» mental utterances form the original text, enlarged and completed by Jehovistic supplements. There an several places in which he says contradictions to tlw original text are apparent One such contiadietior he artfully frames by supposing th;it, .iccording t. Rebekah obvionsly disapiiears from the stagi as a grand or coitspicuons character ; grand in hei pnidente, magnanimity, and her theocratic zeal of iailli. Hit zi al of faith had a niixlure of fauati< CHAPS. XXVII.— XXVIII, 1-9. 517 exaggeration, and in this view siie is the grand- mother of Simeon and Levi (eh. xxxviii.). 1. It must be especially noticed that Jacob re- mained single far beyond the age of I.saac. He seems to have expected a hint from Isaac, just as Isaac was married through the care of Abraliani. The fact bears witness to a deep, quiet disposition, which was only developed to a full power by extiaor- dinary circum.^tances. He prove.-f, again, by his ac- tions, that he is a Jacob, i. e., heel-catchor, sup- planter. He does not refuse to comply with the |ilan »f the mother from any conscientious scruples, but ■•om motives of fear and prudence. And how ably Ind firmly he carries through his task, though his felse confidence seems at last to die upon his lips with the brief ■'3S, ver. 24! But however greatly he erred, he held a proper estimate of the blessing, for the security of which he thought he had a right to make use of prevarication ; and this blessing did not consist in earthly glory, a fact which is decisive as to his theocratic character. Esau, on the other hand, scarcely seems to have any conception of the real contents of the Abrahamic blessing. The pro- found agitation of those who surrounded him, gives him the impression that this must be a thing of in- estimable worth. Every one of his utterances proves a misunderstanding. Esau's misunderstandings, how- ever, are of a constant significance, showing in what light mere men of the world regard the thingsol the kingdom of God, Even his exertion to mend his im- proper marriage relations eventuates in another error. 8. Isaac's blessing. In the solemn form of the bless- ing, the dew of heaven is connected with the fatness of the earth in a symbolic sense, and the idea of the theocratic kingdom, the dominion of the seed of blessing first appears here. In the parting blessing upon Jacob, the term bnp indicates a great develop- ment of the Abrahamic blessing. — Ranke : Abraham, no doubt, saw, in the light of Jehovah's promises, on to the goal of his own election and that of his seed, but with regard to the chosen people, however, his prophetic vision extended only to the exodus from Egypt, and to the possession of Canaan. Isaac's prophe- cy already extends farther into Israel's history, reach- ing down to the subjugation and restoration of Edom. • 9. The blessing pronounced upon Esau seems to be a prophecy of his future, clothed in the form of a blessing, in which his character is clearly announced. It contains a recognition of bravery, of a passion for liberty, and the courage of a hunter — The Idumseans were a warUke people. 10. When, therefore, Isaac speaks in the spirit, about his sons, he well knew their characters (Hel). xi. 20). The prophetic blessing will surely be ac- complished ; but not by the force of a magical offi- ;acy ; as Knobel says : " A divine word uttered, is a power which infallibly and unchangeably secures wliat the word indicates. The word of God can never be ineffectual (comp. ch. ix. 18 ; Numb. xxii. 6 ; 2 Kings ii. 24 ; Is. ix. 7)."— The word of a pro- phetic spirit rests upon the insight of the spirit into tlie profound fundamental principles of the present, in which the future, according to its main features, reflects itself, or exhibits itself, beforehand. 11. The high-souled Esau acted dishonestly in ■Us thvt he was not mindful of the oath by which oe had sold to Jacob the birthright ; and just as Re- Oekah might excuse her cunning by that of Isaac, lu Jacob might excuse his dishonest conduct by sleading Esau's dishonesty. I 12. The application of the proverb, " The en(f 'justifies the mean~," to Jacob's conduct, is obvious ly not allowable. The possible mental reserva tion in Jacob's lie, may assumn the following form 1. I am Esau, i. e., tlie (real) hairy one, and th_ (lavrful) first-born. But even in this case the mentii reservation of Jacob is as different from that of the Jesuits, as heaven from earth. 2, Thy God l)roughl the venison to me ; i, e., the God who has led thcf wills thnt I should be blessed. 13, However plausible may be the deceit, through the divine truth some circumstance will romain unnoticed, and become a traitor. Jacob had rol considered that his voice was not that of Esau. It nearly betrayed him. The expression : "The voice is Jacob's voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau," has become a proverb in cases where words and deeds do not correspond. 14, The first appearance of the kiss in this nar- rative presents this symbol of ancient love to our view in both its aspects. The kiss of Christian brother- hood and the kiss of Judas are here enclosed in one. 15, Just as the starry heavens constituted the symbol of the divine promise for Abraham, so the blooming, fragrant, and fruitful fields are the symbol to Isaac. In this also may be seen and employed the antithesis between the first, who dwelt under the rustling oaks, and of the other, who sat by the side of springing fountains. The symbol of promise de- scends from heaven to earth. HOMILETICAl; AND PRACTICAl. See the Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. Upon the whole the present narrative is both a patriarchal family picture and a religious picture of history — Domestic life and domestic sorrow in Isaac's house. — In the homes of the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. — The blind Isaac: 1. Blind in two re- spects ; and 2. yet a clear-sighted prophet. — How Isaac blesses his sons : 1. How he inleiuh to bless them ; 2. how he is constrained to bless them, — Hu- man guilt and divine grace in Isaac's house : 1. The guilt ; Isaac and Rebekah anticipate divine provi- dence. They deceive each other. Esau is led to forget his bargain with Jacob ; Jacob is induced to deceive his father. Yet the guilt of all is diminished because they thought that they must help tlic right with falsehood. Esau obeys the fatlier, Jacob obeys the mother. Isaac rests upon the biithright, Re- bekah upon the divine oracle. 2. God's grace turns everything to the best, in conformity to divine truth, but with the condition that all must cxpeiate theit sins, — The image of the hereditary curse in the light of the hereditary hle.ssing, wliich Isaac ministers : 1 How the curse obscures the blessing ; 2. how the blessing overcomes the curse. — The characters men- tioned in our narrative viewed as to their contrasts : 1. Isaac and Rebekah ; 2. Jacob and Esau ; 3. Isaac and Jacob ; 4. Isaac and Esau ; 5. Rebekah aud Esau ; 6. Rebekah and Jacob, — The cunning of a theocratic disposition purified and raised to the pru- dence of the ecclesiastical spirit. — God's election is sure : 1. In the heights of heaven ; 2. in tuc deptlis of human hearts; 3, in the providence of grace; 4. in the course of history. — The clear stream of th« divine government runs through all human errors, and that : 1. For salvation to believers ; 2. for judg- ment to unbelievers. To Section first, vers. 1-4. Isaac's infimitv 9" 518 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF UOSEb. age, and bis faith: 1. In what manner the infirmity of age obscured his faith ; 2 how faith breaks through the infirmities of age. — Isaac^s blindness. — The sufferings of old age. — The thought of death : 1. Though beneficial in itself ; 2. may yet be prema- Jure. — The hasty making of wills. — We must not «nticipate fiod. — Not act in uncertainty of heart. — The preference of the parents for the children dil- ferent in character from themselves. — The connection of hunting and the enjoyment of its fruits, with the divine blessing of promise : 1. Incomprehensible as a union of the most diyerse things ; 2. comprehen- sible as a device of human prudence ; 3. made fruit- Ies,s by the interference of another spirit. — Isaac's secrecy thwarted by Rebekah's cunning device. — Human right and divine law in conflict with each other. — Isaac's right and wrong view, and conduct. Starke : It is a great blessing of God, if he pre- s*ves our sight not only in youth, but also in old age (Deut. xxxiT. 7). — Cramer : A blind man, a poor man (Tob. v. 12). — Old age itself is a sickness (2 Sam. xix. 35). — If you are deprived of the eyes of your body, see that you do not lose the eye of faith (Ps. xxxix. 5, 6). — A Christian ought to do nothing from passion, but to judge only by the word of God. — Bibl. Tub.: Parents are to bless their children before they die ; but the blessing must be conformed to the divine will (ch. xlviii. 5). Doubtless Jacob, taught by Isaac's error, learned to bless his children better ; i. e., in a less I'estricted manner. — (The Rab- bins assert that Isaac desired venison before his pro- nouncing the ble.ssiTig, because it was customary that the son about to receive the blessing should perform some special act of love to his father.) — Osiander : It is probable that Isaac demanded something better than ordinary, because this was to be also a peculiar day. To all appearance it was a divine providence through which Jacob gains time to obtain and bear away the blessing before him. — Schroder : Contem- plative men like Isaac easily undermine their health (?). — Experience teaches us that natures like that of Isaac are more exposed to bhndness than others. Shut in entii'ely from the external world, their eyes are soon entirely closed to it. — The son, by some embodiment of his tilial love, shows himself as son, in order that the father on his part also, may, through the act of blessing, show himself to be a father. — Love looks for love. — Thus the blessing may be considered not so much as belonging to the priv- ilege of the first-born, but rather as constituting a rightful claim to these privileges. Section Second, vera. 16-17. Rebekah's counter- scheme opposed to Isaac's scheme. — Rebekah's right and wrong thought and conduct.. — Rebekah protectress of the right of JacoI>'s election opposed to Isaac the elect. — Jacob's persuasi(m : 1. The iriotlier's faith and iier wrong view of it; 2. The faith of the son and his erroneous view. — Jacob's doubt and Rebekah's confidence. — The defect in his hesita- tion (it was not a fear of sin, but a fear of the evil consequences). — The defect in the confidence (not in the certainty itself, but its application). — The cun- ning mother and tlie cunning son. — Both too cun- ning in this case. — ITieir sufferings lor it — (iod's commai dment is of more weight than tlie parental authority, than all human commands generally. Starke : Some commentators are very severe upon Rebekah (Sadris, />i»TOMr.< XXVIII ; others on the contrary (Calvin and others), praise her I'aith, her cunning, her righteousness (because Esau as a bold icoffcr, had sold his birthright), her fear of God (abhorrence of the Canaanitish natuie). (We must add, however, that Calvin also marks the raeani which Rebekah uses as evil.)- — Hebekah, truly, had aeteil in a human way, striving by ual.iwfu mnani to attain a good end. — £iljl. Wirt: If the Word ol God is on our side we must not indeed depart from it, l)ut neither must we nndejtake to bring about what it holds before us by unlawful means, )iut look to God, who knows what means to use, and liow and when to fulfil his word. — Bibl. Tiib : God makei even the eiTOrs of the pious to work good, if theii heart is sincere and upright ; yet we are not to imi- tate their errors. Gerlach : Though staining greatly, as she did the divine promise by her deception, yet at the &am time her excellent faith shines out tljrough the his. tory. She did not fear to arouse the brother's deadly hatred against Jacob, to bring her favorite son into danger of his life and to excite her husband against her, because the inheritance promised by God stood before her, and she knew God had promised it to Jacob. (Calvin).- — Schroder ; (Mi- CHAiLis: The kids of the goats can be prepared in such a way as to taste like venison.) Isaac now abides by the rule, but Rebekah insists upon an exception (Luther). — The premature grasping bargain of Jacob (ch. xxv. 29, etc.,) is the reason that God is here anticipated again by Rebekah, and Jacob's sinfid cunning, so that the bargain again turns out badly. — Luther, holding that the law is annulled by God himself, concludes : Where there is no law, there is no transgression, therefore, shehas notsiimed (! ?) — Both (sons) were already 77 years old. The fact, that Jacob, at such an age, was still under maternal control, was grounded deeply in his individuality (ch. xxv. 27), as well as in the congeniality which existed between Jacob and his mother. Esau, sure- ly, was passed from under Rebekah's control aheady at the age of ten years. Section Third, vers. 18-29. Isaac's blessing upon Jacob: 1. In its human aspect; 2. in its di- vine aspect. — The divine providence controlling Isiiac's plan : Abraham, Isaac and Esau. — Jacob, in E.sau's garments, betrayed by his voice: 1. Almost betrayed immediately ; 2. afterwards clearly betray- ed.— Isaac's sohcitude, or all care in the service of sin and error gains nothing. — Jacob's examination — The voice is Jacob's voice, the hands are Esau's hands. — Isaac's blessing : 1. According to its exter- nal and its typical significance ; 2. in its relation to Abraham's promise and the blessing of Jacob. — Its new thoughts: the holy sovereignty, the gathering of a holy people, the germ of the announcement oi' a holy kingdom. Isaac's inheritance : a kingdom of na- tioiiB, a church of nations. — The fulfihuent of the bles- sing : 1. In an external or typical sense : David's king- dom ; 2. in a spiritual sense : the kingdom of Christ. Starkc : Jacob, perhaps, thought with a contrite heart of the abase of strange raiment, when the bloody coiit of Joseph was shown to him. To say nothing of the cross caused ky children, which, no ilniiht, is the most severe cross to pious parents in this world, and with which the pious Jacob often met (Dinah's rape, Benjamin's di6Scult birth, Sim eon's and Levi's bloody weapons, Reuben's incest, Joseph's history, Judah's history, ch. xxxviii., etc.) For Jacob sinned: 1. In speaking contrary to the truth, and twice passing himself for Esau; 2. in really practising fraud by means of strange raiment and false pretences ; 3. in his abuse of the name ol God (ver. 20) ; 4. in taking advantage cf ais father'i CHAPS. XXVII.— XXVm. 1-9. 51fi weakuess.— Yet God bore with his errors, like Isaac, etc. Ver. '26 : a collection of different places in which we read of a kiss or kisses (see Concordance). — That this uttered blessing is to be received not only ac- cording to the letter, but also in a deeper, secret •onse, is apparent from Hebr. .\i. 20, where Paul lavs : that by faith Isaac blessed his son, of which faith the Messiah was the theme. Gerlach: The goal and centr.al point of this blessing is the word: be lord over thy brethren. For this impUes that he was to be the bearer of the olessin^, while the others should only have a share in his enjoyment. — Lisco : Earthly blessing (Dent, xxxiii. 28).— Cursed be, etc. He who loves the friends of God, loves God himself; he who hates them, hates him ; they are the apple of his eye. — Calwer Handtiuch : The more pleasant the fragrance of the flowers and herbs of the field, the richer is the blessing. Earthly blessings are a sym- bol and pledge to the father of divine grace. — Power and sway; The people blessed of the Lord must stand at the head of nations, in order to impart a bler'sing to all. — Isaac, much against his will, blesses him whom Jehovah designs to bless. — Schrodkr : Ah, the voice, the voice (of Jacob) ! 1 should have dropped the dish and run away (Luther). — Thus also the servants of God sow the seed of redemption among men, not knowing where and how it is to bring fruits. God does not limit the authority granted to them by their knowledge and wisdom. The virtue and efficacy of the sacraments by no means depend, as the Papists think, upon the inten- tion of the person who administers them (Calvin). — (Esau's goodly raiment : Jewish tra him at the same time the door of heaven. Ue feels as a sinner rebuked and punished at this sacred place ; he trembles and is filled with holy awe, but not dis- heartened. Ue did not tremble before men nor wild beasts, but now he trembles before Jehovah in his Banctuary, but it is the trembling of a pious confi- dence.— And he set it up for a pillar. — Calvin : ".\ striking rnonuTnent of the vision." We must here distingui.fh between the stone lor a pillar, as a memorial of divine help, as Joshua and Samuel '.reefed pillars (ch. xxxi. 45; xxxv. 14; Josh. iv. 9, TO; xxiv 20; 1 Sam. vii. 12); and the anointing of the stone with oil, which conseci'aied it to Jeho- vah's sanctuary (Exod. xx. 30). In the same manner, we must distinguish, on the one hand, between the 'longeerated stone of Jacob, which marked the place as an idea! house of God and a future place for sao rifice (see ch. xxxv. 15 ; ch. xxxv. 7), and in an u& conscious typical prophecy the place of the futuM tabernacle, and, on the other hand, the .anointed stones worshipped with religious veneration (whence the expression : "Oelgotze," idols of oil), and espe- cially the stones supposed in the heathen world to have fallen from heaven, by whose names we are reminded of Bethel, but whose worship, however, is not to be deiived from Jacob's conduct at Bethel (see Keil, p. 302; Knoekl, p. 239; Delitzsch, p. 460 ; Wi.\ER, " Stones "). — Called the name. — Knobei, : " Aecoi'ding to the Elohist, he assigns the name at his return (xxxv. 15)." The naming at the last-quoted place, however, clearly expresses the execution of his purpose to sacrifice upon the stone, and thus to change it from an ideal to an actual Bethel, a place for the worship of God. It is evident that this naming of Luz, or the place near by, was of importance only to Jacob and his house, and that the Canaanites called the city Luz now as before, until it became a Hebrew city. According to Keil, Jacob himself called the city Luz by the name of Bethel, but not the place where the pillar was erect- ed. This would be very strange, and it is not proved by ch. xlviii. 3, where Jacob in Egypt characterizes in general the region of this divine revelation. From Josh. xvi. 2 ; xviii. 13, too, we receive the impression that Luz and Bethel, strictly taken, were two sepa^ rate places ; for Jacob had not passed the night in the city of Luz, but in the fields or upon the moun- tain, in the open air. Generally, the whole region was called Luz, in the time of the Canaanites, but Bethel at the time of the Israelites. — Vowed a vow. — The vow seems to unite the faith in Jehovah with external and personal interests. But the fol- lowing points should be considered : First, the vow is only an explanation and appropriation of the promise immediately preceding; second, t is a very modest appropriation of it (meat and druik and rai- ment) ; thirdly, Jacob emphasizes espe ;ially that point which the promise had left dark for his further trial (ch. xxxii. 7), viz., the desire to ret irn to hia paterual home in peace, i. e., especially, free from Esau's avenging threats. — The vow too: 'Then shall the Lord be my God, is emphatical, and explains itself by the following promises. Jacob fulfilled the first after his return (ch. xxxv. 7 ; vcr. 16), and Israel fulfilled it more completely. The tithe.'', that first appeal' in Abraham's history (ch. xiv. 20), were no doubt employed by Jacob, at his return, for burnt- offerings and thank-offerings and charitable gifts (see below) (ch. x.xxi. 54 ; xlvi. 1). [Murphy says, the vow of Jacob is a step in advance of his predeces- sors. It is the spirit of adoptioii working in him. It is the grand and solemn expiession of the soul's free, full, and perpetual acceptance of the Lord to be its own (iod. The words. If God will be with me, do not express the condition on which Jacob will acce])t God, but are the echo and thankful ac- knowledgment of the divine .-issurance, I am with thee. The stone shall be God's house, a monument of the presence and dwelling of (!od wilh his people. Here it signalizes the grateful and loving welcome which (lod receivi'S from his saints. The tenth is the share of all given to God, as rcpri'senting the full share, the whole wliich belongs to him. Thus Jacob opens his heart, his home, and his treiisure, to God. As the Father is prominently manifested in Abra^ ham, and the Son in Isaac, so also the Spirit ii Jacob. — A. G.] CHAP. XXVIII. 10-22. 525 DOCTRINAl AND ETHICAL. 1. Jacob's pilgrimage. The patriarchs pilgrims of God (Heb. xi.). 2. From Isaac onward the night dream-vision ig the fundamental form of revelation in the history of the patriarchs.— Consecrated night-life: 1. As to the occasion : In the most helpiess situation, tlie most solemn and glorious dream. 2. As to the form : A divine revelation in the dream-vision : a. miracles of Bight, symbols of salvation ; b. miracles of the ear, promise of salvation. 3. As to its contents ; The images of the vision : a. the ladder ; b. angels, as- cending and descending; c. .Tehovah standing above the ladder and speaking. — The words of the vision, or the centre f'f the whole vision (Calov. : Verbwn dei quasi aithna vinioniii). General promise ; indi- vidual promise. 8. The rainbow in the brightness of its colors, though soon vanishing away, proclaims the mercy of God, descending from heaven, and ruling over the earth ; but Jacob's ladder expresses more definitely the connecting and living intercourse between heaven and earth. The ladder reaching down from heaven to earth, designates the revelations, the words, and promises of God ; the ladder reaching upwards from earth to heaven, indicates faith, sighs, confession, and prayer. The angels ascending and descending, are messengers and the symbols of the reality of a personal intercourse between Jehovah and his people. 4. The angelic world develops itself gradually. Here they appear in great numbers, after having been preceded by the symboUc cherubim and the two an- gels, in company wiih the Angel of the Lord : I. These hosts, however, appear in the vision of a dream ; 2. they ascend and descend on tlie ladder; it does not appear, therefore, that they flew. They do not speak, but Jehovah speaks above them. Nevertlie- less, they indicate the living communion between heaven and earth, the longing for another world, well known to the Lord in the heavens ; the help and salvation which comes from above, and with which believing hearts are well acquainted, and the ascending and descending signifies that personal life •3 only mediated and introduced tli rough personal life. They carry on this mediation, bearing upwards from earth reports and prayers, and from heaven to earth protection and blessings. 5. In this vision and guidance of Jacob the Angel of the Lord unfolds and reveals his peculiar nature in a marked antithesis. Jehovah is the one peculiar personality who, exalted above the multi- tude of angels, begins to speak, receives and gives the word. 6. Christ brings out the complete fulfilment of Jacob's vision, John i. 52. From this exegesis of the Lord it follows that Jacob, now already as Israel (see John i. 47 ; ver. 49), not only beheld a constant intercourse between heaven and earth, but foresaw tlso, in an unconscious, typical representation, the gradual incarnation of God. BitTMGARTEN : " The MJ ."athers, and even Luther and Calvin, are loo rash 31 regarding the ladder, directly and by itself, as the s'^iabol cf the mystery of the incarnation. The lad- o '.- ts6if cannot be compared with Christ, but Jacob, who beholds the ladder," etc. No doubt, Jacob, in his vision, is a type of Christ, and Baumgarten cor- rectly says : " As far as a dream (it is, the nighf- •ision of a believer) stands below the reahty, and things that happen but once below tliose that con tinually occur, so far Jacob stands below Christ.' Yet the mutual relatiou and intercourse betweet God and the elect, which is the result of t-e ad vent of Christ, was doubtless typified by this lad der. 7. From Jacob's ladder we receive the first defi- nite intimation that beyond Sheol, heaven is the home of man. 8. Just as Jacob established his Bethel at hil lonely lodging-place, so Christians have founded theij churches upon Golgothas, over the tombs of martyrs, and over crypts; and this all in a symbolic sense. The church, as well as Christians, has come out of great tribulations. — But every true house of God ia also, as such, a gate of heaven. 9. The application of oil also, which afterwards, in a religious sense, as a a symbol of the spirit, runs through the entire Scriptures, we find here first men- tioned. 10. Jacob's vow is to be understood from the preceding promise of the Lord. It was to be uttered, according to the human nature, in his waking state, and is the answer to the divine promise. 11. As to the tithes and vows, see Dictionaries. Gi':rlach : " The number ' ten ' being the one that concludes the prime numbers, expresses the idea of completion, of some whole thing. Almost all na- tions, in paying tithes of all their income, and fre- quently, indeed, as a sacred revenue, thus wished to testify that their whole property belonged to God, and thus to have a sanctified use and enjoyment of what was left. 12. The idea of Jacob's ladder, of the protecting hosts of angels, of the house of (Jod aad its sublirse terrors, of the gate of heaven, of the symbolical significance of the oil, of the vow, and of the tithes , — all these constitute a blessing of this consecrated night of Jacob's life. 13. Jacob does not think that Jehovah's revela- tion to him was confined to this place of Bethel. He does not interpret the sacredness of the place in a heathen way, as an external thing, but theocratically and symbolically. Through Jehovah's revelation, this place, which is viewed as a heathen waste, be- comes to him a house of God, and therefore he con- secrates it to a permanent sanctuary. U. Vers. 20, 21. Briefly: If God is to me Je- hovah, then Jehovah shall be to me God. If the Lord of the angels and the world proves himself to me a covenant God, then 1 mil glorify in my cove- nant God, the Lord of the whole world. [There is clear evidence that Jacob was now a child of God. He takes God to be bis God in covenant, with whom he will live. He goes out in reliance uptra the divine promise, and yields himself to the divine control, rendering to God the homage of a loving ^nd grate- ful heart. But what a progress there is between Bethel and Peniel. Grace reigns within him, but not without a conflict. The powers and tendencies of evil are still at work. He yields too readily to their urgent solicitations. Still grace and the principles of the renewed man, gain a stronger hold, and be- come more and more controlling. Under the loving but faithful discipline of God, he is gaining in hia taith, until, in the great crisis of his life, Maiianaim and Peniel, and the new revelations thei: given to him, it receives a large and sudden increase. He is thenceforward trusting, serene, and established, strengthened and settled, and passes into the quie* life of the triumphant believer. — X. G.] b«4 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL. See Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. — Jacob, the third patriarch. How he inherited from his grandfather: 1. Tlie active deeds of faith, and from his father ; 2. the endurance of faith, and tlierefore even he apptars ; o. as the wrestler of faith. — Or the petriarch of hope in a special sense. — Jacob's pilgrim- age.— His couch upon the stony pillow becomes his Bethel. — The night-vision of Jacob at Bethel becomes more and more glorious : 1. The ladder ; 2. the angels ascending and descending ; 3. Jehovah and his prom- ise.— -The ladder : a. From heaven to earth : the word of God ; b. from earth to heaven : prayer (cries and tears, prayer, intercession, thanks, praise). — The An- gel of God over our life. — Jehovah speaking above the silent angels, or the peculiar irlory of the word of God, especially of the gospel. — Jacob's nolile fearlessness, and his holy fear. — Bethel, or the sacred places and names upon this earth. — Jacob's vow, the answer to Jehovah's promise. — How the God of Abraham and Isaac becomes also the God of Jacob, or, Jehovah always the same in the kingdom of God : 1. The living results ; 2. the Hving nature of the results. Section First, vers. 10-15. Starke : Jacob left his home secretly and alone, with all possible speed, before his brother Esau was aware of it. He took nothing with him but his staff (ch. xxxii. 10). — (Jo- SEPHOS : Unfavorable opinion of the people at Luz.) — Jacob, in this wretched condition upon his journey, i symbol of the Messiah. (Explained allegorically by R.iMBAcn : 1. Wooing a wife in a strange coun- try ; 2. the true heir appearing in poverty ; 3. the sojourn at Bethel. Christ had not where to lay his head.) — This ladder, a symbol of God's paternal care, by which, as by a heavenly ladder, heaven and earth are connected. — But that this ladder was to typify something far higher, we learn from Christ himself. The mystery of Christ's incarnation, and of his me- diatorial office, was typified by this. — Freiberger Bibel: In this ladder we see the sti'ps and degrees: 1. Of the state of Christ's humiliation ; 2. of the state of his exaltation. — Chrtsostom : " Faith is the ladder of Jacob reaching from earth to heaven. — Bersh. : The ladder of Jacob is the church, as yet partly militant upon the earth, and partly triumphant in heaven. — Tlie Lord (Jehovah). Chaldee: The glory of the Lord. Arab. : The light of the Lord. — (Freiberger Bibel : Grotius and Clericus are wrong in not being willing to give the name, the Angel of the Lord, to Christ, but to one of the highest angiLs, to wlioni they attribute the name of Jehovah, con- trary to the sense and usage of the Holy Spirit. ) — Ver. LI. God, in comforting him, proceede gradually: 1. He himself is with him, not a mere angel ; 2. he will bring him back again ; 3. he will never leave him (Rom. viii. 28). — Parents ought not to bring up their children too delicately, for they never know in what circumstances they may be placed. — Hall : God is generally nearest to us when we are the moat bumble. — Bibt. Tub. : Even in his sleep Jacob had intercourse with the Lord ; in a like manner our eleip should be consecrated to the Lord. — Clirist, the true Jacob's ladder (I's. xci. 2; Isa. xxxiii. 2). Gerlach: That the angels here neither hover nor fly, is owing to the representation and typical signifi- cance of the vision. By this very tivct .Jacob was as- sured that the [liace where his head lies, is the i)nint to which God sends his angels, in order to execute hie commands concerning him, and to receive com- munications from him ; a symbol of the loving ant uninterrupted care for his servants, extending to in- dividu:ds and minute events. — Dreadful. The olo church called the Lord's supper a drewlful mystery [Kacraiiiejitum tretnenduw ) . — Lisco : Now Jacob, like Abraham and Isaac, stands as the elect of Jeh > vah. This is of greater importance, since Jaeoli is the ancestor of the Israelites only. The promises of Jehovah, therefore, th^it were given to him, must have appeared as the dearest treasure to his descend' ants. — Schroder: Ver. 10. Because the sun uas set A symbol corresponding with his inward feeling The paternal home with the revelations and the wor ship of the only true God, is fir behind him, ? strange solitude around him, and a position lull of temptation before him. — The living stone, the rock of salvation, is the antitvpe of that typical stone in the wilderness ; do with it what the patriarch did with his (F. W. Krummacher), Heb. i. 14. — In the symbol of the ladder lies the prediction of the special providence of God. — Earth is a court of paradise ; life, here below, is a short pilgrimage; our home is above, and the hght of a blessed eternity illuminates our path (F. W. Krummacher). Section Second, vers. 16-22. Starke: Swell, the Lord. Chald. : The glory of the Lord. — Ver. 17. His feeble nature trembled before this heavenly manifestation, because he was well aware of his un- worthiness, and the sublimity of God's majesty con- sidereearanee ■S the son of the rich Isaac. In the view of Ki'il, he relates only the circumstances mentioned fron ver. 2-12. — Surely thou art my flesh and my bone. — He recognizes him fully from his appearance and his comniuniealion, as his near relative. — The space of a month. — Literally, during some, an in- definite number of days. It was yet uncertain, from day to day, how they would arrange matters. 3. Vers. 15-25. Jacob's xiiit ami Sfrvice for Rachel, and the decepton prttrti.- her countenance, and, indeed, with a reference to her beautiful eyes, which were wanting to Leah. Thus the passage indirectly says that Leah's form was beautiful.— Serve thee seven years for Rachel. — Instead of wages he desires the daughter, and instead of a service of an indefinite number of days he promises a service of seven years. " Jacob's service represents the price which, among the Orientals, was usually paid tor tlie wife which was to be won (see WiNEit, Rrulw., under marriage). The custom still exists. In Kerek, a man without means, renders service for five or six years (Riitkr, Krdkwide, XV. p. 674), and in Ilauran, Burkhardt ("Syria," p. 464), met a young man who had served eight years for his hare support, and then received for a wife the daughter of his master, but mnsi ren- der service still." Knoukl. On the contrary, Keil dis. jiutes the certainty of the assumption that the cus- tom of selling their daughters to men was g.-neral at that time. And we should certainly be nearer the truth in explaining many usages of the present bor- der Asia from patriarchal relations, than to invert everything aceonling to Knohel's view. Keil holds that Jacob's seven years of servioe takes the plaor CHAP. XXIX.— XXX. 1-24. 529 of the customary dowry and the presents given to the relatives ; but lie overlooks the fact that the '.de-is of buifin'i dind presenting (And barter) are not is far apart in the East as with us. Nor can we di- rectly infer the covetousness of Laban from Jacob's .ac- ceptance of the offer, although his ignoble, selfish, nar- row-minded conduct, as it 15 seen afterwards, throws jome light also en these earlier transactions. — It is better that I give her to thee. — " Among all Bedouin Arabians the cousiu has the preference to strangers (Bl'RKHakot, "Bedouin," p. 219), and the Druses in SjTia always prefer a relative to a rich stranger (Vol.s'ky, "Travels," ii. p. 62). It is gene- rally customary throughout the East, that a man marries his next cousin ; he is not compelled to do it, but the right belongs to him exclusively, and •he is not allowed to marry any other without his consent. Both relatives, even after their marriage, call each other cousin (Burkhardt, " Bedouins," p. 91, and "Arabian Proverbs," p. 274, etc.; Layard, "Nineveh and Babylon," p. 222; Lase, "Manners and Customs," i. p. 167). Knobkl. — They seemed unto him but a few days. — So far, namely, as that his great love for Rachel made his long service a delight to him ; but, on the other hand, it is not said that he did not long for the end of these seven years. Yet he was cheerful and joyful in hope, which is in perfect keeping with Jacob's charac- ter.— A Feast. — Probably Laban intended, by the great nuptial feast which he prepared, to facilitate Jacob's deception by the great bustle and noise, but then also to arrange things so, that after seven days the wedding might be considered a double wed- ding. For it is evident that he wishes to bind Jacob as firmly and as long as possible to himself (see ch. XXX. 27). — Leah, his daughter. — The deception was possible, through the custom, that the bride was led veiled to the bridegroom and the bridal chamber. Laban probably believed, as to the base deception, that he would be excused, because he had already in view the concession of the second daughter to Jacob. — And Laban gave unto her Zilpah We can- not certainly infer that he was parsimonious, because he gave but one handmaid to Leah, since be un- doubtedly thought already of the dowry of Rachel with a second handmaid. The number of Rebekah's Imndmaids is not mentioned (ch. xxiv. 61). — Behold, it vras Leah. — [" This is the first retribution Jacob experiences for the deceitful practises of his former days." He had, through fraud and cunning, secured the place and blessing of Esau, — he, the younger, in the place of the elder ; now, by the same deceit, the elder is put upon him in the place of the younger. What a man sows that shall he also reap. Sin is often punished with sin. — A. G.] See Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. 4. Vers. 26-30. Sis renewed service for Rachel. — It must not be so done. — " The same custom exists among the East Indians (see Ma.vu. ; " Stat- utes," ill. 160; RosENM., A. u. "Mod. Orient," and Von Bohlen, upon this place). Even in the Egypt of to-day, the father sometimes refuses also to give in marriage a younger daughter before an older one 'Lane : " Customs and Manners," i. p. 169)." Kno- bel. Delitzsch adds the custom in old imperial Germany. This excuse does not justify in the least Laban's deception, but there was, however, a sting for Jacob in this reply, viz., in the emphasis of the right of the first-born. But Laban's offer that fol- lowed, and in which now truly his ignoble selfishness • manifest, calmed Jacob's mind. — Fulfil her 34 week. — Lit., mnJce full iht weik with this one^ i. e^ the first week after the marriage, which is due to hei, since the wedding generally lasted one week ^•Iudi,. xiv. 12; Tob. xi. 19). [Her week — the week of Leah, to confirm the marriage with her by keeping the usual wedding-feast of seven days. But if Leah was put upon him at the close of the feast of seven days, then it is Rachel's week, the second feast of seven days which is meant. The marriage with Rachel w.as only a week after that with Leah. The seven years' service for her was rendered afterwards. —A. G.]— And we will.— Ch. xxxi. 1; ver. 23; probably Laban and his sons. Laban also, as Rebe- kah's brother, took part in her marriage arrange- ments.— Rachel his daughter. — Within eight days Jacob therefore held a second wedding, but he ful- filled the service for her afterwards. Laban, there- fore, not only deceived Jacob by Leah's interposition, as Jacob tells him to his face, but he overreached him also in charging him with seven years of service for Leah. Thus Jacob becomes entangled in polyg- amy, ill the theocratic house which he had sought in order to close a theocratic marriage, first by the faier and afterwards by the daughters. 5. Vers. 31-35. 77ie first four sons of Leah. — When the Lord saw. — The birth of Leah's first four sons is specifically referred to Jehovah's grace ; first, because Jehovah works above all human thoughts, and regards that which is despised and of little account (Leah was the despised one, the one loved less, comparatively the hated one, Deut. xxi. 15) ; secondly, because among her first four sons were found the natural first-born (Reuben), the legal first-born (Levi), and the Messianic fir.st-born ( Judah) ; even Simeon, like the others, is given by Jehovah in answer to prayer. Jacob's other sons are referred to Elohim not only by Jacob and Rachel (ch. xxx. 2, 6, 8), but also by Leah (vers. 18, 20), and by the narrator himself (ver. 17), for Jacob's sons in their totality sustain not only a theocratic but also a universal destination. — He opened her womb. — ■ He made her fruitful in children, which should attach her husband to her. But theocratic husbands did not esteem their wives only according to their fruit- fulness (see 1 Sam. i.) It is a one-sided view Keil takes when he says: "Jacob's sinful weakness ap- pears also in his marriage state, because he loved Rachel more than Leah, and the divine reproof appears, because the hated one was blessed with children but Rachel remained barren for a long time." All we can say is, it was God's pleasure to show in this way the movements of his providence over the thoughts of men, and to etiualize the incon- gruity between these women. — Beuben. — Lit., Beu Ben : Behold., a son. Joyful surprise at Jehovah's compassion. From the inference she makes : now therefore, my husband will love me, her deep, strong love for Jacob, becomes apparent, which had no doubt, also, induced her to consent to Laban's deception. — Simeon, her second son, receives his name from her faith in God as a prayer-answering God. — Levi. — The names of the sons are an expres- sion of her enduring powerful experience, as well as of her gradual resignation. After the birth of the first one, she hopes to win, tlrodgii he*, son, Jacob's love in the strictest sense A'tertue birth of the second she hoped to be put on a footing of equality with Rachel, and to be delivf red from her disregard After the birth of the third one she hoped at leaai for a constant affection. At the birth of the fourth she looks entirely away from herself to Jehovah.- 530 GENESLS, UK THii i'lKST BOOK OF MOSES. Tudah. — Praised. A verbal noun of the future Hoplial from nT' . The literal meaning of the name, therefore, is : " shall be praised," and may thug be referred to Judah as the one " that is to be praised," but it may also mean that Jehovah is to be praised on account of him (see Delitzsch, p. 465). [See Rom. ii. 29. He is a Jew inwardly, whose praise is of God. 'fl jrdsworth refers here to the analogies between the patriarchs and apostles. — A, (i.] — She left bearing. — Not altogether (see ch. xxx. Iti, etc.), but for a tinje. (">. Raelisfs dejection, and tlie co7tnecHon with Bilhah, her maid (oh. xxx. 1-8). — And when Ra- chel saw. — We have no right to conclude, with Kcil, from Rachel's assertion, that she and Jacob were wanting in prayer for children, and thus had not followed Isaac's example. Even in prayer, pa- tience may be finally shaken in the human sinful heart, if God intends to humble it. — Give me children or else I die, i. e., from dejection ; not : my remembrance will be extinguished (Tremell) ; much less does it mean : I shall commit suicide Chrysost.). Her vivid language sounds not only irrational but even impious, and therefore she rouses also the anger of Jacob. — Am I in God's stead. — Lit., instead of God. God alone is the lord over life and death (Deut. xxxii. 39; 1 Sam. ii, 6). Ra- chel's sad utterance, accompanied b.v the threat : or else I die, serves for an introduction as well as an excuse of her desperate proposition. — My maid, Bilhah The bad example of Hagar coniiimes to operate here, leading into error. Tiie question here was not about an heir of Jacob, but the proud Ra- chel desired children as her own, at any cost, lest ."he should stand beside her sister childless. Her jealous love for Jacob is to some extent overbalanced by her jealous pride or envy of her sister, so that she gives to Jacob her maid. — Upon my knees. — Ancient interpreters have explained this in an absuidly literal way. From the fact that children were taken upon the knees, they were recognized either as adopted children (1. 23), or as the fruit of their own bodies (Job iii. 12). — That I may also have children by her. — See ch. xvi. 2. — Dan (judge, one decree- ing justice, vindex). — She considered the disgrace of her barrenness by the side of Leah an injustice. — Naphtali. — According to Knobel : wrestler ; ac- cording to others: viy wrestling, or even, the one for whom I miesiled. Delitzsch : the one obtained by wrestling. The LXX place it in the plural : Napli- lalim, wrestlings. Ffirst regards it as the abbrevi- ated i'orrn of Naphtalijah, the wrestling of Jehovah. Against tlu^ two last explanations may be urged the deviation fi'om the form NaphtaUm, wrestlings ; and according to the analogy of Dan, vindicator, the most ptt''alile explanation is, ray wrestler. As hiving the foundation for the name, Rachel says : With great Wrestlings have I wrestled with my sister The wrestlings of God could only be in the wrest- lings ol' prayer, as we afterwards si^e from Jacob's wrestlings, through which he becomes Israel. De- litzsch, too, exjdains: These are the wrestlings of prayer, in the assaults and temptations of I'aith. IIkngstI'.niikko: Struggles whose issue bears tint character of a divine judgment, hut through which the struggle itself is not clearly understood. Kno- tiKL: "She waM not willing to leave the founding of a people of (iod to her sister only, but wished also to becoi e an ancestress, as well as Leah." Hut how can Rachel speak of a victory over her sister rich in ohildren ? Leah has left bearing, while liilhah. her maid, begins to bear ; at the same time, Rachel in eludes as much as possible in her words in ordei to overpersuade herself [She believes that she bai overcome. — A. G.] Hence, still, at Joseph's birth she could say : Now (not before) God has taken away my reproach. 7. Vers. 9-13. Leah's emulation, and Zilpah, hef maid. — Took Zilpah, her maid Leah is still less excusable than Rachel, since she could oppose her own four sons to the two adopted sons of Rachel But the proud and challetiging assertions of Rachel, however, seem to have determined her to a renewed emulation ; and Jacob thought that it was due to the eijual rights of both to consent to the fourth mui' riage. That Leah now acts no longer as before, m a pious and humble disposition, the names by which she calls her adopted sons clearly prove. — A troop cometh. — Good fortune. An unnecessary conjec- ture of the Slasorites renders it ^3 xa "Ibrtune victory cometh." — Asher. — The happy one, or the blessed one. 8. Vers. 14-21. Leah's last births. — CaU me blessed. — An ancient mode of expression used by ha|>py women fiom Leah to Mary (Luke i. ■ts). The preterite expresses the certain future. — And Reuben went. — Reuben, when a little boy (according to De- litzsch Hve years old ; according to Keil only four), brought unto his mother a plant found in the fields, and called O^Nl'1^, a name which has been rendered in various ways. "The LXX correctly translates, D"'5<'m=/i7)Aa ^ai'SpayopoJi'; ^"m (and the kindred ■'bib) is the Mandragora vernalis (high-German: alrihia, alrun, mandrake; Grimm., ' Mythol.' ii. p. 1153, edit, iii.), out of whose small, white and-green flowers, which, according to the Song vii. 14, are harbingers of Spring, there grows in May, or what is equivalent, at the time ot' the wheat-harvest, yel- low, strong, but sweet-smeUing apples, of the size of a nutmeg (.^lab. tuj^'ah ex Saltan, i. c, pontuni Sa.- tuiKi'], wliich in antiquity as well as during the middle ages (sec Guaesse: 'Contributions to the literature and traditions of the Middle Ages,' IS.'iU) were thought to promote fruitfulness and were generally viewed as Aphrodisiacum." Delitzsch, Hence tlie fruit was called Dudaitn amatoria, Love-apple. Theophrastus tells us that love-potions were prepared i'rom its roots. It was held in such high esteem by them that the goddess of love was called Mandragoritis. All the (lifiFerent travellers to Palestine speak about it (see KNOBEt., p. 224; Delitzsch, p. 4B7 ; Keil, p. 211';; Winer: Alrai'U, Mandrake). — Give me of those mandrakes. — Love-apples. In the transac- tion Ijctween Rachel and Leah concerning the man- drakes, her excited emulation cuhninateil, not, how- ever, as Keil says, as a mutual jealousy as to the allection of their husband, but a jealou.sy as to the births, otherwise Rachel would not have been obliged to yield, anil actually have yielded to Leah the rigiil in question, — And God hearkened unto Leah. — Knobel thinks that the Jehovislic and Elohistio views are here mingled in conlusion. The Elohist records of Leah after the ninth verse, that she prayed, and considers her pregnancy an answer to her prayer ; the Jchovist, on the contrary, ascribes it to the ert'ect |)roduccd by the mandiakes, of which Leah retained a part. Here, therefore, the critical assumption ot a biblical book-making culminates. It is obviously the design to bring out into prominence the fact that Leah hecame pregnant again without mandrakes, and that they were of no avail .o Rachel, a fact whicb CHAP. XXIX.— XXX, 1-24. 53 "'oil renders prominent. Moreover, it could not be the intention of Rachel to prepare from these man- drakes a .so-called love-potion for Jacob, but only to attain fruitfulness by their effects upon herself. .Just as now, for the same purpose perhaps, unfruitful women visit or are sent to certain watering-p'aces. From this standpoint, truly, the assumed remedy of nature may appear as a premature, eager self-help. — Issachar. — According to the Chethib, ^SUJ V . there is reward; according to Keri, "IDID Sia^ , it brings reward, which is less fitting here. Leah, according to ver. 18, looked upon Issachar as a re- ward for her self-denial in allowing her maid to take her place. By this act, also, her strong affection for Jacob seems to betray itself again. But no such struggle is mcntitmed of Rachel in the interposition of her maid. — Zebulun. — That the children here are altogether named by the mothers, is Jehovistic, as Knoliel thinks : " The Elohist assigns the names to the children through the father, and is not fond of etymologies ! " It is just as great violence to the words : God hath endued me, etc., to say the nauie signifies a present, while, according to the words following, it signifies dwelUr, The name of Zebulun is first formed after the inference which Leah drew from the divine gift or present. baT , to dwell, alludes to the preceding T3T , to make a pres- ent ; both verbs are awa^ Key. — Dinah, is mentioned on account of the history, ch. xxxiv. Ch. xx.tvii. .35 and cli. xxxvi. 7 seem to intimate that he had other daughters, but they are not mentioned further. Dinah is the female Dan. Leah retains her supe- riority. Hence there is no fuller explanation of the name after the deed of Dinah's brothers, ch. zsxlv. 9. Vers. 22-24. Rachel the mother of Joseph. — And God remembered Rachel. — The expression : he remembered, here also denotes a turning-point after a long trial, as usually, e. g., ch. viii. 1. In relation to the removing of unfrultfulness, see 1 Sam. i. 19. — And God hearkened to her. — She there- fore obtained fruitfulness by prayer also. — Joseph. — This name, in the earlier document, as Knobel expresses himself, is called "Dsi"' , one that takes away, 1. e., takes away the leproach, from CDX ; and then, in the second document, he shall add, from Tp'^. Delitzsch also explains : one that takes aieai/. Keil adopts both derivations. The text only allows the latter derivation : he >na>/ add. To take away and to add are too strongly opposed to be traced back to one etymological source. Rachel, it is true, might have revealed the sentiments of her heart bv the expression : God hath taken away my reproach ; but she was not able to give to her own sons names that would have neutralized the significance and force of thi names of her adopted sons Dan and Naphtali That she is indebted to God's kmdness for Joseph, while at the same time she asks Jehovah for another son, and thereupon names Joseph, does not furnish any sufficient occasion for the admission of an addi- tion to the sources of scripture, as Delitzsch assmnes. The number of Jacob's sons, who began with Jeho- vtl, was also closed by Jehovah. For, according to 'be number of twelve tribes, Israel is Jehovah's oovenant people. In regard to the fact, however, that Jacob's ehildren were not bom chronologically in the pre- ceding order, compare Delitzsch with reference to EushiBiDS: Prreviiratio Evang., ix. 21,and Astruc. : " Conjectures," p. 396, and Keil. The first-born Reuben, was born probably during the first year of the second seven years, and Joseph at the close of the same. All the sons, therefore, were born during the second heptade. Dinah's birth, no doubt, occuri also during this period, though Keil supposes, from the expression ",ns, that she may have been bor/i later. But if we now adopt the chronological sue cession, Leah would have given birth to seven chL dren in seven years, and even then there was a pause for some time between two of them. The imperfect, with the T consecutive, however, does not express always a succession of time, but sometimes also it expresses a train of thought. We may suppo.se, therelbi'e, that Leah gave birth to the first four son« during the first four years. In the meanwhile, how ever (not after the expiration of the four years) Rachel effected the birth of Dan and Naphtali bj Jacob's connection with Bilhali. This probably in dueed Leah, perhaps in the fifth year, to emulate hef example by means of her handmaid, who in a quick succession gave birth to two sons in the course of the fifth and sixth years. During the sixth and sev- enili years Leah again became a mother, and a short time after Zebulun, Joseph was born also. Accord- ing to Delitzsch, Joseph's birth would occur between that of Issachar and Zebulun. But then the expres- sion ver. 2.T would not be exact, and the naming of Zebulun by his mother would be without foundation. The last remark also bears against Keil's view, that Joseph probably was born at the same time with Zebulun, though he also considers it probable that he mav have been born later. DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL. 1. The divine revelation, its consolations and its promises, revive the believer, so that he can pro- ceed on his pilgrimage with renewed vigor. An ex- perience similar to that at Bethel Jacob afterwards met with at Peniel (ch. xxxii. 30). 2. Eliezer, acting for Isaac, Jacob, and Moses, found their future brides by the side of wells. These charming descriptions of the East resemble each other, and yet greatly differ in their details. On ac- count of their significance and beauty, they were applied to spiritual relations by the fathers. [See also Wordsworth, who goes fully into all the details of these analogies. — A. G.] 3. Jacob experienced the gracious providence of Jehovah here at the well, through one act after another: Shepherds from Ilaran ; acquaintances of Laban ; Rachel's appearance ; the occasion and call to assist her at the moment. ■4. Is he well? lb cibcji. Happiness and wel- fare, according to the oriental, but particularly accord- ing to the biblical, view, consists especially in peace, inviolability, both as to outward and inward life. 5. Tin: eharaclirs. Zahan's charaeter. That Laban was really a sharer m the theocratic faith, and susceptible of noble and generous sentiment, is evi- dent not only from the manner in which he receives Jacob, but also from the way in which he dismisses him (eh. xxxi. 24 ; 54 fif.). But we also see, how, un- der the influence surrounding him at home (ch. xxxi. 1 ), the selfishness in him gradually increased, until it cuhninated in the base use which he made of hii nephew's necessity and love, and thus, at last, pro- ceeds to practise the grossest deception. Eren u t>32 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSER. this deception, however, we must not overlook the fact tliat. .villi a friendly interest in Jacob, he con- sidered it as a pious fraud. He was \villing to give '>otli his daughters to Jacob ; perhaps, too, he had in his eye Leah's quiet but vehement affection for Jacol). He so far lestrained his selfishness, also, that he per- mits Jacob to return home with the large possessions that he had acquired while with him. Moieover, he had to overcome the excited spirit of his sons and brethren. The lower standpoint which be occupies is e^ident from the fact that he himself leads his nephew into a theocratic double-marriage, but per- haps also with the intention of securing to his house, with greater certainty, a full share in the mysterious blessing expected by Abraham, and because he qui- etly consented that the strife of his daughters should involve Jacob still farther in polygamy. — As to Leah, the narrator has no fault to find, except that lier eyes were not as beautiful as those of her sister, but were tender. The vehement, though quiet love for Jacob, as seen on every occasion, no doubt made her also willing to enter into the deception of Jacob by Laban. Besides, she regarded herself certainly as excusable upon higher grounds and motives, just as Thamar, who fanatically married into the house of promise, and that by a guilty course (ch. xxxviii). Her increasing humility (see Exegesis) causes her to be an object of Jehovah's peculiar regard, or rather, by this humility, her especial election as ancestress of David and tlie Messiah becomes evident, and even in her over-zealous strife with her sister, in which the question is about the increase of the patriarchal family, her ,'^elf-denial is proven by the struggle with whicli she gives her maid to Jacob, and the kindness with which she gave the mandrakes to her sister. Rachel, on the other hand, possessed not only bright eyes, but also ardent affections. In the fiery and glowing nature of her affection (ch. xxx. 1), as well as in her cunning (ch. xxxi. 34, 35) Rachel is the image of Rebekah, but with these features of char- acter more strongly marked. So also at the end, in the tragical issue of her life. For as Rebekah did not reach the goal and see Jacob again, so Rachel did not attain her aim in sharing witli him peacefully anil honorably his paternal heritage. In Rachel's sinful impatience too, there was not wanting also a moral element, for " the pure desire of parents for offspring is the highest degree of virtuous matri- mony." Delitzsch (see p. 4H5, and the words of Luther there c|uoted). Keil, without any sufficient reason, places Rachel (p. 206), in leligious respects, below Liah. nistinctions of election are not always contrasts of light and darki»ess. Finally, Jacob here appears clearly as the man of the wrestlings of faith, and as tlie patriarch of hope. However pru- dent, it happens to liim as to the (Edipus in the Greek tragedy. (Kdipus solved the riddle of the sphinx, yet is Mind, and remains blind in relation to the riddle of his own life. Lab^in cheated him, as his sons did afterwards, and he is punished through the same transgression of whicli be himself was guilty. Jacob is to struggle for everything — for his birth- right, his Rachel, his herds, the .security of his lih', the rest of his old age, and for hia grave. But in [lie.se stru^'glcs he does not come off without many tiansgres.sioiiB, from which, however, as God's elect, he is liberated by severe discipline. He, therefore, j( .stamped as a man of hope by the divine provi- dence. As a fugitive he goes to Ilaran, as ii fugitive tie retuinH home. Seven years he hopes for Rachel, twenty years he hopes for a return home ; to the very evening of his life he is hoping for the recot cry of Joseph, his lost son in Sheol ; even whilst ht is dying upon Egyptian soil, he hopes for a grave in his native country. His Messianic hope, however, in its full development, rises above all these instaa ces, as is evident in the three chiof stages in his hfa of f;iith : Bethel, Feniel, and the blessing of his son! upon his death-bed. His life differs from that of hil father Isaac in this : that with Isaac the quickening experiences fall more in the earlier part of his life, but with Jacob they occur in the latter half; and that Isaac's life passes on quietly, whilst storms and trials overshadow, in a great measure, the pilgrimage of Jacob. The Messianic suffering, in its typica* features, is already seen more plainly in him than in Isaac and Abraham ; but the glorious exaltation corresponds also to the deeper humiUation. 6. Jacob's service for Rachel presents us a pic- ture of bridal love equalled only m the same devel- opment and its poetic beauty in the Song of Solo- mon. It is particularly to be noticed that Jacol^ however, was not indifferent to Rachel's infirmities (ch. xxx. 2), and even treated Leah with patience and indulgence, though having suffered from her the most mortifying deception. 1. The deception practised by Laban upon Jacob was perfectly fitted, viewed as a divine punishment tlirough human sin, to bring his own sin before hia eyes. As he introduced himself as the first-born, by the instigation of his mother, so Leah, the first-bom, is introduced to him by his mother's brother, under the pretence of the appearance of his own Rachel. And this deception Laban even excuses in a sarcastio way, with the custom as to the birthright of the daughters at Haran. Thus Jacob atones for his cun- ning, and Laban truly must atone for his deception. 8. Leah's election is founded upon Jehovah's grace. Without any doubt, however, she was fitted to become the ancestress of the Messianic line, not only by her apparent humility, but also by her in nate powers of blessing, as well as by her quiet and true love for Jacob. The fulness of her life be- comes apparent in the number and the power of lier children ; and with these, therefore, a greater strength of the mere natural life predominates. Joseph, on the cimtrary, the favorite son of the wife loved with a bridal love, is distinguished from his brethren, aa the separated (ch. xlix.) among them, as a child of a nobler spirit, whilst the import of his life is not aa ricli for the future as that of Judah. 9 If we woidd regard the deception and impo- sition practised upon Jacob as at all endurable, we must assume, on the one hand, Leah's fanatic and vehement love ; on the other, his own perfect illu- sion. This unconscious error and confusion of na- ture, seems almost to have been transmitted to Reu- ben, the first-born (ch, xxxv. 2'i ; xlix. 21); and therefore, in consequence of his offence, he also lost the birthright. We cannot, however, entirely con- cur in Luther's view, which Delitzsch approves, that while there was nothing adulterous In the connectioij of .lacob and Leah, it was still extra-natural, and ic that sense, monstrous. There was undoubti'dly an impure and unnatural element in it. But we must bear in mind, as was remarked above, not only Leah's love, but also Jacob's self-oblivion, in which the fi'ce choice is gi/nerally limited and restrained by the blind forces of the night-life, through and in which God works with creative energy. It is tha moment in which the man falls back into the hand of God as the creator. eUAF. XXIX. 1— XXX. 24. 5Sh 10. The difference between the hou.'ie at Haran and Isaac's house at Beer-sheba, appears from this, that Laban entangled Jacob in polygamy. And even in this case the evil consetiuences of polygamy jppear : envy, jealousy, contention, and an increased j/cnsuality. Nevertheless Jacob's case is not to be judged according to the later Mosaic law, which prohibited the marrying of two sisters at the .same time (Lev. xviii. 18). Calvin, in his decision, makes no distinction between the times and the economies, a fact which Keil justly appeals to, and insists upon as bearing against his harsh judgment (that it was a case of incest) (p. 205). 1 1. In our narrative we first read of a great and splendid wedding-feast, lasting for seven days. It is therefore not by chance that this splendid wedding- feast was followed by a painful illusion. And, leav- ing out of view grosser deceptions, how often may Rachel's image have been changed afterwards into Leah's form. 12. While the sisterly emulation to surpass each other in obtaining children is tainted with sin, there is yet at the bottom a holy motive for it, faith in the Abrahamie promise consisting in the blessing of theocratic births. Thus al-^o we can explain how the fulness of the twelve tribes proceeded from this emulation. 13. Isaac's prejudice, that Esau was the chosen •ne, seems to renew itself somewhat in Jacob's prejudice that he must gain by Rachel the lawful heir. The more reverent he appears therefore, in •jeing led by the spirit of God, who taught him, not- withstanding all his preference for Joseph, to recog- nize in Judah the real line of the promise. 14. That the respective moi hers themselves here issign the names, is determined by the circumstances. The entire history of the birth of these sons, too, is reflected in their names. Of similar signification are Ihe names : Gad and Asher ; Levi and Zebuhui ; Biraeon and Naphtali ; Judah and Joseph ; Reuben and Benjamin born afterwards; Issachar, Dan and 1 )inah. 15. The progress of life equalizes and adjusts, LO a great extent, the opposition between J^icob's love for Rachel and his disregard toward Leah, espe- cially by means of the children. At the same time (in which he recognizes Leah's resignation, Rachel's passionate ill-humor incites him to anger. 16. Me shall add; he shall give to me another ton. This wish was fulfilled, and was the cause of her death. She died at Benjamin's birth, llow dangerous, destructive, and fatal, the fulBhnent of a man's wishes may be to him, is illustrated by fre- quent examples in the Scriptures. Sarah wished for a son from Hagar, a source of great grief to her. The desire of Judas to be received among the dis- ciples of Jesus was granted, but just in this position he fell into the deepest corruption. Peter wished to be as near as possible to the Lord in the house of the high priest, but hence his fall. The sons of Zebedee wished for places at the right and left hand of Jesus, — had their wish been fulhlled they wouUi have filled the places of the malefactors on the cross, \{ the right and left of the Crucified. Rachel's wish, it is true, was not the only cause of her death, but with a certain triumph the once barren one died in t'iuiJbirth, just as she was completing the num!>er twelve of Israel's sons. 1 7. How important Joseph's birth was to Jacob 1b seen from this : that henceforth he thinks of his journey home, although the report looked for from Rebekah tarried 1 ing. He was urged to venture journey home. 18. This histoiy of Jacob's and Leah's unioi sheds a softening light upon even the less happj marriages, which may reconcile us to them, for thii unpleasant marriage was the cause of his becoming the lather of a numerous posterity ; from it, indeed, proceeded the Messianic fine; leaving out of view the fact that Leah's love and humility could not remain without a blessing upon Jacob. The fundamental condition of a normal marriage is doubtless bridd love. We notice in our narrative, however, how wonderfully divine grace may change misfortune, even in such instances, into rea; good. God is esp^ cially interested in marriage connections, because hi is thus interested in the coming generations. HOMTLETICAX. AND PaACTICAi. See Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. Jacob't wrestlings of faith. — The patriarch of hope. — Jacob's double fiight, from Esau and from Laban. — Rich in fortune and rich in misfortune, in both respects rich in blessing. — Jacob and Rachel, or the consecration of bridal love.' — The shepherd and the shepherdess : the same condition. — Jacob's service for his bride a type of the same service of Christ for the church, his bride. — Rachel and Leah, or God makes a great diS'erence between his children, and yet esteems them alike according to his justice. — The three marriage connections at wells : that of Isaac, of Jacob, and of Moses, — The names of Jacob's sons, a type of human weakness and divine salvation in his house. (Texts for marriage occasions.) To Section First, veti. 1-S. Starke: Cramer ; If God's command and promise are before us, we can proceed in our undertakings vrith joy and confidence. — Places where weUs are mentioned (see Concord- ances^.^(Jesus, the well of life. The stone, the impotence of human nature, to be removed by faith. Since, according to ch. xxxi. 47, the Chaldffian.s spoke a difierent language from that of the inhabitants of Canaan, Jacob probably made himself understood to the people of Haran, because he had learned the Chaldee from his mother (Clericns). — The changing of the language of the patriarchs into the later He- brew of the Jews.) [There is every reason to believe that these dialects were then so nearly alike that there was no difficulty in passing from one to the other. — A. G.] — Because the word peace embracea both spiritual and natural well-being, the Hebrews used it as a common salutation. Section Second, vers. 9-14. Divine providence was here at work. — (Allegory of the well. How Christ has removed the heavy stone of sin and death. The three herds referred to the three days in which Christ was in the grave! etc. Burmann.) — Ver. 13. This was necessary in order to remove all suspicion from the mind of Laba:i, since he still remembered what a numerous retinue had accompanied Eliezer. — .\s three distinguished patriarchs found theii brides at wells ^Moses and his Zipporah), just so the Lord Christ presents to himself the cliurch, his spir- itual bride, through holy baptism, as the laver in tho word. — Schroder : Their first meeting a prophecy of their whole future united life. — Ver. 11 ^Calviu), In a chaste and modest Ufe greater liberties were allowed. — (If any one turn to the true source of wis dora, to the word of God, and to the Saviour revealee d31 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. therein, be will receive celestial wisdom for his bride. Berl. Bibel.) Section Third, yets. 15-25. Ver. 20. As a regular servant. A tvpical intimation of the Messiah, who in the form of a servant, with great and severe toil, obtained his bride. — (Reward of Jacob's patient waiting, of his faith and his chastity. — Ver. 18. Vir- tuous maidens do not attend large, exciting assem- blies, to get a husband, but remain at their vocation, and trust in Goa, who is able to give to them a pious, honorable, and upright husband. — Lange: If tlie whole difficult service became easy to Jacob from the love he had to Rachel, why should it not be said of God's children, that it is from love to God that we keep his commandments, etc. (1 John v. 3). — Bibl. Wirt. : A chn-tc love is a beautiful thing, by which conjugal low- is afterwards more and more Btrengthened and coiiHrmed. — Ver. 2.^. Here Jacob might have understood how it grieved Esau when, for the sake of his birthright, he hud practised upon him such cimning and deceit. As he had done unto oth- ers, God permitted that he should receive from others. — The crafty Laban wears the image of the world; whoever serves it never receives what he expects ; he looks for Rachel, and behold it is Leah (Olear). Gerlach : From this instance onward (especially) God speaks to Jacob by every occurrence. Laban deceives him, because he thinks that Laban's (Ja- cob's ?) service will be profitable to him, and thus he (Laban) lo.^es not only a great part (?) of his herds, but is also obUged lo part from his children. — The misery of bigamy : it was therefore expressly forbid- den in the law (Lev. xviii. 18) that any one should marry two sisters at the same time, or to favor one wife before the other (Deut. xxi. 17). The seven years of service reminds us perhaps of the later statute among the IsraeUtes, according to which ser- vants were to obtain their freedom during the sev- enth year (Exod. xxi. 2) ; Jacob, theretbre. as a compensation for the daughters, took upon himself a seven years' service (slavery). — (The danger of exciting Esau prevented hiui from bringing tlie price from his liome, even had he entrusted his affair to God.) — Schroder: Space is no obstacle to faith, nor time to hope. — An engagement of long standing, if decreed by God, may become a Siilutary and bene- ficial school for a Christian marriage. — Comparisons between the deception prMctised by Laban upon Jacob, and that which Jacob practisrd upon Esau : 1. One brother upon another, 2. There the younger instead of the older ; here the older, etc. a. (Roos) He did not know Leah when he was married lo her, just as his father knew him not when he blessed him. 4. Leah at the instigation of her father, Jacob at tlie instigation of his mother. — But he received, notwithstanding his ignorance as to Leah, the wife designed lor him by God, who was to become the mother cif the Mes.«iah, Just as Isaac blessed him unwittingly as the rightful heir of tlie promise. Ah, in how many errors and follies of men, here and everywhere, do we find (iod's inevitable grace and faithfulness inti-rtwined (Koos). Section J<'ourt/i, vers. 26-30. Starke : Ver. 27. It is remarkable that the ancient Jews, at births, marriages, and deaths, observed the seventh day as an holy clay (Gen. xxi. 4 ; Luke ii. 21 ; Gen. 1. lU; Hir. xxii. 13). From this fact we may conclude that Ihi' ancient llelirews already considered the day of birth and circumcision, the day of marriage, and the day of death, as the thr. e most important ones in Efe — (Ver. aS. Jacob might have asked for a & vorce.) — Jacob's polygamy not caused by sensnality but did not remain unpunished. — (BuKMAX^: Com paiison between *he two wives and the Old and New Testament, the tivo churches to whom the Lord ii betrothed. The Old Testament Leah, the wearied, the tender eyed.) — Hall: God often afflicts ui through our own friendship (relatives). He often punishes our own sins by the sins of others, before we are aware of it (2 Sam. xvi. 22).- — Osiasder : Oh, what is avarice not capable of? — Hall : God's chil- dren do not easily obtain what they wish for, but must toil hard for it ; (German) work for it, tooth and nail. — Schroder: Jacob's history, in its turning- points, meets with personages who serve to bring out his character more clearly in contrast with theirs; their thoughts bound in the present, — his looking on into the future. Thus Esau and Laban. Section Fifth, vers. S\-&5. Starke: Osiander: It is still customary with God t^ take care of the distressed. — Cr.imer: God distributes his gifts by parts. Do not despise any one. — Hall: God kiiowi how to weigh to us in similar ways both our gifts of grace and our crosses. — Bibl. Wirt. : There is nothing so bad or so compUcated but that God can bring good out of it. — (Signification of the word from which " Judah" is derived: 1. To thank; 2. to commend; 3. to praise; 4. to confess.) From this Judah al Jews received their beautiful name. — Gerlach Reuben : see a son ; in allusion to Raah-Be-Onyi, i. e., he (Jehovah) hath looked upon my affliction. — Schroder : The mother gives tlie names, as she does also in Homer. Sectio)i Sij-th, ch. xxx. 1-8. Starke: Bibl. Wirt.: Impatience is the mother of many sins. — Even to the pious in their married life the sun of peace and har- mony does not always shine ; at times dark clouds of dissension and strife arise. But we must guard in time against .such clouds and storms. — We must not try to obtain the divine blessing by unrighteona means. — .Schroder : Children are God's gift. All parents should consider this, and take such care of these divine gifts that when God calls those whom he has entrusted to them, they may render a good account (Vuler. Herb.). — In Rachel we meet with envy and jealousy, while in Jehovah there is com- passion and grace. Section Seventh, vers. 9-13. Schroder: For all times Israel is warned by the jiatriarch's culpable weakness and pliancy in relation to his wives, as well as by the frightful picture of his polygamy. (Israel, it is true, should even in this way learn to distinguish the times, to recognize the workings of divine grace iu and over the errors of men, and to rejoice at the progress in his law.) Si ction Eighth, vers. 14—21. Starke: (Do you ask as to the nature of the Dudaim ? some think they are lilies, others that they are berries, but no one knows what they are. Some call them " winter clierric's." Luther.) — The rivalry of the sisters. Thus God punished him because je had taken two wives, even two sisters. Even tlie holy women were not purely and entirely spiritual. — Sciiuuder: In reference to the maid's children, God*s name is nei- ther mentioned by Leah nor by tlie narrator. They were in the strictest sense begotten in a natural way (Hciigstenbcrg). (This is wrong, for in the first place Jacob had nothing to do with the maids in the natural way of mere hi.st ; 2. in that case they would not have been numbered among the Idessed seed of Israel. 'I'lie principal tribes, nidaed, did no/ spring from them.) CHAP. XXX. 26— XXXI. 1-3. 53," Section Ninth, vera. 22-24. Starkb : Why bar- renoess was considered by Abraham's descendants u a sij;n of the divine curse: 1. It appeared as if they were excluded from the promise of the enlarge- ment of Abraham's seed ; 2. They were without the hope of giving birth to the Messiah ; 3. They had f-0 share in God's universal command : be fruitful and multiply. — Osiander : Our prayers are not to bf considered as in vain, if we receive no answer im mediately. If we are humbled sufficiently below th« cross, then we will be exalted. — Schroder : Luthei says respecting Jacob's wives that they were nol moved by mere carnal desire, but looked at the bles* ing of children with reference to the promised seed THIRD SECTION. JaeoVa thought of returning home. New treaty mith Laban. His closely calculated propositum (Prelude to the method of acquiring possession of the Egyptian vessels). Laban's dis- pleasure, God^s command to return. Chapter XXX. 25— XXXI. 1-3. 25 And it came to pass, when Rachel had borne Joseph, that Jacob said unto Laoan, Send me away [let me go], that I may go unto mine own place, and to my country. 26 Give me my wives and ray children, for whom I have served thee, and let me go: foi 27 thou knowest my service which I liave done thee. And Laban said unto him, I pray thee, if I have foimd favour in thine eyes, tarry; for I have learned by experience' 28 that the Lord hath blessed me for thy sake. And he said, [farther], Appoint me thy 29 wages, and I will give it. And [But] he said unto him, Thou knowest how I have 'iO served thee, and how thy cattle was with me [what thy herds have become under me]. For it wax little which thou hadst before I came, and it is noiv increased unto a multitude; and the Lord hath blessed thee, since my coming' [after me] : and now when sliall I provide 31 for mine own house also? And he said. What shall I give thee? And Jacob said, Thou shalt not give me anything [anything peculiar]. If thou wilt do this thing for me, I 32 will again feed and keep thy flock [small cattle] : I will pass through all thy flock to-day, removing from thence all the speckled and spotted [dappled] cattle [lambs], and all the brown [dark-colored] cattle among the sheep, and the spotted and speckled among the 33 goats: and of such shall be my hire. So shall my righteousness [rectitude] answer for me in time to come,' when it shall come for my hire ; before thy face : every one that • is not speckled and spotted among the goats, and brown among the sheep, that shall be 34 counted stolen with me. And Laban said, Behold, I would it might be according to 35 thy word. And he removed that day the he-goats that were ringstreaked [striped] and spotted, and all the she-goats that were speckled and spotted, and every one that had some white in it, and all the brown among the sheep, and gave them into the hands 36 of his sons. And he set three days' journey betwixt himself [the shepherds and flocks of Laban] and Jacob [the flocks ofjacob under his sons] : and Jacob fed the rest [the sifted] of Laban'a flocks. 37 And Jacob took him rods of green poplar, [gum] and of the hazel [almond] and chest- nut-tree [maple] * ; and pilled white streaks in them, and made the wliite appear which 38 was in the rods. And he laid the rods which he had [striped] pilled before the flocks in the gutters in the watering-troughs' when the flocks came [to which the flocks must come] 39 to drink, that they should conceive when they came to drink. And the flocKs con- ceived before the rods, and brought forth [threw, oast] ringstreaked, speckled and spotted. 10 And Jacob did separate the lambs, and set the faces of the flocks toward the ring- straked, and all the brown in the flock of Laban ; and he put his own flocks by them- 41 selves, and. put them not unto Laban's cattle. And it came to pass, whensoever the stronger cattle did conceive, that Jacob laid the rods before the eves of the cattle in th« 42 gutter.s, that they might conceive among the rods. But when the cattle were feeble, 43 he put ihem not in: so the feebler were Laban's. and the stronsrer Jacob's. And the 630 GENESIS, OK TUE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. man increased exceedingly, and had much [small] cattle, and maid-servants, and met) servants, and camels and asses. Cu. XXXI. 1 And he heard the words of Laban's sons, saying, Jacob hath taken away all that was our father's ; and of that which ivas our father's hath he gotten all 2 this glory [riches]." And Jacob beheld the countenance of Laban, and, behold, it wa> 3 not toward him as before ' [formerly]. And [Then] the Lord said imto Jacob, Return unto the land of thy fathers, and to thy kindred [thy home] ; and I will be with thee. [' Ver. 27.--Lit., I have augured, "^nuins ; Sept., oluvi^otian ; not that Lahan was a serpent-woishipper, but that b< ased di\ination as the heathen ; and thus drew his inferences and auguries.— A. G.J l' Ver. 311. -Lit., at my foot.— A. GJ [3 Ver. 33. — Lit., in day tO'Viorrow — the future— at all times, when, etc. Lange renders " when thou shalt come npo M to my wages ; i. e., to examine. — A. G.] [< Ver. 37.— Heb., ^liaiS . plane-ti-ee ; so Sept.. Vulg. and Syriac.— A.G.] I' nsaW, an unusual archaic form foi nj'i"'?^. Keil.— A. G.] (• Oh. XXXI. Ver. 2.— Lit., weight.— A. G.J ]} Ver. 2.— Lit., as yesterday, the day before.— A. G.) GENERAL PRELIMIKARy REMARKS. 1. The term iibjS , ver. 27 (conip. ch. xii. 13), shows that this section, according to Knobel, is Je- hoyistic. 2. In consequence of Laban's deception, Jacob must serve fourteen years for his Rachel. According to ch. xxxi. 41 he served him six years longer, agreeably to the terms of the contract that he had just now concluded with him. 3. The doubtful way in which he now secured his reward leads us to conjecture that he was conscious that he had been defrauded by Laban, and that he was deahiig with a selfish man, whose selfishness and power, he tliought. could only be countervailed by cunning. Nor is it to be denied that wisdom's weapon Is given to the feeble to protect himself against the harsh and cruel power of the strong. Our narrative comes under the same category with the surreptitious obtaining of the blessing of the first-born by Jacob, and the acquisition of the gold and silver vessels of the Egyptians by the Israelites. The ]irudence manifested in these cases is the same ; but still tliere was a real deception in the first case (one deception, however, against another); in the present case it was simply an overreaching, while in the third they were only availing themselves of the situation of the Egyptians, i. e., their disposition. In all three cases, however, the artlul, or at least wisely-calculated, project, was provoked l>y a great and gross wrong. Esau proposes to take hack the birthright which he had sold to Jacob, Laban caused him to perform a service of foui teen years, and intends to make him still further a jtri-y to his avarice. The Egyptians have indeed consumed the very strengtli of Israel by their bondage. And if the scale here tiu'ns against Jacob because he thus cunningly overreached his father-in-law, it is bal- anced by Laban's pressing him again into his ser- vice, that he might misuse him anew ; nor is the marvellous chariu to be lel't out of view, which lay in bis ancient, nomadic science and art. Superior Biirjds were never inclined to let their arts and sciences ie donnant. EXEOETICAL AND ORITICAI,. 1. Vers. 25-34. The tirm ontnirl. — When Ra- ohel. — At Joseph's birth [which theref'orc could not hive occurred until the lifteenth year ol his residence with Laban. — A. G.] a strong feeling comes ovei Jacob, which leads him to believe that he is to re turn iiome without having received a call from thence or a divine command here. It is apparent from what follows that he first of all wished to be- come independent of Laban, in order to provide for his own. He is, therefore, soon hampered again, since a fair prospect opened to hiiii now and here. Laban's character now comes into view in every utterance. — May I still grace, etc., lit.. If I have found favor, etc. If this expression may be called an aposiopesis, we must still bear in mind that this was a standing form of expression even in the oath. Keil supplies " slay yet." The optative form already expresses all that is possible. If Tens is, accord- ing to Delitzsch, a lieathen expression, then the phraseology in Laban's mouth appears more striking still, through the eoimection of this expression with Jehovah's name. — Appoint me. — He not only recognizes, almost fawningly, Jacob's worth to his house, but is even willing to yield unconditionally to his determination — a proof that he did not expec' of Jacob too great a demand. But Jacob is not ii clined to trust himself to his generosity, and hence his cunningly calculated though seemingly trifling demanil, Laban's consent to his demand, however, breathes in the very expression the joy of selfishness ; and it is scarcely sufficient to translate : Behold, I would it might be according to thy word. But Jacob's proposition seems to point to a very trifling reward, since the sheep in the East are nearly all white, while the goats are generally ot a dark color or speckled. For he only demands of Laban's herds those sheep that have dark spots or specks, or that are entirely black, ami those only of the goats that were white-spotted or striped. But he does not only ilemand the speckled laini)s brought forth hi'realtcr, after the |)rescnt immber of such are set aside for Laban (Tueh, Jianmg., Kurtz), but tiie piesent iu- speetion is to lorni the first stock of his herds (Kno- bel, Dehtzseh). [The words, "thou shalt not give me anytliing," seem to indicate that Jacob had no stock from Laban to begin with, and did not intend to be de|iendent upnn him for any part of his po.^ses- sions. Tho-se of this de.-criplion which should ap- pear amiiiig the (locks should i>c his hire, lie would depend upon the divine providence and his own skill lie would be no moie indebted to Laban tJian .\l)ra ham to the king of Sodom. — A, (i.J Altcrwards, also, the speckled ones brought forth among Laban't CHAP. XXX. 25— XXXI. I-s. 53". lleM'j! are to be added to his, as is evident from his following arts. Michaelis and Bohlen miss the pur- port, but it lies in verse 33. For when he invites Latiunto muster his herds iu time tocotre, lira CT':, it surely does not mean literally the next day, as Delitzsch supposes, but iu time to come (see Gesenius, ims). As often as Laban came to Jacob's herds in the future he must regard all the increase in speckled «nd ringstreaked lambs as .Jacob's property, but if he found a purely white sheep or an entirely black goat, then, and only then, he might regard it as stolen. (As to the sheep and goats of the East, see Bible Dictionaries, the Natural History of the Bible, and Knobkl, p. 246.) Moreover, this tr.msaction is not conducted wholly " in the conventional forms of oriental politeness, as in ch. xxiii., between Abra- ham and the Hittites " (Del.). Laban's language is submissive, while that of Jacob is very frank and bold, as became liis invigorated courage and the sense of the injustice which he had suffered. 2. Vers. 35, 3ii. The separation of the herdx. — And he removed It surely is not correct, as RosenmiiUer, Maurer, Del. and Keil suppose, that Laban is here referred to ; that Laban, " to be more certain." had removed the speckled ones himself and put them under the care of his own sons. In this view everything becomes confused, and Bohlen justly remarks : " The reference here is to Jacob, because he intended to separate the animals (ver. 32), as cer- tainly it was proper for the head servant to do, and be- cause there is no mention of Laban's sons until ch. xxxi. 1, while Jacob's older children were certainly able to t.ikecare of the sheep." Reuben, at the clo.'ie of this new term of six years, had probably reached his thirteenth year, Simeon his eleventh. But even if they had not reacheii tliese years, the expression he gave them, T'33'T'a, could mean: he formed a new family state, or herds, as a possession of his sons, although they were assisted in the man.^gement by the mothers, maids, and servants, since he himself had anew become Laban's servant. Hence it is also possible (ver. 36) for him to make a distinction between himself as La- ban's servant, and Jacob as an independent owner, now represented by his sons. It is altogether improbable that Jacob would entrust his herds to Laban's sons. But it is entirely incomprehensible that Jacob, with 'his herds, could have taken flight nithout Laban's knowledge, and gained three days the start, unless his herds were under the care of his own sons. [This ia of course well put and unanswerable on tlie suppo- sition that the sheep and goats which were removed from the flocks were Jacob's stock to begin with, but it has no force if we regard these .as Laban's, and put therefore under the care of his own sons, while Jacob was left to manage the flocks from which the separated were taken. — A. G.] — Three days' journey betwixt Lit., "a space of three days between." Certainly days' journeys here are those of the herils and are not to be estimated ac- cording to the journeys of men. Again, Jacob is ahead of Laban three days, and yet Laban can over- take him We may conceive, therefore, of a dis- tance of about twelve hours, or perhaps eighteen miles. By means of this sejiaration Jacob not only gained Laban's confidence but also his property. 3. Vers. 37—13. Jacobus nianagenunt of Laban^s \erih. — Took him rods. — De Wettk : Storax, al- mond-tree, maple. BtrssE.s : " Gum-tree. The Alex- andrians here translate, styrax-tree, but Hos. iv. 13 poplars. If we look at the Arabic, in which our Hebrew word has been preserved, the explanation of styrax-tree is to be preferred. It is similar to thi quince, grows in Syria, Arabia, and Asia Minor, reaches the height of about twelve feet, and tur- nishes, if incisions are made in the bark, a sweet, fragrant-smelling, md transparent gum, of a light- red color, called styrax. Almond-tree. This signifi. cation is uncertain, since the hazelnut-tree may a!?c be referred to. Plane-tree. A splendid tree, fre- quent even in South Europe, having large boughs, extending to a great distance (hence the Greek name, Platane), and bearing some resemlilaiice to the maple tree." Jacob of course must select rods from such trees, whose dark external bark produced the great- est contrast with the white one below it. In this respect gum-tree might be better adapted than white poplars, almond-tree or walnut better than hazel- nut, and maple better than plane-tree. Keil : Storax, walnut, and maple trees, which all have below their bark a white, dazzhiig wood. Thus he procured rods of different kinds and pilled white streaks in them. — And he set the rods. — Knobel thinks, he placed tnt staffs on the watering-troughs, but did not put them ii the gutters. But this does not agree with the choice of the verb, nor the fact itself: the animals, by looking into the water for some time, were to receive, as it were, into themselves, the appearance of the rods lying near. They, in a technical sense, "were frightened" at them. The wells were surrounded with water- ing-troughs, used for the watering of the cattle. — And they conceived. — For the change of the forms here, see Keil, p. 2li). — And brought forth cattle. — " This crafty trick was based upon the common experience of tlie so-called fright of ani- mals, especially of sheep, namely, that the represen- tations of the senses during coition are stamped upon the form of the fcetus (see Boon., Hieroz., i. 618, and Frieoreich upon the Bible, i. 37, etc.)." Keil. For details see Knobel, p. 247, and Delitzsch, p. 472. — And set the faces of the flock. — Jacob's second artifice. The speckled animals, it is true, were removed, from time to time, from Laban's herds, and added to Jacob's flock, but in the meantime Jacob put the speckled animals in front of the others, so that Laban's herds had always these spotted or variegated animals before them, and in this manner another impression was produced upon the she-goats and sheep. Bohlen opposes this second aitifice, against RosenmiiUer, Maurer, and others. The clause in question should be : he sent them to the speckled ones that already belonged to him ('3S in the sepse of veritus). But the general term TSSn is against this. The separation of the new-born lambs and goats from the old herds could only be gradual. — The stronger cattle. — The third artifice. He so arranged the thing that the stronger cattle fell tc him, the feebler to Laban. His first artifice, there- fore, produced fully the desired effect. It was owing partly, perhaps, to his sense of equity toward Laban, and partly to his prudence, that he set these limita to his gain ; but he still, however, takes the advan- tage, since he seeks to gain the stronger cattle for himself. Bohlen : " Literally, t/ie bound ones, firmly set, i. e., the strong, just as the covered ones, i. e., tha feeble, languid, faint ; for the transi ' ion is easy from the idea of binding, firmness, to that of strength, and from that of covering, to languishing, or faint, ness. Some of the old translators refer them to ver ual and autumnal lambs (comp. Plin. 8, 47, Cold mella, De re rust., 8, 3), because the sheep in Pale* hSH GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. tine and similar climates bear twice in a year ( Aris- roT., Mist. Aiiim., 6, 18, 19; 'Problems,' 10, 46; BoCHART, Htei'oz., i. p. 512), and because those con- leivetl in the Spring or Summer and born in the Autumn are stroufrer than those conceived in Au- tumn and born in Spring. But the text does not draw this precise distinction." The Septuagint only distinguishes between iiriuriua and fitrTjuo. Luther renders '• late" and " early born." — And the man increased. — With the rich incre^ise in cattle, care was taken at the same time to secure an increase in men-servants and maid-servants, as well as camels and asses. Knobel finds a contradiction in the fact that this rich increase is here ascribed to .Jacob's artifice, whilst it is attributed to the divine blessing in ch. xxxi. 9. But so much only is evident, tliat Jacob dill not act against his conscience, but thought that he might anticipate and assist by human means the fulfilment of those visions in which the rewards of this kind were promised to him. — And he heard. The complete success that Jacob met with excited the envy and jealousy of Laban's sons, whose exist- ence is indicated first in the plural (ch. xxix. 27), but whose definite appearance here shows that the selfish disposition peculiar to this family was more fully developed in them than in Laban himself. — The words of Laban's sons. — According to De- liizsch, they were ((uile small, not yet foui-teen years of age — an assertion, however, which has no suffi- cient ground. 4. Ch. xxxi. 1-3. Jacobus reftolution to return home. — All that was our father's. — They evident- ly exaggerate in their hatred, and even accuse him of dishonesty by the use of the expression : of that which was our farhe/s. But Labaii shares in the threatening disposition ; his countenance had changed remarkably toward Jacob, a fact all the more striking, since he had formerly been extraordinarily friendly. Trouble and dangers similar to those at home now develop themselves here ; then comes, at the critical jimcture, Jehovah's command : Return. DOCTRINAL AUD ETHICAL. 1. Jacob's resolution to return home at his own risk, is to be explained from his excessive joy at Joseph's birth, and from his longing for home and for deliverance from the oppression of Laban. More- over, he seems to have considered Rachel's son as the principal Messianic heir, and therefore must hasten to conduct him to the promised land, even at the peril of his life. Besides, he now feels that he must jirovhie for his own house, and with Laban's Belfishnesa there is very Utile prospect of his attain- ing this in Laban's housft. These two circumstances show clearly why he allows himself to be retained by Laban (for he has no assurance of faith that he is now to return i, and in the second place, the maimer and means by which he turns the contract to his own advantage. 2. We here learn that Iisban's prosperity was not very great before Jacob's arrival. The blessing first returns to the house with Jacob's entrance. But this blessing sei-med to become to Laban no lilessing of faith. His conduct toward the son of his sister •ind his son-in-law, becomes more and mote base. He seizes eagerly, therefore, the terms oflurcil to him by Jacob, because they appear to hiin most favor- «ble, since the sheep in the Kast are generally white, ■vhile the goats are black. His intention, therefore, is to defraud Jacob, while he is actually overreachec by him. Besides, this avails only of the mere form as to the thing itself, Jacob really had claims to a fair compensation. 3. Just as Jacob's conduct at the surreptitious obtaining the birthright was preceded by Isaac's intended cunning, and the injustice of Esau, so also, in many respects, here Laban's injustice and artifice precedes Jacob's project (ch. xxxi.). In this light Jacob's conduct is to be judged. Hence he after, wards views his real gain as a divine blessing, al- though he had to atone again for his selfishness and cunning, in the form of the gain, at least, by fears and danger. Moreover, we must still bring into view, as to Jacob's and Laban's bargain, the follow- ing points: 1. Jacob asks for his wages very mod cslly and frankly ; he asks for his wives and children, as the fruit of Ids wives, and for his discharge. While Laban wishes to keep him for his own advan tage. 2. Jacob speaks frankly, Laban flatters and fawns. 3. Jacob might now expect a paternal treat- ment and dowry on the part of Laban. Laban, on the contrary, prolongs his servile relation, and asks him to determine his reward, because he expected from Jacob's modesty the announcement of very small wages. 4. In the proposition made by Jacob, he thought he had caught him. 4. The establishment of his own household, after being married fourteen years, shows that Jacob, in this respect, as well as in the conclusion of his mar- riage, awaited his time. 5. The so-called impressions of she goats and sheep, a very old observation, which the cooperation of subtle impressions, images, and even imaginations at the formation of the foetus, and, indeed, the foetus itself among animals confirms. — The attaiimieni of varieties and new species among animals and plants is very ancient, and stands closely connected with civihzation and the kingdom of God. 6. Jacob's sagacity, his weapou against the strong. But as he stands over against God, he employed dif- ferent means, especially prayer. 7. The want of candor in Laban's household, corresponds with the selfishness of the household. 8. In the following chapter we find still further details respecting Jacob's baigain. In the first place, the selfish Laban broke, in diilerent ways, the firm bargain made with Jacob, in order to change it to his advantage (ch. xxxi. 7). Secondly, Jacob's mor- bid sense of justice had been so excited that he re- ceived explanation of the state of things in his herds even in his night-visions. HOMILETIOAI, AND PRACTICAL. See the Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. The jircsent section is, for the most part, fitted for re- ligious, Ijiographical, and psychological contempla- tions. It is to be treated carefully both with respect to .Jacob's censure as well as his praise. — Jacob's resolutions to return home: I. The first: why so vividly foimed, but not accomplished ; 2. the second: the cau.se of his assur.ance (the divine c(jniniand). Moreover, perils e(|ual to those threatening at home, weie now surrouniling him. — His hinging for home during hi.s service abroad. — The hardships of a se vere .scrvituile in Jacob's life, as well as in the historj of his descendants: when blessed V — Laban's selfish- ness ami Jacob's sense of right at war with eacl other. — Prudence as a weapon in lile's batttle: t CHAP. XXSI. 4— XXXIL 2. 53! The authority to use this weapon when opposed to a harsh superiority or subtlety ; 2. tlie mighty effi- cacy of this weapon ; 3. the danger of this \vea[)on. — Jacob's prudence in its riglit and wrong aspects in our liistory : 1. The right hes in his just claims; ■2. the wrong, in his want of candor, liis dissimula- tion and his self-help. — His natural science, or knowl- edge of nature, combined witli prudence, a great power in life. — The ditiicullies in the establishment of an household: 1. Their general causes; 2. how they are to be overcome. — Jacob's prosperity abroad. — Jacob struggling with difficulties .ill his lite loug. Section First, vers. 25-M. Starke: (As to the different meanings of fns, ver. 27. Some com- mentators hold that Laban had superstitiously con- sulted his teraphim, or idols.) — Bihl. I17)-(. ; It is customary with covetous people to deal selfislily with their neighbors. — Ver. 30. By means of my loot. LcTHKR : i. e., I had to hunt and run through tldck and thin in order that you might be rich. — Ver. 34. If Laban had been honest, he could have represented to Jacob, tliat he would be a great loser by this bargain. God even blesses impious masters on account of their pious servants (1 Tim. v. S). — Calweb Handbuch : Jacob 91 years tdd. — Thus Laban's covetnusness and avarice is punished by tlie very bargain which he purposed to make for his own advantage. — We are not to apply the criterion of Christianity to Jacob's conduct. — Schroder : Acts and course of life among strangers. As to Laban. Courtesy to- gether with religion are made serviceable to the at- tainment of his ends. — Thus, also, in the future, there is only a more definite agreement of master and servant between Jacob and his fatherin-Iaw. — (The period of pregnancy with sheep lasts fiv« months ; they may thereforf lamb twice during the year. Herds were the liveliest and strongest in au- tumn, after having enjoyed the good pasture during the summer, etc. On the contrary, herds are feeblt after having just passed the winter.) said unto thee. do. 17, 18 Then Jacob ro.se up, and set his sons and wives upon camels; And he carriec away all his cattle, and all his goods [his mnvabie property, gain] which lie had gotten, thf cattle of his getting, which he had gotten in Padan-aram ; for to go to Isaac his fathe. 19 in the land of Canaan. And Laban went to shear his [to the feast of sheep-shearing] sheep. 20 and Rachel had stolen the images' [Teraphim, household gods] that were her father's. And Jacob stole away unwares [the heart of] to Laban tlie Syrian, in that he told him not 21 that he tied. So he fled witli all that he had; and he rose up, and passed over the 22 river [Euphrates], and set his face [journey] toward the mount Gilead. And it was told 23 Laban on the third da}', that Jacob was tied. And [Then] he took his brethren with him, and pursued after him seven days' journey : and they overtook him in the mount 24 Gilead. And God came to Laban the Syrian in a dream by night, and said unto him. Take heed that thou speak not to Jacob either good or bad. 25 Then Laban overtook Jacob. Now Jacob had pitched his tent in the mount r and 26 Laban with his brethren [tented] pitched in the mount of Gilead. And Laban said to Jacob, What hast thou done, that thou liast stolen away unwares to me, and carried 27 away my daughters, as captives taken with the sword [the spoils of war] ? Wherefore didst thou flee away secretly, and steal away from me, and didst not tell me, that I might have sent thee away [given thee a convoy] with mirth, and with songs, with tabret, 28 and with harp ? And hast not suffered me to kiss my sons [grandsons], and my daughters? 29 thou hast now done foolishly in so doing. It is in the power of my hand* to do vou hurt : but the God of j'our father spake unto me yesternight, saving. Take thou heed 30 that thou speak not to Jacob cither good or bad. And now, though thou wouldest needs be gone, because thou sore longedst after thy father's house ; yet wherefore hast 31 thou stolen my gods? And Jacob answered and sj,id to Laban, Because I was afraid: for I said [said to myself ], Perad venture thou wouldest take b}' force thy daughters from 32 me. With whomsoever thou findest thy gods, let him not live : before our brethren discern thou what u thine with me, and take it to thee : for Jacob knew not that 33 Rachel had stolen them. And Laban went into Jacob's tent, and into Leah's tent, anu into the two maid-servants' tents; but he found them not. Then went he out of Leah's 34 tent, and entered into Rachel's tent. Now Rachel had taken the images [household gods], and put them in the camel's furniture, and sat upon them. And Laban searched all 35 the tent, but found them not. And she said to her father, Let it not displease my lord that I cannot rise up before thee; for the custom of women [female period] is upon me. And he searched [au], but found not, the images. 36 And Jacob was wroth, and chode with Laban : and Jacob answered, and said to La- ban, What is my trespass? what I's my sin, that thou hast so hotly pursued [bumed] after 37 me? Whereas thou hast searched all my stuff, wliat hast thou found of all thy household- stuff? set it here before my brethren, and thy brethren, that they may judge betwixt 38 us 'ooth. This twentv years have I been with thee ; thy ewes and tliv she-goats have 39 not cast their young, and the rams of thy flock have I not eaten. That which waa torn of beasts, I brought not unto thee; 1 bare the loss of it [must make satisfaction for it] ; 40 of my hand didst thou require it, whether stolen by day, or stolen by night. Thus I was; in the da}' the drought consumed nte, and the frost by night; and my sleep 41 departed from mine eyes. Thus have I been twenty years in thy house: I served thee fourteen years for thy two datighter.s, and six years for thy cattle: and thou hast 42 changed my wages ten times. Except the God of my father, the God of Abraham, and the fear of Isaac had been with me, surely thou hadst sent me away now empty. God hath seen mine t ffliction, and the labor [wearisome labor] of my hands, and rebuked [Tiigcd] thee yesternight. 13 And Laban answered, and said unto Jacob, These daughters are my daughters, and these ciiildren are my children, and these cattle are my cattle [licrds], and all that t.iou seest is mine ; and what can I do this day unto these my daughters, or unto theii 44 children which they have borne? Now therefore come thou, let us luake a covenan) 45 fa cnvpnant of peace I, I and thou ; and let it be for a witness betwet i me and thee. Ant' CHAP. XXXI 4— XXXII. 2. 541 46 Jacob took a stone, and set it np for a pillar. And Jacob faid unto his bretliren. Gather stones; and they took stones, and made an heap: and thej' did eat tl ere upon 47 the heap. And Laban called it Jegar-sahadutha [syriao: heap of witness] : but Jacob called 48 it Galeed [the same in Hebrew] : And Laban said, This lieap is a witness between me and 49 thee this day. Therefore was the name of it called Galeed: And Mizpah [watch-tower]; for he said, The Lord watch between me and thee, when we are absent cue frotu 50 another. If thou shalt afflict my daughters, or if thou shalt take other wives besides 51 my daughters, no man is with us; see, God, is witness betwixt me and thee. And Laban said to Jacob. Behold this heap [stone heap], and behold this pillar, wliich I hav# 52 cast [erected] betwixt me and thee ; This heap he witness, and this pillar he witness, that 1 will not pass over this heap to thee, and that thou shalt not pass over this heap and thi? 53 pillar unto me, for harm. The God of Abraham, and the God of Nahor, the God ol their father, judge [plural] betwixt us. And [But] Jacob sware by the fear of his father 54 Isaac. Then Jacob offered sacrifice upon the mount, and called his brethren to eat 55 bread : and they did eat bread, and tarried all night in the mount. And early in the morning Laban rose up, and kissed his sons and his daughters, and blessed them : and Laban departed, and returned unto his place. Ch. XXXn. \. And Jacob went on his way, and the angels of God met him. And 2 when Jacob saw them, lie said, This is God's host : and he called the name of that place Mahanaim [two camps: double camp]. [I Ch. xxxi ver. 6.— The full form of the pronoun, see Green's Grammar, 71, (2.)— A. G.) [» Ver. 7.— brn , Hiphil from bbn ; see Green's Grammar, 142, (3.)— A. G.] [3 Ver. 10.— Heb., Beriiddim, spotted with hail. Our word, grizzled, is from the French, grSle, ftaiY, andthns a literal translation of the Hebrew. — A. G.] [* Ver. 15. — The Hebrew form, the absolute infinitive after the finite verb, denotes continuance of the action. — Ha has constantly devoured, — A. G.] [^ Ver. 19. — O^S^n . The word occurs fifteen times in the Old Testament ; three times in this chapter, and nowherf else in the Pentateuch. It is always in the plural. It means, perhaps, to live well, or to nourish. In two passapjes (Jndg, xvii. and xviii., and Hosea iii. 4), they are six times aspociated with the ephod. The use of them in the worship of God is denounced as idolatry CI Sam. xv. 23), and hence they are classed with the idols put away by Josiah, 2 Kings xxiii Murphy. — A. G.l [« Ver. 29.— Heb., There is to God my hand.— A. G.] GENERAL PRELIinNARY REMARKS. I. Delitzsch regards the present section as thrnughout Elohistic ; but according to Knobel, Je- hovistic portions are inwrought into it, and hence the narrative is here and there brolsen and discon- nected. • 2. The present journey of Jacob is evidently in contrast with his previous journey to Mesopotamia ; Mahanaim and Peniel form the contrast with Bethel. 3. We malie the foltowing division : 1. .lacoli's ■ionference with his wives, vers. 4-16 ; 2. the flight, vera. 17-21 ; 3. Laban's pursuit, vers. 22-25 ; 4. Laban's i-eproof, vers. 26-30 ; 5. Laban's search in the tents of Jacob, ver. 31-35; 6. Jacob's reproof, vers. 36-42 ; 7. the covenant of peace between the two, vers. 43, 53 ; 8. the covenant meal and the de- parture, ver. 54-ch. xxxii. 2. EXEOETICAI, AND CRITICAL. 1. Vers. 4-16. Jacobus conference with his m-es. — Unto his flock. — Under some prete.'st Jacob had left the fJocliS of Laban, although it was then the feast of sheep-shearing, and gone to his own floclis (a three days' journey, and probably in a di- rection favoring his flight). Hither, to the field, he calls his wives, and Rachel, as the favorite, is called first. — Changed my wages ten times. — The expression ten times is used for frequently, in Xuinb. uv. 22 and in other passages. [Keil holds that the ten, as the number of completeness, here denotes as of ten as he could, or as he had opportunity. It is proba- bly the definite for an indefinite. — A. G.] — If he said thus. The ring-streaked As Laban deceived Ja- cob in the matter of Rachel, so now in the arrange ment for the last six years, he had in various ways dealt selfishly and unjustly, partly in dividing equally the spotted lambs, according to his own term*, and partly in always assigning to Jacob that particular kind of spotted lambs which bad previously been the least fruitful. — And the Angel of God. — Jacob here evidently Joins togeth- er a circle of nicrht-visions, which he traces up to the Aneel of the Lord, as the angel of Elohim, and which run through the whole six years to their close. If Laban imposed a new and unfavorable condition, he saw in a dream that now the flocks should bring forth lambs of that particular color agreed upon, now ring-streaked, now speckled, and now spotted. But the vision was given to comfort him, and indeed, under the image of the variegated rams which served the flocks. This angel of Elohim declares himself lube identical with the God of Bethel, i. «.. with Je- hocth. who reveals himself at Bethel as exalted abovt the anaels. It is thus his covenant God who baa guarded his rights against the injustice of Lab&n, and ]irepares this wonderful blessing for him ; a fact which does not militate against his use of skill and craft, but places those in a modified and milder light. The conclusion of these visions is. that Jacob must return. [The difference between this narrative nml that given in ch. xxx., is a differeice having 't* 642 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. grtund and explanation in tlie facts of the case. For obvious reasons Jacob cliose here to pass over his own strategy and craft in silence, and brings out into prominence the divine providence and aid to which his prosperity was due. That Jacob resorted to the means he did, is not inconsistent with the ob- ject!'e r5ality of the dream-vision, but ratlier con- firms i'. If he regarded the vision as prophetic of the issue, as he must have done, the means which he osed, the arts and cunning, are characteristic of the man, who was not yet weaned from confidence in himself, was not entirely the man of fniih. If we regard this vision as occurring at the beginning of the six years' service, it is entirely natural that Jacob should now connect it so closely with the voice of ^sistanee against his unjust sufferings in Mesopotamit, so now he enjoys a revelation of the protection Mnich God had prepared for him upon Mount Gilead, through his angels (comp 2. Kings vi. 17). In this jcns" he well calls the angels, "God's host," and the place in which they met him, doubU catnp. By the side of the visible camp, which hC; with Laban and his I'etainers, had made, (!od hat prepared another, invisible camp, for his protection. It served also to encourage him, in a general way for the approaching meeting with Esau. — Maha- naim. — Later a city on the north of Jabbok [ive V Radmek's "Palestine," p. 253; Robinson: "Re searches," vol. iii. 2 app. 166), probably the one noil called Mahneh, [For the more distinct reference of this vision to the meeting with Esau, see Kcrtz Ge.ichirhte, p. 254, who draws an instructive and beautiful parallel between this vision and that at Bethel.— A. G.] DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL. 1. Jacob a fugitive even in his journey homa But the God of Bethel protects him now as the God of Mahanaim ; and the angels who, as heavenly mes- sengers, moved up and down the ladder at Bethel, now appear, as became the situation, a warlike host, or the army of God. Keil holds that he saw th« angels in a waking state, " not inwardly, but with- out and above himself; but whether with the eye of the body or of the spirit (2 Kings vi, 17) cannot be decided." At all events, in the first place he saw an objective revelation of God, with which was con- nected, in the second place, the vision-power [i. e., eine visionare stimmwng, a power or disposition cor- responding to the vision and enabling him to perceive it.— A. G.]. 2. The want of candor between Laban and Ja cob at Haran leads finally to the violent and passion ate outbreak on Mount Gilead. But such outbreak, have ever been the punishment for the want of frankness and candor. The fearful public terrors of war, correspond to the secrecies and blandish- ments of diplomacy. — The blessing of a genuine and thorough frankness. Moral storms, their dan- ger, and their salutary results. 3. The visions in which Jacob saw how God se- cured his rights against Laban's injustice, prove that from his own point of view he saw nothing wrong in the transaction with the parii-colored rods. But thos ! rods are thus seen to be merely a subordinate means. There is no sufficient ground for the conjec- ture of Keil, that it may be suspected that the dream-vision of Jacob (of the spotted rams) was a mere natural dream (see p. 212). It is evident that the vision-disposition jiervades the night-life of Ja cob, growing out of his oppressed condition and hiu unjust sufferings. — Sc'iiRi>DER: "But Jacob's crafty course (eh. xxx. 37) is not therefore commended by (!od, as Luther and Calvin have taught. Jacob was still striving to bring about the fulfilment ol' the di- vine pronii.se by his own efforts." 4 The alienation of the daughters of Laban from their father is not commendable, but is expl.iined bj his severity. On the other hand, ihey are bound t(< their husliand in a close and lovely union. For tba tlieft ol' the teraphim, see the Exegetical notes. 5. It is not a chance that we meet here in tlj idols of Laban the earliest traces of idolatry in the Old World, although the / had doubtless existed else- where much earlier and in a gro.sser form. We cas thus sec h(j\v Polytlicism gradually developed itself out of tlie symbolic image-wor.sliip of Monotheism (Rom. i. 23). Moreover, the teraphim fire estiniatii, entirely from a theocratic point of view Tlici CHAP. XXXI. 4— XXXII. 2, 51! cou-d te stoleu as other household furniture (have «ye8 bi t sec uot). They could be hiddeu under a camel's saddle. They are a contemptible nonentity, which can render no assistance— Ver. 23. The zeal for god.i and idols is always fanatical. 6. The speech of Laban, and Jacob's answer, give us a repre-ientation of the original art of spealiing among men, just as the speech of Eliezer did. They form at the same time an aniitliesis bet«een a pas- sionate and exaggerated rhetoric and pliraseology on tile one hand, aud an earnest, grave, reUgious, and moral oratory on the other hand, exemplified in his- tory in the antithesis of the heathen (not strictly classic) to the theocratic and religious oratory. The contri.it between tne speeches of Tertullus and Paul Acts xiiv. 2) is noticeable here. Laban's eloquence agrees with his sanguine temperament. It is pas- sionate, exaggerated in its terms, untrue in its exag- geration, and yet not without a germ of true and affectionate sentiment. Analysis of diffuse and wordy sjieeches a difficult but necessary task of the Christian spirit. 7. Prov. XX. 22, Rom. xii. 17, come to us in the place of the example of Jacob ; still we are not jus- tified in judging the conduct of Jacob by those ut- terances of a more developed economy (as Kcil does). [This is true in a qualified sense only. The light whiclr men have is of course an important element in our judgment of the character of their acts. But Jacob had, or might have had, light sufficient to know that his conduct was wrong. He nught have knoivu certainly that it wiis his duty, as the heir of faith, to commit his cause unto the Lord. — A. G.] 8. The establishment of peace between Laban and Jacob has evidently, on the part of Laban, the significance and force, that he breaks off the theo- cratic communion between the descendants of Nahor and Abraham, just as the line of Haran, earlier, was separated in Lot. 9. At all events, the covenant-meal forms a thor- ough and final conciliation. Laban's reverence for the God of his fathers, and his love for his daughters and grandsons, present him once more in the most favorable aspect of his character, and thus we take our leave of him. We must notice, however, that before the entrance of Jacob he had made Uttle pfogress in his business. Close, narrow-hearted views, are as really the cause of the curse, as its fruits. 10. The elevated state and feeling of Jacob, after this departure of Laban, reveals itself in the vision of the hosts of God. Heaven is not merely coti- nected with the saint on the e;irth (through the lad- de. , , its hosts are warlike hosts, wlio invisibly guard the saints aud defend them, even while upon the earth. Here is the very germ and source of the designation of God as the God of hosts (Zebaoth). 11. There are still, as it appears to us, two strik- mg relations btitween this narrative and that which follows. Jacob here (ver. 32) pronounces judgment of death upon any one of his family who had stoleu the images. But now his own Rachel, over whom he had unconsciously pronounced this sentence, dies soon after tlie images were buried in the earth (see XXXV. -1, 18). But when we read afterwards, that Joseph, the wise son of the wise Rachel, describes his cup as his oracle (although only as a pretext), the tonjecture is easy, tliat the mother also valued the images as a means of securing her desires and long- ings. She even ascribes marvellous powers to the nandrakes. 35 12. The Moimt of Gilead a monument and wit ness of the former connection between MesODOtamit and Canaan. HOMILETICAL AND PEACTICAL. Contrasts : Jacob's emigration and return, oi the two-fold flight, under the protection of the God of Bethel, and of Mahanaim. — Laban the persecutor : a. of his own ; b. of the heir of the promise. — The persecutor : 1. His malicious companions ; 2. thosa who flee from him ; 3. his motives. — -The word of God to Laban : " Take heed," etc., in its typical and lasting significance. — The punishments of the want of candor : strife and war. — The two speeches and speakers. — The peaceful departure: 1. Its light side, reconciliation; 2. its dark aspect, separation. First Section, vers. 4-16. Starkk : Cramer: The husband should not always take hU own way, but sometimes consult with his wife (Sir. iv. 35). — It is a grievous thing when chddren complain before God of the injustice of their parents. — Chddren should conceal, as far as possible, the faults of their parents. — Lisco : The human means which he used are not commanded by God, but are his own. — Gerlach: Jacob's conduct, the impatient weakness of faith ; still a case of self-defence, not of injustice. — Schro- der : A contrast : the face of your father, the God of mi/ father. Second Section, vers. 17-21. Starke: Although Jacob actually begins his journey to the land of Ca- naan, some suppose that ten years elapse before he comes to Isaac, since he remained some time at Succoth, Sichem, and Bethel (comp. ch. xxxiii. 17 ; XXXV. 6). — The shearing of the sheep was in the East a true feast for the shepherds — an occasion of great joy (see ch. xxxviii. 12; 1 Sam. xxv. 2, 8, 36). Section Third, vers. 22-2.5. Starke : Josephus. The intervention of the night, and the warning by God in his sleep, kept him from injuring Jacob. — Bibl. Tub. : God sometimes so influences and directs the hearts of enemies that they shall be favorably inclined towards the saints, althougli they are really embittered against them. — Hall : God makes fool- ish the enemies of his church, etc. — Whoever is in covenant with God need have no fear of men. — ScHRiiiiER: Jacob moves under the instant and pressing danger of being plundered, or slain, or of being made a slave with his family and taken to Meso- potamia. Stdl the promiser (ch. xxviii. 1.5) fulfils the promise to him. Thus, whatever may oppress us for a time, must at last turn to our salvathm (Calvin). Section Fourth, vets. 26-30. Starke: ^It is the way of hypocrites when their acts do not prosper, t" speak in other tones.) — Vers. 29. He does not say that he has the right and authority, but that he has the fower (comp. John xix. 10). In this, however, he reliites liinjself For if he possessed the power why does he suffer himself to be terrified ami de terred by the warning of (jod in the dream ? — Cal WKK Handhuch : He cannot cease to threaten. — Ht looiild have injured him but dared not. — Schroder The images are his highest happiness, since to hin. the presence of the Deity is bound and confined tc its symbol. Section Fifth, vers. 31-35. Starke: Cramer: Ver. 32. A Christian should not be rash and pa* sionate in his answer. Ver. 35. The woman's cun- ning IS preeminent (Sir. xxv. 17 ; Judg. xiv. 16).— Calwek Handhuch: Ver. 38. The ewes and the 540 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. goats in their state were the objects of his special care. — Falsehood follows theft. — Man's cunning is ready ; woman's inexhaustible and endless (Val. Berberger). Section Sixth, Ters. 36.^2. Starke : What is in- cluded in a shepherd's faithfulness (ver. 38). — Bibl. Wirt. : When one can show that he has been faith- ful, upright, and diligent, in his office, he can stand up with a clear conscience, and assert his innocence. Cramer : A good conscience and a gracious God give one boldness and consolation. — Schrodek : The per- secution of Jacob by Laban ends at last in peace, iove and blessing. — -Thus the brother line in Meso- potamia is excluded after it has reached its destina- tion. Section Seveiith, vers. 43-53. Starke : (Differ- ent conjectures as to what Laban understood by the God of Nahor, whether the true God or idols). — • Cramer : When a man's ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him (ProT. xvi. 7). — Calwer Handbuch: Laban now turns again and gives way to the natural affections of a father. The circumstances which tended to calm liifl mind : 1. The seven days' journey ; 2. the divine warning; 3. the mortification resulting from his fruitless search ; 4. Jacolj's self-defence and the truth of his reproaches. — His courage and anger gradually give way to fear and anxiety. — Schrodkr : In the Hebrew, the word " if " occurs twice, pointing. as we may suppose, to the idea, may God so punisl thee. — (Li'THER : How can this fellow i Laban i iir. name the thing?) Eic/Iuh Section, ver. 55-ch. xxxii. 2. Starke Jacob has just escaped the persecutions of his unjust father-in-law, when he began to fear that he should meet a fiercer enemy in his brother Esau. Hence God confirms him in his faith, opens his eyes, etc. — It is the office of the angels to guard the sauits. (Two conjectures as to the double camp : one that some of the angels went before Jacob, others fol- lowed him ; the other that it is the angel camp and the encampment of Jacob.) — (Why the angels are called hosts: 1. From their multitude; 2. their or- der ; 3. their power for the protection of the saints, and the resistance and punishment of the wicked ; 4. from their rendering a cheerful obedience as be- came a warlike host. — Calwer Handbuch : The same as ch. xxviii. Probably here as there an inward vision (Ps. xxxiv. 7). — Schroder: Jacob's hard service, his departure with wealth, and the per- secution of Laban, prefigure the future of Israel in Egypt. — (Val. Herberger.) Whosoever walks in hia way, diligent in his pursuits, may at all times say with St. Paul : " He shall never be forsaken." — The invisible world was disclosed to him, because anxiety and fear fill the visible world. — Ldthkr: The angels. In heaven their office is to sing Glory to God in tb« Highest ; on the earth, to watch, to guide, to war. FIFTH SECTION. jseob^t return. Bu fear of Esau. Hit night wrestlings mth God. Peniel. The name Israel. Meeting and recondliaiion with Esau. Chapter XXXH. 3— XXXIII. 1-16. 3 And Jacob sent messengers before him to Esau his brother, unto the land of Seir, 4 the country of Edora. And he commanded them, saying, Thus shall ye speak unto my lord Esau; Thy servant Jacob saith thus, I have sojourned [have been a stranger] with 5 Laban, and stayed there until now : And I have oxen, and asses, flocks, and men- servants, and women-servants: and I have sent [and now I must send, the n paragogic] to tell my lord, that I may find grace in thy sight. 6 And the messengers returned tc Jacob, saying, We came to thy brother Esau, and 7 also he cometh to meet thee, and four hiuidred men with him. Then Jacob was greatly afraid, and distressed : and he divided the people that was witli iiim, and the flock.s, and 8 lierd-s, and the camels into two bands: And said [thougbt], If Esau couie to the one company, and smite it, then tiie other company which is left shall escape. 9 And Jacob said, O God of my father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac, ti.ri L>nl which saidst [artsayingj unto me, Return unto tliy country, and to thy kindred [birth- lO i\.ice], and I will deal well willi thee: I am not worthy [too littlo for] of the least of all tha mercies, and of all the truth, which thou hast shewed unto ihy servant : for with my staff I ] [alone] I passed over liiis Jordan, and now I am become two ljanTordan re- gion. That Suecoth belonged to the tribe of Gad, does not disprove Robinson's conjectures, since there may have been more than one Suecoth. Compare, further, as to the traditional Suecoth, Vox Raumer p. 256 ; Knobel, p. 204 [also Keil, Murphy, Words- i worth, Jacobus, Smith's "Bib. Die.,'' all of whom decide against Robinson. — A G ] — And he built. — ,' He piepares here lor a longer residence, since he [ builds himself a house instead of tents, and booths for liij flocks, i. e., inelosures made of shrubs or etakes wattled together. Knobel thinks " that tliis Is very improbable, since Jacob would naturally wish to go to Canaan and Isaac" (ch. xxii. 8). But if we bear in mind that Jacob, exhausted by a twenty- years' servitude and oppression, and a flight of more than seven days, shattered by his spiritual conflicts, «nd lame bodily, now, first, after he had crossed the Tordan. and upon the spiritual and home land, came to the full sense of his need of repose and quiet, we shall then understand why he here pauses and rests. As the hunted hart at last sink? to the ground, so he settles down and rests here for a time. Ha seems to have hoped, too, that he would be healed at Suecoth, and it is probably with a special reference to this that it is said, ver. 18, that Jacob came " in peace or in health " to Shechem. Jacob, too, after his experienceof his brother Esau's importuiuty, had good reason tor inquiring into the coniiition of things at Hebron, before he brought his family thither. [The fact that he built a house for himself, and permanent booths for his flock, indicates his contin- ued residence at Suecoth for some years ; and the age of Dinah at his flight from Laban makes it ne- cessary to suppose either that he dwelt here or at Shechem six or more years before the sad events nar- rated in the following chapter. — A. G.] And it ap- pears, indeed, that, either from Suecoth or Shechetn, he made a visit to his father Isaac at Hebron, and brought from thence his mother's nurse, Deborah, .since Rebekah was dead, and since she, as the confi- deiuial friend of his mother, could relate to him the history of her life and sufferings, and since, more- over, she stood in closer rel.ation to him than any one else. Nor could Jacob, as Keil justly remarks, now an independent patriarch, any longer subordinate his household to that of Isaac. 2. Tlie sojourn at Shechem (vers. 18-20). — And Jacob came (to Shalem) in good health.— The word cVr is taken by the Sept., Vul, and Luther [and by the translators of the Eng. Bib. — A. G.], as a proper noun, to Shalem, which soma have regarded as another name for Shechem, and others as designating an entirely different place, and the more so, since the \'illage of Salim is still found in the neighborhood of Shechem (Robinson: "Re- searches," vol. iii. p. 114 ft'.). But it is never men- tioned elsewhere in the Old Testament, and abttj as an adjective, refers to the Dli'ia. ch. xxviii. 21. Jehovah has fulfilled his promise. — A city of She- chem.— Or, to the city. Lit., of Shechetn. The city was not in existence when Abraham sojourned in this region (ch. xii. 6). The Hivite prince Ha- mor had built it and called it after the name of his SOIL For the old name ilamorthi of Pliny, sea Keil, p. 224 [who holds that it may be a corruption from Hamor; but see also Robinson, vol. iii. p. 119. — A. G.]. — In the land of Canaan. — Keil infers from these words that Suecoth could not have been in the land of Canaan, i. e., on the west of the .Tor- dan. But the words here, indeed, refer to the im- mediately following Hebraic acquisition of a pieca of ground, just as in the purchase of the cave at Hebron by Abraham it is added, " in the land of Canaan" (ch. xxiii. 19). — Padan-aram (see ch. XXV. 20)— before the city. — [See the Bible Diction- aries, especially upon the situation of Jacob's well, and Robinson,' vol. Mi. pp. 113-1?6. — A. G.]. r?e» 560 GENESIS. OR THE flKST BOOK OF MOSES. after his return to Hebron Jacob kept a pasture sta- tion at Shei-hfin (ch. xssvii. 12). — A parcel of a field (Josh. xxiv. 32). — .Abraham purchased for himself a [lossession for a burial place at Hebron. Jacob goes further, and buys a possession for him self during hfe. " This purchase shows that Jacob, in liis faith in the divine promise, viewed Canaan as his own home, and the home of his seed. Tradition fixes this parcel of land, which, at the comiuest of t'anaan, fell as an heritage to the sons of Joseph, and in which Joseph's bones were buried (Josh. ixiv. 32 ), as the plain lying at the southeast opening of the valley of Shechem, where, even now, Jacob's well (John iv. 6) is shown, and about two hundred or three hundred paces north of it a Mohammedan wely, as the grave of Joseph (Robinso.s ; " Re- searches," vol iii. pp. 113-136, and the map of Xablons, in the "German Oriental Journal," xvi. p. 634)." Keil. For the relation of this passage with ch. xlviii. 22, see the notes upon that passage. — An hundred pieces of money. — Onk., Sept.,Vid., and the older commentators, regard the Quesita as a piece of silver of the value of a lamb, or stamped with a lamb, and which some have held as a proph- ecy pointing to the Lamb of God. Meyer (Heb. Diet.) estimates the Quesita as equal to a drachm, or an Egyptian double-drachm. Delitzseh says it was a piece of metal of an indeterminable value, but of greater value than a shekel (see Job xlii. 11). — An altar, and named it. — That is, he undoubtedly named it with this name, or he dedicated it to El- Elohe-Israel. Delitzseh views this title as a kind of superscription. But Jacob's consecration means more than that his God is not a mere imaginary deity ; it mean.s, further, th.at he has proved himself actually to be (iod (God is the God of Israel) ; God in the clear, definite form of El, the Mighlii, is the God of hrail. the wreitUr with God. Israel had eiprrienced both, in the almighty protection which his God had shown him from Bethel throughout his journeving-, and in the wrestlings with him, and learned his might. In the Mosaic period the expre.^sion, Jeho- vah, the God of Israel, takes its place (Ex. xxxiv. 23). " The chosen name of God, in the book of Joshua." Delitzseh. [The name of the altar em- braces, and stamps upon the memory of the world, the result of the pa.st of Jacob's life, and the expe- riences through which Jacob had become Israel. — A. G.J 3. /Jinah (ch. xxxiv. 1-31). — Dinah the daugh. ter of Leah. — a. T/ie rape of Dinah (vers. 1-4). Dinah was bom about the end of the fourteenth year of Jacob's residence in Haran. She wa,s thus about six yeara old at (he settlement at Suecoth. Tne sojourn at Suecoth appears to have lasted for about two years, .hu-ob must have spent already several years at Shechem, since there are prominent and definite signs of a more confidential intercourse with the .Slieebemites. We may infer, ilierefore, iliat Din.ah was now from twelve to sixteen yeai s of age. Joseph was seventeen y('ars old when he was sold by his brethren (ch. xxxvii. 2), and at that time Jacob had returned to Hebron. There must have passed, S.ierefore, about eleven years since thf return Iroin Haran, at wlii.h lime Joseph was six years of age If now we regard the residence of Jacob at Bethel and the region of Ephrata as of brief linration, and bear in mind that the residence at Shechem ceased with Ihi' rape of Dinah, it follows that Dinah mu.st have been about loiirteen or fifteen yearn of age when she wa.'* deflowered. In the East, too, females reach the age of puberty at twelve, and sometimei still earlier (Delitzseh). From the same eircum stances it is clear that Simeon and Le\i must hav^ Deen above twenty. — Went out to see Scarcely nowever, to see the daughters of the native inhabit* ants for the first time, nor to a fair or popular festi- val (Josephus). Her going indicates a friendly visit to the daughters of the land, a circumstance which made her abduction ])ossible, for she was taken by Shechem to his house (ver. 26). — His soul clave unto Dinah. — This harsh act of princely insolence and power is not an act of pure, simple lust, whicl usually regards its subject with hatred (see the his- tory of Tamar, 2 Sam. xiii. 15). — Spake kindly to her. — Probably makes her the promise of an honor- able marriage. b. Shtcheins offer of marnagi (vers. 5-12). — And Jacob heard it — In a large nomadic fimily the several members are doubtless often widely dispersed. Besides, Dinah did not re- turn home. — Held his peace until they wrero come. — The brothers of the daughter had a voice in all important concerns which related to her (xxiv. 50 ff.). Moreover, Jacob had to deal with tht proud and insolent favorite son of the prince, i. e., prince of that region, and a painful experience had made him more cautious than he had been before.- -And Hamor the father of Shechem As if he wished to anticipate the indignation of Jacob's youthful sons. — Because he had wrought folly Keil speaks of " seduction," but this is an inadei^uate ex- pression. Some measure of consent on the part of Dinuh is altogether probable. In this case the dis- honor (S53B) had a double imDurii7, since an uncir- cumcised person had dishonored her. — And the men viexe grieved. — Manly indigiiation rises in these young men in all its strength, but as the wise sons of Jacob, they know bow to control themselves. [It was more than indignation. They were enraged ; they burned with anger ; it was ki}tdled to them. — A. G ]— He had wrought folly.— nbrj nrr , a standing expression for crimes which are irrecon- cilable with the dignity and destination of Israel as the people of God, but especially for gross sins of the Besh (Deut. xxii. 21 ; Judg. xx. 10 ; 2 Sam. xiil 12 1, but also of other great crimes (Josh. vii. 15i. — Which thing ought not to be done. — A new and stricter morality in this respect also, enters with the name Israel. — My son Shechem. — The hesi- tating proposal of the father gives the impression of (.mViairassment. The old man offers Jacob and his suns the full rights of citizens in his little country, and the son engages to fulfil any demand of the brothers as to the bridal price and briiial gilts. Keil confuses these ordinary determinations. [He holds only with most that they were strictly presents (tind not the price for the bride) made to the bride and to Ikt mother and brothers. — .\. G] — c. The fanat cal refvtii/e of the .'62 GE.VESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. Knobel tliinks the Jehorist l:as made additions. (Vitlioiit regard tii this, we can easily see, that God, who is to linld the Cauaanites under his fear, so that they shall not take revenge on the house of Jacob, must be culled Elohini. Although Jacob had suffer- ed nearly ten years to elapse since his return from Mesopotami:!, without fulfilling the vow he had made (ch. xxviii. 20) at Bethel, when he fled from Esau (Keil), we are not, therefore, to infer that he had been regardless of his duty during these ten years. r;r a perfect security against Esau was a part of that which was to complete his happy return ; but there arose a necessity between Peniel and Siiccoth, that he must not only have security for himself and his family, against the persecutions of Esau ; but against his oflBcious importunity, before he could go beyond Shechem with his whole train. Hence his sojourn at Succoth and Shechem. But when he is now reminded of a duty, too slowly fulfilled, the mo- tive is found not merely in the vow which he has to fulfil, but in the circumstances occasioned by his eons, which make his longer stay at Shechem unsafe, t9 whicli we must, doubtless, add, that in the mean- while the relations and distinctions between his house and that of Esau,were more securely and permanent- ly established. Have not the sons, who formerly were easily infatuated to render homage to their stately uncle, now manifested in an extreme way their Israe/iiix/i consciousness ? The recollection (ch. xxxi. 30) proves that Jacob cherished the consciousness of his duty. He seems, indeed, to have gone too far in his precautionary tardiness. In seeking to entirely avoid Esau, he is entangled with the Shechemites. The call and warning also — Make an altar at Bethel — informs him that the time for his complete return home has now come. — Up to Bethel. — Betliel lay in the mountain region. — Put away the strange gods. — Tlie shock that Jacob had expe- rienced by tlie rape of Dinah, the crime of his sons, the imperilled existence of his family, and the divine warning immediately following, strengthens his sense of the holiness of God, and of the sinfulness in him- self and his household, and he enjoins, therefore, an act of repentance, before he can enter upon the act of thanksgiving. He has, moreover, to confess, in reference to his house, the sins of a refined idolatry, the sins of his sons at Shechem, and his own sins of omission. His love for Rachel had, doubtless, led him weakly to tolerate her teraphim initil now. B t now he has grown strong and decided even in ce- apect to Raeliel. The fanatical Israelitish zeal of his Rons had also a better element, which may have quickened his monotheistic feeling. Since the ma- jority of Jacob's servants came from the circle and inllucnce of the Nahorites, whose image-worship was viewed ijy the stricter Israelitish thought as idola- try (Kx. XX.; Josh. xxiv. 2), there were probably to be found in Jacob's house other things, besides the teraphim of Ilichel, winch were regardcil as the ob- jects of religious veneration. But the jiurification was necessary, not merely because they were now to renjove to Bethel, the place of the outward revela- tion of Jehovah (Knof)i'l), but because the spirit of Jeliovah utters stronger demands in the conscience of Jacob, and because the approaching tliaidisgiving must he sanctified by a foregoing repentance, [There la gfKid grounil fir the cotijcctnre that there was a npucial reason for the charge now, since in the spoil of the city there would be images of gold and silver. — AM.] — And be clean.— The acts take place in tlie followirij^ order : 1. The iiuttiiig away of the flt"**nge gods ; 2. A symbolical purification, completed, with out any doubt, through religious washings (Ex. xxii 4 ; and similar passages) ; and 3. The change of gar ments. In some cases (Ex. xix. 20) a mere washing of the garments was held to be sufficient, here thf injunction is more strict, since the pollution has oeen of longer duration. In Knobel's view they were tc put on their best garments, but they would scarcely go on their mountain journey in such array. Thechang ed garments express the state of complete purification, even externally. — Unto God wrho answ^ered mo. — He will thus fulfil his vow, and hold a thaaksgiving feast with them. — And all their ear-rings. — They followed the injunction of Jacob so strictly, that they not only gave up the religious images, but also theii amulets (chains), for the ear-rings were eapecially so used (see Wi.skr ; Renl Worierbiich^ Amiilds). — And Jacob hid them. — As stripped and dead human images they are buried as the dead (Lsa. ii. 2o). — Under the oak (Terebinth). — Kxobel: "In the Terebinth grove at Shechem, i. e., under one of its trees (comp. ch, xii. 6; Judg. vi, 11). According to ch. xii. 7, and other passages, it was a grove. We must, therefore, read here nixn, as in Joshua, xxiv. 26, by the same author, to whom belongs also Ex. xxxii. 2, or assume that there were both kinds of trees in the grove." — And the terror of God was upon. — The genuine repentance in the house of Ja- cob was followed by the bles.sing of divine protec- tion against the bloody revenge with which he was threatened from those who dwelled near Shechem. God himself, as the protecting God of Jacob, laid this terror upon them, which may have been intro- duced on the one hand, through the outrage of She- chem (Knobel); and on the other, through the fear- ful power of Jacob's sons, their lioly zeal, and that of their God. — Luz, which is in the land of Ca- naan.— The words appear to be .added, in order to fix the f ict, that Jacoli had now accom]ilished his [iros- perous return. [The name Luz, almond tree, still re- curs, as the almond tree is still Hourishing. Morphy. — A. G J — And all the people. — The nmnber of Jacob s servants, both in women and children, may have been considerably increased through the sudden overthrow of Shechem. Although Jacob would have restored all, as some have conjectured, the heads of the families to whom this restitution could be made were wanting. — That is Bethel. — There is no contradiction, as Knobel thinks, between this passage and ch. xxviii. 19, which is to be ex- jilained upon the assumption of an Elohistic account, lint as (vers. 1 5) a confirmation of the new name which .Jacob gave the city. Luz is so called by the Canaau- ites now, as it was before, although a solitary wander- er had named the [ilace, where he spent the night, more than twenty years before, Bethel. — El-Bethel. He names the altar itself, as he had also the altar at Shechem (ch. xxxiii. 2il). and still further the place surrounding the altar, and thus declared its conse- cration as a sanctuary. El, too, is here in the geni- tive, and to be nad i>f God ; the place is not called (iod of Bethel, but of the God of Bethel. He thus eviilently connei'ts this consecration with the earlier revelation of God received at Bethel. * — Then Deb- orah died. — The nurse of Rebekah h.id gone with her to Ilel)i'on, but how came she here? Delitzsch conjectures that Rebekah had sent her, according to the promise (ch. xxvii. 46), or to her daughter- • [The vert) tlPiD, appejired, is tiore plurai — one of tb few caseH im whicli Efohim takes the plural -flrb.— A. (1.) CHAP. XXXIII. 17— XXXV. 1-16. i>6S in-law and grandchildren, for their care ; but we hare ventured the suggestion that Jacob took her with him upon his return from a visit to Hebron. She found her peculiar home in Jacob's house, and irith his children after the death of Rebekah. For other views see Knobel, who naturally prefers to Bud a difficulty even here. It is a well-known method of exaggerating all the blanks in the Bible into diversities and contradictions. ^Allon- bachuth. — Oak of weeping. Delitzsch conjectures that perhaps Judg. iv. 6 ; 1 Sam. xvi. 3, refer to the same tree as a monument, a conjecture which, however, the locality itself refutes. — And Ood ap- peared unto Jacob.^The distinction between God spake and Ooil appearedh iinalogous to the dis- tinction in the mode of revelation (ch. xii. vers. 1 and 7). " He now appears to him," Keil says, " by day in visible form : for the darkness of that form- er time of anguish has now given way to the clear light of salvation. The representation is incorrect, and is based upon the assumption, that the night revelations are confined to times of trouble. — Again. — Now, at his return when the vow has been paid, as before in his migration, when the vow was oc- casioned and made. But now Jehovah appears to him as his God, according to his vow, t/ien shall the Lord be mi/ God. [ Wken he came out of Padan- aram. — This explains the clause (ver. 6), which is in the land of Canaan. Bethel was the last point in the land of Canaan that was noticed in his flight from Esau. His arrival at this point indicates that he has now returned to the land of Canaan. Mokpht, p. 427. — A. G.] — And blessed him. — So also Abra- ham was blessed repeatedly. — Thy name is Jacob ? — We read the phrase according to its connection with ch. xxxii. 27, as a question. Then Jacob an- swered to the question " what is thy name ? Jacob. Here God resumes tlie thread again, thou art Jacob? But if any one is not willing to read the words as a question, it still marks a progress. The name Israel was given to him at Peniel, here it is sealed to him. Hence it is here connected with the Messianic prom- ise. [Murphy suggests also that the repetition of the name here implies a decline in his spiritual life between Peniel and Bethel. — A. G.] — I am Ood Almighty. — This self-applied title of God has the lame significance here as it had in the revelation of God for Abraham (xvii. 1) ; there he revealed him- self as the miracle-working God, because he had promised Abraham a son ; here, however, because he promises to make from Jacob's family a community [assembly. — A. G.] of nations. [The kahal is sig- nificant as it refers to the ultimate complete fulfil- ment of the promise in the true spiritual Israel. — A. G.] * Knobel sees here only aci Elohistic statement of the fact which has already appeared of the new naming of Jacob, which, too, he re- gards as a mere poetic fiction. According to this supposition, Israel here cannot be warrior of God, but, perhaps, prince with God. Even Delitzsch wavers between the .assumption of an Elohistic redac- tion or revision, and the apprehension and recognition of new elements, which, of course, fiivor the idea of a * [Murphy says, from this time the multiplicnlion of Israel is rapid. In twenty-five ye.irs after this time he goes iowii into Egypt with seventy sollle. and two liandred and Sen years after that Israel goes out of Esypt numbering ihout one million eight hundred thousand. A nation and R ctmtjrega' ion of nations, such as loere then known in the rorld. had at the last date come of him, and " kings" were lO follow in due time.— 4.. G.] new fact. To these new elements belong the libation, the drink-offei ing (probably of wine), poured upon the stone anointed with oil, Jacob's own reference to thii revelation of God at Bethel fch. xlviii. 3), and the circumstance that Hos. xii. 5, can only refer to this revelation. Under a closer observation of the devel- opment of Jacob's faith, tliere is no room to speak of any confounding the thcophany at Peniel with • second theophany at Bethel. It must be observed, too, that henceforth the patriarch is sometimes called Jacob, and sometimes Israel. [This is the first men- tion of the drink-offering in the Bible. — A. G.] DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL. 1. We view Jacob's settlement at Succoth: a. In the light of a building of booths and houses for re- freshment, after a twenty years' servitude, and tiie toils and soul-conflicts connected with his journey- ings (comp. the station Elim, Ex. xv. 27, where Is- rael first rested) ; b. As a station where he might regain his health, so that he could come to .Shechem well and in peace ; c. As a station where he could tarry for a time on account of Esau's importunitj (comp. Exegetical notes). 2. Jacob's places of abode in Canaan, in their principal stations, are the same with those of his grandfather Abraham. He settles down in the vicin- ity of Shechem, as formerly .Abraham had done in the oak groves of Moreh (ch. xii. 6). Then he re moved to Bethel, just as Abraham had gone into the same vicinity (ch. xii. 8), and after his wandering to Egypt returned here again to Bethel. At last he comes to Hebron, which had been consecrated by Abraham, as the seat of the patriachal residence. 3. The importance of Shechem in the history of the kingdom of God (see Bible Diet.) It Is: a. A capital of the Hivites, and as such the scene of the brutal heathenish iniquity, in relation to the rehgious and moral dignity of Israel ; b. The birth-place of Jewish fanaticism in the sons of Jacob ; c. A chief city of Ephraim, and an Israelitish priestly city ; d. The capital of the kingdom of Israel for some time ; e. The principal seat of the Samaritan nationality and cultus. The acquisition of a parcel of land at Shechem by Jacob, forms a counterpart to the pur- chase of Abraham at Hebron. But there is an evi- dent progress here, since he made the purchase for his own settletnent during Ufe, while Abraham barely gained a burial place. The memory of Canaan by Israel and the later conquest (comp. xlviii. 22), is closely connected with this possession. In Jacob's life, too, the desire to exchange the wandering no- madic life for a more fixed abode, becomes more appa- rent than in the life of Isaac. [Robinson's "History of Shechem " is full and accurate. Wordsworth's re- mark here, after enumerating the important events clustering around this place from Abraham to Christ, is suggestive. Thus the history of Shechem, combin- ing so many associations, shows the uniformity of the divine plan, extending through many centuries, for the sahatian of the world by the promised seed of .Abraham, in whom all nations are blessed ; and foi the outpouring of the spirit on the Israel of God, who are descended from the true Jacob; and foi their union in the sanctuary of the Christian church , and for the union of all n.itions in one household it* Christ, Luke, i. 68.^A. G.] 4. Dinah's history, a warning history for th( daughters of Israel, and a foundation of the Old 564 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. Testament limitation of the freedom of the female 3ex. 6. The collision between the sons of Jacob and Shechem, the son of Haraor, is a vivid picture of the collisions between the youthful forms of political despotism and hierarchal pride. Sheciiem acts as an insolent worldly prince, Jacob's sons as young fanatical priests, luring him to destruction. 6. Afier- Jacob became Israel, the just conscious- ness of his theocratic dignity appears manifestly in Ins sons, under the deformity of fanatical zeal. \fe may \iew this narrative as tlie history of the origin, and fiisr original form of Jewish and Christian fanaticism. We notice first that fanaticism does not originate in and for itself, but clings to religious and moral ideas as a monstrous and misshapen outgrowth, since it changes the spiritual into a carnal motive. The sons of Jacob were right in feeling that they wore deeply injured in the religious and moral idea and dignity of Israel, by Shecliem's deed. But still they are already wrong in their judgment of She- chem's act ; since there is surely a difference between the brutal lust of Amnion, who after his sin pours his hatied upon her whom he had dishonored, and Shechem, who passionately loves and would marry the dishonored maiden, and is ready to pay any sum as an atonement ; a distinction which the sons of Jacob mistook, just as those of the clergy do at this day who throw all breaches of the seventh command- ment into one common category and as of the same heinous dye. Then we observe that Jacob's sons justly shun a mixture with the Shechemites, al- though in this case they were ndlling to be circum- cised for worldly and selfish ends. But there is a clear distinction between such a wholesale, mass conversion, from improj)er motives, which would have corrupted and oppressed the house of Israel, and the transition of Shechem to the sons of Israel, or the establisiinient of some neutral position for Dinah. But leaving this out of view, if we should prefer to maintain (what Jacob certainly did not maintain) that an example of revenge must be made, to intimidate the heathen, and to warn the future Israel against the Canaanites, still the fanatical zeal in the conduct of Jacob's sons passed over into fa- naticism strictly so called, which developed itself from the root of spiritual pride, according to its three world-historical characteristics. The first was cun- ning, the lie, and enticing deception. Thus- the Hu- guenots were enticed into Paris on the night of St. Bartholomew. The second was the murderous at- tack and carnage. How often has this form shown itself in the history of fanaticism ! Tliis protended Siicred murder and carnage draws the third charac- teristic sign in its train : rapine and pillage. The possessions of the heretics, according to the laws of the miildle ages, fell to tlie executioner of the pre- tended justice ; and the history of the crusades against the heretics testifies to similar horrors ami devaxlation. Jacob, therefore, justly declares his condemnation of the iniqidty of the brothers, Simeon and Levi, not only at once, but upon his death-bed (ch. xlix.), and it marks the assurance of the apocry- phal standpoint, when the book Judith, for the pur- pose of palliating the crime of Judith, glorifies in a poetical stmin the like fanatical act of Simeon (ch. ii.). Judith, indeed, in the trait of cunning, appears fts the datigliter in spirit of her ancestor Simeon. We must ii.;* fail to distinguish here in our liistory, in this first vivid picture of fanaticism, the nobler point of departure, the theocratic motive, from the terrible counterfeit and deformity. In this relation there seems to have been a diflFerence between th« brothers, Simeon and Levi. While the former ap pciirs to have played a chief part in the history of Joseph also (ch. xlii. 24, and my article, "Simeon," in Herzog's " Real Encyclopedia"), and in the divi sion of Canaan was dispersed among his brethreUi the purified Levi came afterwards to be the repre- sentative of pure zeal in Israel (Exod. xxxii. 28 ; Deut. xxxiii. 8) and the admmislrator of the priest- hood, i. e., the theocratic priestly first-born, by tho side of Judah the theocratic political first-bom. A living faith and a faithful zeal rarely develop them- selves as a matter of fact without a mixture of fa- naticism ; " the flame gradually purifies itself from the smoke." In all actual individual cases, it is a question « hether the flame overcomes the smoke, or the smoke the flame. In the life of Christ, the Old- Testament covenant faithfulness and truth bums pure and bright, entirely free from smoke ; in the history of the old Judaism, on the contrary, a dan- gerous mixture of fire and smoke steams over the land. And so in the development of individual be- lievers we see how some purify themselves to the purest Christian humanity, while others, over sinking more and more into the pride, cunning, uncharitable- ness and injustice of fanaticism, are completely ruined. Delitzsch : " The greatest aggravation of their sin was that they degraded the sacred sign of the covenant into the common means of their mal- ice. And yet it was a noble germ which exploded so wickedly." 7. This Shechemite carnage of blind and Jewish fanaticism, is reflected in a most remarkable way, as to all its several parts, in the most infamous crime of Christian fmaticisin, the Parisian St. Bartholo- mew. [The narrative of these events at Shechem shows how impartial the sacred writer is, bringing out into prominence whatever traits of excellence there were in the characters of Shechem and Hamor, while he does not conceal the cunning, falsehood, and cruelty of the sons of Jacob. Xor should we fail to observe the connection of this narrative with the later exclusion of Simeon and Levi from the rights of the first-born, to which they would natu- rally have acceded after the exclusion of Reuben ; and with their future location in the land of Canaan. The history furnishes one of the clearest proofs of the genuineness and unity of Genesis. — A. G.] 8. Jacob felt that, as the Israel of God, he was made offensive even to the moral sense of the sur- rounding heathen, through the pretended holy deed of his sons ; so far so that they had endangered the very foundntion of the theocracy, the kingdom of (iod, the old-covenant church. Fauiiticism always produces the same resiUts ; either to discredit Chris- tianity in the moral estimate of the world, and im- peril its very existence by its unreasonable zeal, or to expose it to the most severe persecutions. 0. The direction of Jacob to Bethel, by the com- mand of (iod, is a proof that in divine providence tlie true community of believers mu: CHAP. XXXIII. 17— XXXV. 1-15. 56: >{ Jacob to fulfil the vow he had made at Bethel. Dut with this the object of his removing from She- ?ht'ra and of his concealed flight is closely connect- ed. So also the purpose of purifying his house from the guilt of fanaticism, and the idolatrous image- worship. At the same time it is thus intimated that both these objects would have been secured already, If Jacob had been more in earnest in the fulfilment of his vow. 1 1. As Jacob intends holding a feast of praise and thanksgiving at Bethel, ho enjoins upon his house- hold first a feast of purification, i. e., a fast-day. This preparation rests upon a fundamental law of the inner spiritual life. We must first humble ourselves for our own deeds, and renounce all known evil practices, if we would celebrate with joyful praise and thanksgiving, with pure eyes and lips, the gra- cious deeds of God. The approach of such a feast is a foretaste of blessedness, and hence the con- science of the pious, warned by its approach, is quickened and made more tender, and they feel more deeply the necessity for a previous purification by repentance. In the Mosaic law, therefore, the purification precedes the sacrifices ; the solemnities of the great day of atonement went before the joy- ful feast of tabernacles. Hence the Christian pre- pares himself for the holy Supper through a confes- sion of his sins, and of his faith, and a vow of re- formation. The grandest form in which this order presents itself is in the conufction between Good- Friday and Easter, both in reference to the facts jommemorated (the atonement and the new life iu Christ) and in reference to the import of the solemni- ties. The Advent-season affords a similar time for oreparation for the Christmas festival (comp. Matt. •. 23). 12. Viewed in its outward aspect, the purification of Jacob's house was a rigid purification from relig- ious image-worship, and the means of superstition, which the now awakened and enlightened conscience of Jacob saw to be nothing but idolatry. But these wurks of superstition and idolatry are closely con- nected with the fanaticism for which .Jacob's house must also repent. The common band or tie of idol- atry and fanaticism is tlie mingling of the religious state and disposition with mere carnal thoughts or •Bentiments. There is, indeed, a fanaticism of icono- clasm, but then it is the same carnal thought, which regards the external aspect of religion as religion itself, and through this extreme view falls into an idolatrous fear of images, as if they were actual hos- tile powers. The marks of a sound and healthy treatment of images idolatrously venerated, are clear- ly seen in this hi.d. The vow of baptism and con- firmation * is fulfilled in the pious Christian life, upon the ground of the grace and truth with which God fulfils his promises. Jacob's vow refers to a special promise of God, at his entrance upoL a difiB- cult and dangerous journey, and hence the fulfilment of the vow was the glorification of the gracious lead- ing of God, and of the truth and faithfulness of God to his word. It was a high point iu the life of Israel, from which, while holding the feast, he looked back over his whole past history, but more especially ovei his long journey and wanderings. But for this very reason the feast was consecrated also to an outlook into the future. For the further history of Bethel, see Bible Dictionaries. 15. The solemn, rev, rent burial of Deborah, and the oak of weeping dedicated to her memory, are a proof that old and faithful servants were esteemed in the house of Jacob, as they were in Abraham's household. As they had taken a deep interest and part in the family spirit aud concerns, so they were treated in life and death as members of the family. The aged Deborah is the counterpart to the aged Eliezer. The fact that we find her here dying in the family of Jacob, opens to us a glance into the warm, faithful attachment of this friend of Rebekah, and at the same time enables us to conclude with the highest certainty that Rebekah was now dead. Debo- rah would not have parted from Rebekah wiiile she was living. Delitzsch : " We may regard the hea- then traditioiu, that the nurse of Dionysius (P"33, BciKxos) Ues buried in Scythopolis (Pli.v. J{. iV. ch. v. 15), and that the grave of Sileuos is found in the land of the Hebrews (Pacsan. Etiaca, cap. 24), with which F. D. Michaelis connects the passage, as the mere distorted echoes of this narra'ive." 16. We may regard the new and closing revelatiou and promise which Jacob received at Bethel after his thanksgiving feast, as the confirmation and sealing of his faith, and thus it forms a parallel to the con- firmation and sealing of the faith of .\braham upon Moriah (ch. xxii. 13). But it is to be observed here that .Jacob is first sealed after having purified his faith from any share in the guilt of fanaticism. And the same thing precisely may be said of the sealing of .\braham, after he had freed himself from the fiinatical prejudice that Jehovah could in a religioiu • [Among the coniin(nt:il churches coniirmatiun is re. garded in much the same li'-'ht as we rejT.ird the opcD recep- tion of ihe baptized meiabers of the church, to their firs, communion ; when they are said to a.ssume for themse va the vows which were made for them in their barr.s'n.— -A i. 066 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. •ense literally demand the sacrifice of a human life, L e., the literal killing, he became certain of his life of faith, of the promise of God, and of his future. Thus here the flame of Israel is completely purified from the smoke. But here, again, it lies in the very law 01 the inward life, that God cannot seal the faith from wliich the impure elements have not been purged. Otherwise fanaticism, too, would be con- firmed and sanctioned. Hence the assurance of faith ■pill always waver and fluctuate, even to its disap- pearance in any one, in the measure in wliich he combines impure and carnal elements with his faith, and then holds it more and more as a confidence of a hiirher grade. Enthusiastic moments, mighty hu- man acts of boldness, party earnestness and temerity, will not compensate for the profound, heavenly as- surance of faith, an established life of faith, which is the gift of the Holy Spirit. True it is, that the precondition of sealing is justification, the heart ex- perience of the peace of God, of reconciliation by faith ; but this gift of God the Christian must keep pure by steadfastness in the Lord, even in the midst of temptation, which is often a temptation to fanati- cism (see the Epistle of James), and then he is con- firmed. In our estimate of the stages of confirma- tion, it is not at all strange that Jacob should have the name of Israel, first given to him at Peniel, here confirmed to him. Henceforth he is more frequently called Israel, for the new life in him has become a new nature, the prominent and ruling feature of his being. 17. The renewed Messianic promise assured to Jacob (ch. x-ixv, 11). 18. From the fact that Jacob erected a stone pil- lar at Bethel, on which he poured a drink-offering, and then oil, Knobel conjectures, without the least ground, that the Elohist here introduces the sacrifice in this form, and knows nothing of an altar and of animal sacrifices (p. 274). But it is eviilent that this pillar was taken from the altar before mentioned (ver. 7), and that this drink-offering must therefore be distinguished from the sacrifice upon that altar. As in the wrestling of Jacob, the distineiiijn between the outward and inward aspects of the riglit of the first-born, and thus also of the priesthood, first comes into view, so here, also, we have the distinction be- tween the peculiar sacrifice in the strict sense and the thank-offering. The stone designates (ch. xxviii. 20) the ideal house of God, and in this significance must be distinguished from the altar. Througli the thank-ofiering Jacob consecrates the enjoyment of his prosperity to the Lord ; through the oil he raises the stone, as well as his thanksgiving, to a la.sting, sacred remembrance. [Kurtz remarks here : " The thirty years' journey from Bethel to Bethel is now completed. The former residence at Bethel stands to the present somewhat as the beginning to the end, the prophecy to the fidfilment ; for, the unfolding of the purpose of salvation, so far as that could Ite done in the life of Jacob, iias now reached its acme and relative completion. There the Lord appeared to him in a dream, here in his waking state, and the dream is the prophetic type of the waking reality. There (Jod jrrondsed to protect and bless him, and bring \i\in back to this land — a promise injw fulfilled. Theii' Jacob made his vow, here lie pays it. There God consecrates him to be tlie bearer- of salvation, and makes the threefold promise of (he blessing of Balvatioir. So fur as the promise coidd be fulfilled In Jacob, it is now fullilleil; the land of promise is open 'lefore him, he has already obtained possession in part, and the promised seed reaches it-s first stagi of completeness in the last son of Rachel, giving the significant number twelve, and the idea of salvatioc attains its de\'elopment, since Jacob has become Ifl rael. Bu.t this fulfilment is only preliminary and relative, and in its turn becomes a prophecy of the still future fulfilment. Hence God renews the bless ing, showing that the fulfilment lies in the futurt still ; hence God renews his new name Israel, which defines his peculiar position to salvation and his re- lation to God, showing that Jacob has not yet fuUj become Israel ; the promise and the name are cor- relates— the one will be realized when the other is fulfilled. Hence, too, Jacob renews the name Beth- el, in which the peculiarity of the relation of God to Jacob is indicated, his dwelling in and among tht seed of Jacob, and the renewing of this name pro- claims his consciousness that God would still become in a far higher measure, El-beth-el." — A. G.] HOMILETICAIi AND PEACTICAIi. See the Doctrinal and Ethical remarks. Jacob's settlement at Shechem: 1. The departure thithei from Succoth ; 2. the settlement itself: 3. the new departure to Bethel. — The settlement itself: 1. How promising 1 happy return. Prosperous acquisition of the parcel of land. Peaceful relations with the Shechemites. Religious toleration. 2. How seri- ously endangered (through Jacob's carelessness. He does not return early enough to Bethel to fulfil his vow. Probably he even considers the altar at She- chem a substitute. His love for Rachel makes him tolerant to her teraphim, and consequently to the teraphim of his house generally. His polygamy ia perhaps the occasion of his treating the children with special indulgence). 3. How fearfully disturbed I Dinah's levity and dishonor. Importunity of the Shechemites; the carnage of his sons. Ihe exist- ence of his house endangered. 4. The happy con- clusion caused by Jacob's repentance and God's pro- tection.— The first great sorrow prepared for the patriarch by his children. — Dinah's conduct. — The dangerous proposals of friendship by the Shechem- ites.— The brothers, Simeon and Levi. Their right Their wrong. — Fanaticism in its first biblical form, and its historic mauifestations. — Its contagions pow- er. All, or at least the majority, of Jacob's sons, are swept along by its influence. — Jacob's repentance, or the feast of purification of his house. — How the union of repentance and faith is reflected in the sacred institutions. In both sacraments, in the oele- brutioii of the Lord's Supper, in the connection of sacred festivals, especially in the connection between Good-Friday and Easter. — The thanksgiving at Beth el. — Here, too, the feast of joy is followed by deep mourning and funer.-il obsequies. — Deborah : 1. We know ver-y little of her; and yet, 2. we know very much of her. — The greatness of true and unselfish love iu the kingdom of God. — The nobility of free service. — Jacob's confirmation — confirmed as Israel. — The renewed promise. First Section, 'llie settlement at Succoth. Ch. xxxiii. 17. St.uikk: lie, no doubt, visited his father during this hiterval, — Gmclacm: (On some accounts we believe that Succoth was situated or the right .side of Jor-dan, m the valley of Succoth, in which \nj the city of Betli-Shean. Succoth are literally huig made of boughs, here folds irirrde of bough* of treef and bushes.) CHAP. XXXIII. 17— XXXT. 1-15. 50' Secon I Sectio7t. Thp settlement at Shechem. Ch. sxxiii. 18-20. Starkk : (Shcchem, Cjuesita. The Septuagint transl., lainbs ; Chaki., ])eai'Is. Others un- derstand money. Epiph.^ de po7id. et »to?w.'., asserts that Abraham introd\iced the art of coininf; money m Canaan), Schkodek: Von Raunier consideis Shalem as the more ancient name ofShechem. Robin- son regards it as a proper name, and finds it now in tlie village of Shalem, some distance east from Shechem. Third Section. Dinah. Ch. xxxiv. 1-31. Btakke : Dinah's walk : without doubt, taken from motives of curiosity. — -Contrary to all his expecta- tions (for a peaceful, quiet time of woi'ship, etc.), Jacob's heart is most keenly mortified by Dinah's disgrace, and the carnage committed by Simeon and Levi. — He who wishes to shun sin, must avoid also occasions of sin. — Curiosity is a great fault in the female sex, and has caused many a one to tall. ScHRiinKR : {Val. Herb.) A gadding girl, and a lad who has never gone beyond the precincts of home, are both good for nothing (Tit. ii. 5). a. 77ie rape. St.\rke : (2 Sam. xiii. 12) By force (2 Sam. xiii. 12- 14). (Judging from Dinah's levity, it was not with- out hei consent.) — Ckamkr : Rape a sin against the sixth and seventh commandments. — What a disgrace, that great and mighty lords, instead of being an ex- ample to their subjects in chastity and honor, should surpass them in a dissolute and godless deportment. — Gerl-ich : Ver. 7. Fool and folly are terms used frequently in the Old Testament to denote the perpe- tration of tlie greatest crimes. The connection of the thought is this, that godlessness and vice are the greatest folly, etc. — Schroper : Josephus says, Dinah went to a fair or festival at Shechem. The person that committed the rape was the most ilistin- gtiished (ver. 19) son (the crown-prince, so to speak) of the ruling sovereign. — The sons of Jacob, for the first time, transfer the spiritual name of their father to the house of Jacob, etc. They are conscious, therefore, of the sacredness of their families. The sharp antithesis between Israel and Canaan enters in- to their consciousness (Baumgarten). b. 77ie propo- sal of marriage. Stauke : Although it is just and proper to strive to restore fallen virgins to honor by asking their parents or friends to give them in mar- riage, and thus secure their legal position and rights, ^■et it is putting the cart before the horse. — Little children bring light cares, grown children heavy cares. (God afterwards prohibited (Dent. vii. 3) them to enter into any friendly relations with the heathen nations.) c. The fanatical revenge of Jacob''. s sons. Starke : Take care that you do not indulge in wrath and feelings of revenge. — H.ill : Smiling malace is generally fatal. — Kven the most bloody machimitions are frequently gilded with religion. — FreibergerBibel : Hamor, the ruhng prince, is a sad example of an unfaithful and interested magistracy, who, under the pretence of the common welfare, pursues liis own ad- vantage and interests, while he tries to deceive his subjects. —The Sliechemites, therefore, did not adopt the Jewish religion from motives of pure love or a proper regard for it, but from self-interest and love of gain. — Cramer : It is no child's play, to treat re- Dgii-in in a thoughtless and careless way, and to chcinge from one form to another. — One violent son may bring destruction upon a whole city and countrv. — Hall : The aspect of external things constrains many more to a profession of religion, than con- icience (John vi. 26). But how will it be with those who do not use the sacraments from proper motives ? —Strictures upon the apology for this deed in the book of Judith, and by others. — Cramer : God some times punishes one folly by another. — Hall : To make the punishment more severe than the sin, is nfl less unjust than to injure. — What Shechem perpe trated alone, is charged upon all the citizens in com mon, because it seems that they were pleased with it. — Lange: This was a preliminary judpneiit of GoC! upon the Shechemites, thus to testify what the Ca- naanites in future had to expect from Jacob's dO' seend.ants. — Osiander : When magistr.ates sin, their subjects are generally punished with them. They evidently do not present circumcision as an entire- ly new divine service, as an initiation into the cove- nant with the God of Israel, but only as an external custom. — It is remarkable here, how adroitly Hamor and Shechem represent to the people as pertaining to the common advantage, what was only for their personal interest. — We here meet the wild Eastern vindictiveness in all its force. Moreover, tlie carnal heathen view, that all the people share in the act of the prince. — Schroder : We have here the same sad mixture of flesh and spirit which we have seen at the beginning, in Jacob. — Taobe : Sins of the world and sins of the saints in their connection, d. .Jacob't jutlimeni upon this crime. Stakke : (Jacob, no doubt, sent back all the captives with their cattle.) — (It seems that, while not altogether like Eli, he did not have his sons under a strict discipline, since his family was so large.) — For the wrath of man work eth not the righteousness of God (James i. 20). — ■ Gerlach : How miraculously God protected this poor, despised (?) company from mingling with the heathen on the one hand, and from persecution on the other.^ScHRoDER : Judging from this test, what would have become of Jacob's descendants, if divine grace had left them to themselves in such a way (Calvin) ? It was not due to themselves, certainly, that they were not entirely estranged from the kingdom of God, etc. Fourth Section. The departure to Bethel. Ch. XXXV. 1 -8. Starke : Because the true church was in Jacob's house, God would not permit it to be wholly destroyed, as Jacob, perhaps, conjectured — Chan e your garments. — Which are yet sprinkled with the blood of the Shechemites. — Osiander : Le- gitimate vows, when it is in our power to keep them, must be fulfilled (Dent, xxiii. 21). — Cramer: The Christian Church may err, and easily be led to super- stition ; pious bishops, however, are to recognije these errors, and to do away with them. They are to purify churches, houses, and servants, and pouit them to the word of God. Repentance and conver- sion of the soul is the proper purification of sins. — Bibl. Tub. : Is our worship to please God, then our hearts must be cleansed, and the strange gods, our wicked lusts, must be eradicated. — The proper refor- matiou of a church consists, not only in the extirpa- tion of idolatry and false doctrines, but also in the reformation of the wrong courses of life(Xeh. x. 29). — Ver. 8. All faithful servants, both males and fe- males, are to be well cared for when they become sick or feeble, and to be decently buried after their death.— Cramer : Christ is the pillar set up, both in the Old and New Testament ; he is anointed with the oil of gladness, and with him only we find the true Bethel, where God speaks «itli us.— Gerlach: Ver. 1, His worship of God connects itself with this critical point in his history. ,\s in the New Test., " The God of jieace and of comfort," etc., is frequent- ly mentioned, so also the faith of the patriarch clings to God in his peculiar personal revelations. It ii iOS GENESIS, OR TUE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. the God who revealed himself at Bethel, (Still the name, El-Bethel, given with the first revelation at Bethel, includes the whole journey of Jacob until his return to Bethel.) — Schrookr : Jehovah has accom- plished wliat he has said, — We can only approach the house of God in faith, when we have first penitential- ly put away fiom our houses all strange gods. (Mi- | CHAELis finds here the first and oldest trace of the j baptism of proselytes.) I consider that Deborah, a irise and pious matron, was esteemed, so to speak, by the servants ;is a grandmother, who served and con- iolcd Jacob (Luther). — Tacbe : The house of the patriarch Jacob as a mirror of Christian family hfe. Fiflli Section. The sealing nf tfie covenant between Ood and the patriarch at Bethel. Ch, x.txv. 9-15. j Btarkd : As God appears to Abraham ten times, so i he appears to Jacob six time; (ch. xxviiL l!J; xxii 11,13; xxxii. 1-2 ; xxxii. 24 ; xxxv. 1 ; the present passage; and ch. xlvi. •!). — Schroder; Now thai Jacob has become Israel in its luilest sense, the re- newal of the promise connected with the coiifeiTing of the name has a fir greater signifif;ition than be- fore (Hengstenbcrg). — Yer. IS. God comes down to us, wlienever he gives us a token of his ju'esence. Here, therefore, we have a desiiznation of the end of the vision (Calvin). — For tlie symbolical significaiioa of oil, see B ihr, — As Israel, as patriarchal ances- tor, the tbundation-stone of the spiritual tem]ile, he lays the first (?) stone to the building which his de- scendants are to complete, (Dreciisler: So much is certain, that the first idea of a definite house of God is connected with the Bethel of Jacob.) SEVENTH SECTION. Departure from Bethel. Benjamin's birth. RacheVs death. Chapter XXXV. 16-20. 16 And they journeyed from Betliel ; and there was but a little' way to come tc 17 Ephrath [fruit, the fruitful] : and Rachel travailed, and she had hard labor. And it came to pass, when she was in hard labor, that the tnidwife said unto her, Fear not ; thou 18 shalt have this son also.^ And it came to pass as her soul was in departing, (for she died,) that she called his name Ben-oni [my son of pain or sorrow] : but his father called liim 19 Benjamin [son of the right hand]. And Rachel died, and was buried in the way to Epiiratli, 20 whicli is Beth-lehem [house of bread]. And Jacob set a pillar [monument] upon her grave: that is the pillar of Rachel's grave unto this day. [1 yi5^"». toilers, Lange. Laboring, HcH^g „p ; Mnxphy: wh„» [« Ver. 21.-Murphy: threshing.— A. G.) r. Ver w~^^'°:^ 7"^ *°.'?™ f" tri'^e-princes (and tribe name«).-A. G.l n^iLl-k^-^""' ^./-^enc.( was the secret crimmal court in WeWhalia.\omewhat akin to our .gilanc com rhis';.o';rs\*4-iJ^onTaltafrh^fa^^'tr;;e°plrl'r'f^ -'^ their king, and prince. 574 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. PRELIMINAEY EEMABKS. A. It is ill full accordance with the mode of statement used in Genesis, that at this point, at which Esau passes out from connection with ihe theocratic history, the history of his family, as be- longing to the genealogical tree, should be presei-vcd in the memory of the people of God (see p. 495). B. The toledoth of the Edomites is recorded in a series of special genealogies : 1. The point of depar- ture : Ksau's wives and children, and his settlement upon the mountains of Seir (vers. 1-8) ; 2. Esau's sons and grandsons viewed as tribe-fathers (vers. 9- 14); 3. the tribe-chiefs or princes of the house of Esau (vers. 15-19); 4. the genealogy of the abori- gines of the land, the Horites, with whom the Edom- ites, as conquerors, are mingled (vers. '20-3"); 5. the kings of the land of Edoni (vers. 31-39) ; 6. the ruling princes, i. e., the heads of provinces, or rather the seats of chieftains, enduring throughout the reigns of the kings of Edom (vers. 40-43). — C. It is clear that these tables do not Ibrm any one peculiar chronological succession. The tables, numbor iliree of the Edoniitic princes, and four, of the llorite princes, form a parallel ; in point of time, indeed, the line of Horite princes must be regarded as the older line. So, also, table number five of the kings of Edom, is parallel with number six of the provincial princes or councillors of Edom. There are, therefore, but three iundaracntal divisions: 1. The sons and grand- sons of Edom ; 2. the old and new princes of Edom ; 3. the kingdom of Edom viewed as to its kings and as to its provincial rulers (or dukedoms). — In Deut. ii. 12, 22, the Edomites appear to have destroyed the Horites, as the aboriginal dweUers in Seir. But this must be understood in the sense of a warlike subju- gation, which resulted partly in their absorption, partly and mainly in placing the original dwellers in Ihe land in a state of bondage, and that wretched condition in which they are probably described in the book of Job (Job xvi. 1 1 ; xvii. 6 ; xxiv. 7 ; XXX. 1 ; see Knobkl, p. 277). Knobtl refers these tables, as generally all the completed genealogical tables in Genesis, to the Elohist. But this only is established, that the genealogical tables are, in their very nature, in great part Elohistic. EXEGETICAL AND CKITICAL. Esau^s wives and children^ and hi^ seUlefnent upon the tiwuniaii'S nf Seir (vera. 1-8). — Of Esau, that is Edom (ch. xxv. 30). — In ch. xxvi. 34 the two first wives of Esau are called Judith, the daughter of Been the Hittitc, and Bashemath, the daughter of Elon the Ilittite. In ch. xxviii. 9 the tliird wife bears the name of Mahalath, the daughter of Ish- mael. Here the daughter of Elon the Hitlite is called Adah, and in the place of Judith, the daugh- ter of Beeri the Hittite, we have Aholibamah, the daughter of Anah, the granddaughter of Zil)con the Hivite. Hut while the daughter of Elon is named Baflhemath above, here the daughter of Ishinael bears that name. It is perfectly arbitrary when Knobcl and olhers identify tlie Zibeon of ver. 2 with the Zibeon of ver. 21, and then, instead of the addi- tion, the Hivitc, rcarl the Horite. But Knobel re- •narks corri'Clly : " The different accounts (all of which he ascribes to the Elohist) agree in tills : a. Tl it Esau hab. BflCTRINAL AND ETHICAL. 1. The sacred history hangs up in the .reasi re house of the Old Testament the tables of -.he tole- doth of Ei^au, not merely because he too ?eceivedt blessing from God, and had the promise of a blessing (Kein, but more especially because he now break» the band of the theocracy, and passes out of view, just as it had done with the tables of the nations, and all the succeeding genealogical tables. God, indeed, per- mits the heathen to go their own way (.\cts xiv. 16 ; Ps. Ixxxi. 13), but is mindful of all his children (Acts XV. 14 f ; xvii. 26), even those who are in the king, dom of the dead [but in a different sense, surely — A. G.] (Luke xx. 38 ; 1 Peter iv. 6), and hence the people of God, too, preserve their memory in hope. 2. We may suppose that Edom at first preserved the patriarchal religion, although in a more external form. Its vicinity to the trilie of Judah, if it made any proper use of it, was a permanent blessing. The idolatry of Edom is not referred to frequently even in later history. The only allusions are 1 Kings xi. 1 ; ix. 8 ; 2 Chron. xxv. 14. From these intimations we may infer that Edom declined, to a certain extent, into heathen, religious darkness, but much more in- to moral depravity (see Ex. xv. 15, and other pas- sages). The people of Israel are frequently remind- ed, however, in the earlier history, to spare Esau's people, and treat them as brethren (Deut. ii. 4, 5 ; xxiii. 7, 8). It may be remarked, by the way, that these passages show the early age of Deuteronomy, since Edom stands in other relations at a later period. The refined theocratic recollection in Edom, avails so far as to even awaken and cherish its jealousy of Israel. And in this respect Edom stands in the relation of an envious, malicious, .and fake brother of Israel, and becomes a type of Antichrist (Obadiah). This, however, does not exclude the promise of salvation for the historic Edom, in its individual members (Isai. xi. 14; Jer. xlix. 17 fF.). We do not read of any special conversion of Edom to Cliristianity, per haps (see, however, Mark iii. 8), because the violent conversion of Edom to the Jewish faith, under John Hyrcanus, had first occurred, by which Edom was par. tially merged into the Jews, and partially amalga- mated with the Bedouin Arabs. To return back to Jacob, or to fall away to Ishmael, was the only alter- native open to Edom. 3. In the Herodian slaughter of the children at Bethlehem, however, the old thought of Esau, to kill his brother Jacob, becomes actual in the assault upon the life of Jesus. 4. The history of the Edomites falls at last mtii the history of the Herods. For this history, as for that of Edom, we may refer to the Bible Dictionaries, the sources of religious history (Josephus, and others), and books of travels. [Robinson, " Re- searches," vol. ii. p. 551 ff. — A. G-] 5. The table here is composed of several tablej which portray, vividly and naturally, the origin of a kingdom: I. The period of the iribe-chiels ; 2. the iieriod of the peculiar [lermanent tribe-princes ; 3. the period of the formation of the kingdom, and its continued existence upon the basis of permanent tribe principaUiies or dukedoms. 8. The subjugation of the Horites (whom ne ar» not to regard as savages, merely because they dwell in caves) by the Edomites, and' the fusJcn of both oeople inderan Edomitic kingdom, represents to ui 578 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. vividly the process of the fonnation of a people, as in a precisely similar way it has occurred a hundred times in the history of the world. In sacred history we may refer here especially to the rise of the Sa- maritans, and in later history, to the formation of the Roman people. The Franks overcame the Gauls as the Edomltes the Horites, although under different moulding relations. This great forming process is now ■ takins place under our very eyes in North America. But these historical growths of a people are the sub- ject of a special divine providence (Acts xvii. 26). 7. We are here reminded again of the prominent personal view of all the relations of life in the sacred Scriptures. At the close of the whole evolution of a people it is said again : This is Esau. He lives still, as the father, in the entire people ; stamps even the Horitic element with his own image. 8. The discovery of the wann springs by Anah, is an example of human discoveries in their accidental and providential bearings and significance. [Words- worth says : There is an important moral in these generatioris of Ei^au. They show that the families of the carnal race of this world develop themselves more rapidly than the promised seed. Ishmael and Esau come sooner to their possession *^an Isaac and Jacob. The promised seed is of slow gr » fit. It is like the grain of mustard-seed (Matt. xiii. 31). The fulfilments of all God's promises, of great blessings to his people, are always long in coming. But the kingdoms of this world would soon fade, while the kingdom of heaven will endure for ever (p. 147, 148). — A.G.] HOMTLETICAL AND PEAOTIOAl. Meditations upon this chapter must be connected with the general declarations as to Esau, e. g., with Isaac's blessing upon him, with the prophetic p.is- Bages relating to Esau, with the history of the Herods, with Acts xvii. 26, or with other New Testament passages. — The fulfilling of tlie blessing upon Esau. — Esau's development. — The ancient and modern Edom. — How Israel even in later days regarded the fraternal relation of Edom as sacred. Starke : This narrative of Esau has, doubtless, its important uses, partly as it shows how richly God fulfils his promises (ch. xxv. 23 ; xxvii. 39, 40), partly as it sets before the descendants of Jacob, how far the boundaries of Esau's descendants reach, and partly as thence the Israelites are earnestly forbidden to encroach upon them(Deut. ii. 4, 6), except in rela- tion to the Amalekites (Ex. xvii. 14). Moreover, there were many pious men among the descendants of Esau, who were in covenant with God. Observe how the patriarchal sacrificial service continued for a long time among the Edomltes, until, after the exodus of the Israelites from Kgyi)t, the church of the Edomltes gradually declined, etc. (Taken in part from Rambach'.') " Ecclesiastical History.") Ver. 3. These names lead one to think of Jolj's friends. (He then remarks, that .some suppose that Job's friend Eliphaz descended from this one, while oiherB regard tho Eliphaz of Job as still older.) View of the Edo- milM and of the Amalekites. — (Ver. 24. Mulea, ac- cording to Luther. The Hebrew word occurs bet once in the sacred Scriptures, and is, therefore, more difficult to explain. The Sept. has formed from it a man's name; the Chaldee renders u "giants;" the Samar. Emim, a race of giants ; in the Arabic some understand a kind of warm bath; others, a kind ol healing drug.) — Ver. 33. This Jobab is held by some, though without any good reason, as the same with Job. — OsiANDER : The kingdom of Christ alone endure and is eternal; the other kingdoms and sovereign ties, which are of this world, are subject to fre- quent changes, and, indeed, decay and perish (Ps. Ixxxix. 3, 4). Whatever rises rapidly disappears rapidly also (Ps. xxxvii. 36 f.). Lanqe : Jacob, not less than Abraham and Isaac, was a type of Christ: 1. According to the promise, the lord over all Canaan, but he had nothing of his own there but the parcel of the field which he bought at Shechem. Thus, Christ also is the Lord of the whole world, etc. ; 2. Jacob a great shepherd, Christ the chief shepherd ; 3. Jacob's long service for Rachel and Leah, Christ in the form of a servant and his ser^ vice ; 4. Jacob gained two herds, Christ the Jew* and Gentiles ; 5. Jacob a prophet, priest, and king, the three offices of Christ ; 6. Jacob's wrestling, and Christ's agony and struggle ; 7 . Jacob lame in his thigh, Christ and the prints of the nails and spear; 8. Jacob left behind him twelve patriarchs, Christ the twelve apostles. Geri.ach : Calvin's re- marks. We must here remember, that those sep- arated from God's covenant rise quickly and de- cay rapidly, like the grass upon the house-tops, which springs up quickly and soon withers be- cause it has no depth of earth and roots. Both of Isaac's sons have the glorious promise that kings shall come from them ; now they appear first among the Edomltes, and Israel seems to be set aside. But the course of the history shows how much better it is first to strike the roots deep in- to the earth, than to receive immediately a tran- sitory glory which vanishes away in a moment. The believer, therefore, while he toils slowly on- wards, must not envy ihe rapid and joyful pro- gress of others, for the permanent prosperity and blessedness promised to him by the Lord is of far greater value. — Schroder: (Ranke:) The Is- raelites also were to be encouraged in their con- test, through the conspicuous victory which the Edomltes la earlier times had obtained over the numerous tribes of Seir. (Baumgarten :) This exter- nal glory in the very beginning of Esau's history, stands in striking contrast to the simple relations in the family of Jacob, but corresponds jjerfectly with the whole previous course of our history, which, from the begiiming, assigns worldly power and riches to the line which lies beyond the cove nant and union with God, while it sets forth the litnnility and retiiing nature in the race chosen by (loil. — In later history, the kingdom among the lidomites ilppears to have been hereditary (I Kings xi. 14). — Ver. 43. (Baumgarten :) We may ex plain the fact that only eleven names are found liere, while there are fourteen above, upon th« supposition that some of the seats of power em braced more than one princely fimilv. CBAP. XXXVII. 1-S8. 57* THIRD PERIOD. The Genesis of the People of Israel in Egypt from the Twelve Branches of Israel or the History of Joseph and his Brethren. Joseph the Patriarch of the Faith dispensation through Humiliation and Exaltation. — Ch. XXXVII. 1 — L. FIRST SECTION. Jacob's incormderate fondness for Joseph. Joseph's dreams. Hit hrothers' envy. Joseph sold into Egypt. Chaptkb XXXVn. 1-36. 1 And Jacob dwelt in tlie land wherein his father was a stranger, in the land of 2 Canaan. These are the generations of Jacob. Joseph being seventeen years old, waa feeding the flock with his brethren ; and the lad was with the sons of Bilhah, and with the sons of Zilpah, his father's wives : and Joseph brought unto his father their evil 3 report.' Now Israel loved Joseph more than all liis children, because he was the son of his old age''; and he made him a coat of many colors' [a beautiful robe, oh. rxvii. is], 4 And wijen his brethren saw that their fatlier loved him more than all his brethren, they 5 hated him, and could not speak peaceably unto him. And Joseph dreamed a dream. 6 and he told it to his brethren : and they hated him yet the more. And he said unto 7 them. Hear, I pray you, this dream which I have dreamed : For, behold, we were binding sheaves in the field, and, lo. my sheaf arose, and also stood upright; and, 8 behold, your sheaves stood round about, and made obeisance to my sheaf And his brethren said unto him, Shalt thou indeed reign over us? or shalt thou indeed have dominion over us? and they hated him yet the more for his dreams, and for his words. ' 9 And he dreamed yet another dream, and told it to his brethren, and said. Behold, I have dreamed a dream more ; and, behold, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars made 10 obeisance unto me. And he told it to his father, and to his brethren; and his (inther rebuked him, and said unto him. What is this dream that thou hast dreamed ? Shall ] and thy mother and thy brethren indeed come to bow down ourselves to thee to the 11 earth? And his brethren envied him; but his father observed [kept, prcserTed] the say- 12, 1.3 ing. And his brethren went to feed their father's flock in Shecliem. And Israel said unto Joseph, Do not thy brethren feed the flock in Shecliem? come, and I will send thee 14 unto them. And he said to him. Here am I. And he said to him. Go, I pray thee, see whether it be well with thy brethren, and well with the flocks; and bring me word 15 again. So he sent him out of the vale of Hebron, and he came to Shechem. And a certain man found him, and, behold, he was wandering in the field : and the man asked 16 him, saying, What seekest thou? And he said, I seek my brethren: tell me, I pray 17 thee, where they feed their flocks. And the man said. They are departed hence; for I heard them say, Let us go to Dothan [the two wells]. And Joseph went afler h;« 18 brethren, and found them in Dothan. And when they saw him afar off, even before 19 he came near unto them, they conspired against him to slay him. And they said one 20 to another. Behold, this dreamer [man ol dreams] cometh. Come now, theiefore, and lei us slay him, and cast him into some pit ; and we will say. Some evil beast Lath de- 21 voured him : and we wi'l see what will become of his dreams. And Reuben h'lard it s»80 GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. and he delivered him [sought to deliver'] out of their hands ; and he said, Let us r it kill him 22 And Reuben said unto them, Shed no blood, hut cast him inio this pit that is in th< wilderness, and lay no hand upon him ; that he might rid him out of their hands, tc 23 deliver him to his father again. And it came to pass, wnen Joseph was come unto his brethren, that they stripped Joseph out of his coat, his coat of many colors that vjoi 24 on him. And they took him, and cast him into a pit: and the pit was empty, there was 25 no water in it. And they sat down to eat bread: and they lifted up tlieir eyes and looKed, and, behold, a company of Ishmaelites [a caravan] came from Gilead. with theii camels bearing spices [tragakanth-grum], and balm, and myrrh, going to carry it down tt -26 Egypt. And Judah said unto his brethren. What profit is it if we slay our brother, 27 and conceal his blood ? Come, and let us sell bim to the Islimaelites, and let not our hand be upon him ; foi he is our brother, and our flesh. And his brethren were content. 28 Then there passed by Midianites, merchantmen ; and they drew and lifted up Joseph out of the pit, and sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites for twenty pieces of silver: and they 29 brought Joseph unto Egypt. And Reuben returned unto the pit; and, behold, Joseph 30 was not in the pit: and he rent his clothes. And he returned unto his brethren, and 31 said, The child is not; and I, whither shall I go? And they took Joseph's coat, and 32 killed a kid of the goats, and dipped the coat in the blood. And they sent the coat of many colors and they brought it to their father ; and said. This have we found ; know 33 now whether it he thy son's coat or no. And hk. knew it, and said, It is my son's coat 34 an evil beast hath devoured him ; Joseph is without doubt rent in pieces. And Jacob rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his son many days. 35 And all his sons, and all his daughters, rose up to comfort him ; but he refused to be comforted ; and he said, For I will go down into the grave [sheol] * unto my son mourn- 36 ing. Thus his father wept for him. And the Midianites sold him into Egypt, unto Potiphar [Septuagint: nereijipis, belonging to the buh], an officer of Pharaoh's [king; Lepsius: sun], and captain of the guard. 1' Ver. 2.^n5"l DP3n. LXX., i|*070»' ttovt^poc ; Vulgate, more strongly, accw5atJi7/ra(re5 swos apu(fpa/rem crtmifw pestimo. From 23T , an onomatope {dabab — dab—dabbfey^ denoting a light, oft-repeated sound (tap-tap), or motitm, like the Arabic 1,^4^ leniter incessit, replavit. In either way the noun n3'n would come to mean a rumor whispered, or creeping round. It does not mean that Joseph made accusations against them, as the 'v'ulgate has it, but that, in boyish simplicity, he repeated what he had heard about them. The root D2*l occurs only Cant. ni. 10, where Gesenius gives it the sense o\ lightty finwing, which hardly seeras consistent with the radical idea of repetition. The light motion of the lips, like one muttering, or faintly attempting to speak in sleep, as our translators have given it, is more in accordance with the nature of the root. — T. L.1 [* Ver. 3. — D'^3pT "iS . Rendered, son of his old age, TrjAvycros. But, as Maimonides well remarks, this could not have been the cise with Joseph in a degree much exceeding the relation to the father of Issachar and Zebulon. Ho thinks, therefore, that he was so called, not bec;iuse he was late bora, but because he stayed at home, and thus became his father's principal stay and support — " as L-i the custom of old men to retain one son, in this manner, whether the younger* or not — '^S'pTb PT^'^ ".IIUD— that is, be to him -jTipoTpo^os or yTjpo/Soo-KOv, as the Greeks called it." In this view the plural form would be intensive, denoting extreme old age, to which the other places where the form occurs would well agree, Gen. xsi. 2, 7 ; xliv. 20. After Joseph, lieojamin performed this duty. The Turgum of Onkelos seems to have had something of this kind in view, when it renders it nb C'^DH "l~ , his wise son — his careful son, who provided for him. — T. L.) [3 Vc-r. 3, — C©D rSPS, coat of many colors, — rather, coat of pieces. The context shows that it was something beautiful and luxurious ; the other passage where it occurs, 2 Sam. xiii. 18, shows that it may denote a garment for either sex, and the plural form indicates variety of construction or material. The primary sense of the root, DOS , is diminntioTi, not diffusion, as Gesenius says (see HDD). This is inferred from the use of D5X for something small, as the end or extremity of anything, and the parallelism of the verb, Ps. xii. 2,— a garment distinguished for small spot*, stripes, i}T fringes — 1. L.] [* Ver. 35. — On the etymology of 31X11' see Excursus, p. 585 eqq. — T. L.] OENEBAL PRELIMINARY REMABKS. 1. It is to be noted ber^ in the first place, that thu history of Joseph is amplified beyond that of aiiv »!' tin; patriarchs hitherto. This is explained liy the contact which .Jo.seph'» transportation ^ives rise to between the Hebrew spirit and the Egyptian cnltiire and literature. \ trace of this may be found in the history of Abr.'diatn ; for after .Abraham hail been In Eu'y(it, his history be.omcs tnore full. V'th the neuioiabilia of Joseiih connects itself tb ■ ooount of Moses, who was educated in all the different branches of Egyptian learning, whilst this again )ioints to Samuel and the schools of the prophcLs. '1. Knobel regards .loseph's liistory as having grown out of the original Elohistic text connected with a later revision (p. 28s). lie supposes, liowever, in this case, two halves, wiiieh, taken sej)ara'ely, hav* iiosignilicance. That Joset)h was sold into I'-gvpt, ac« cording to the snjiposed original text, can iidy be explain! d Votn the fact mentioned in the supposed additions. Iliat ho had 'Ucurred th" hatred of hi» UUAP. XXXVII. 1-36. 5» brethren by reason of his aapiring dreams. Reu- ben's proposition to cast Joseph into the pit, and » liict aimed at his preservation, was not added until ifterwards, it is said. Even Joseph's later declara- tion : I was stolen from the country of the Hebrews, 18 regarded as mal;ing a difference. Dehtz.-ich, too, ^opts a combination of different elements, witliout, however, recognizing the contradictions raised by Knobel (p. 517). He presents, also, as a problem difficult of solution, the usage of tlie divine names in this last period of Genesis. In ch. xxxvii. no name of God occurs, but in ch. xxxviii, it is Jehovah that slays Judah's sons, as also, in cli. xxxix., it is Jeho- vah that blesses Joseph in Potiphar's house, and in person ; as recognized by Potiphar hicnself. Oidy in ver. 9 we find Elohim, — the name Jehovah not being here admissible. From ch. xl. onward, the name Jehova': disappears. It occurs but once be- tween ch. xl. and 1., as in ch. xlix. 18, when Jacob uses it : "I have waited for thy salvation, Jehovah." For different interpretations of this by Keil, Drechs- ler, llengstenberg, Baumgarten, and Delitzsch, see Delitzsch, p. 615. The three last agree in this, that the author of Genesis, in the oft-repeated Elohim, wished here to mark more emphatically, by way of contrast, the later appearance of the Jehovah- period, Exod. iii. 6. This would, indeed, be a very artificial way of writing books. The riddle must find its solution in actual relations. The simple ex- planation is, that in the history of a Joseph, which stands entirely upon an Elohistic foundation, this name Elohim pTcdominantly occurs. Joseph is the Solomon of the patriarchal times. 3. The generations of Jacob coimect themselves irith those of Esau. Delitzsch justly remarks, p. 511, that the representation which follows (ch. ixxvii. to ch. 1.), was intended to be, not a mere his- tory of Joseph, but a history of Jacob in his sons. Otherwise Judah's history, ch. xxxviii., would appear as an interpolation. The twelve sons of Jacob con- stitute Israel's new seed. The latter fact, of course, has the stronger emphasis. The generations of Jacob are the history and successions of his poster- ity— that is, his living on in his posterity, just as Adam's tholedoth. Gen. v. 1, represent the history of Adam, not personally, but historically, in hi;! descend- uits. 4. Joseph's history is considered in a triple rela- tion : as the history of the genesis of the Israelitish people in Egypt ; as an example of a special provi- dence, such as often brings good out of evil, as ex- emplified in ihe book of Job ; and as a type of the fundamental law of God in guiding the elect from suffering to joy, from humiliation to exaltation^a law already indicated in the life of Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but which, henceforth, develops it- self more and more (especially in the history of David), to terminate, at last, in the life of Jesus, as presen ting the very sublimity of the antithesis. Hence the appearance, in our history, of individual types represeLting the New-Testament history of Jesus, such as the jealousy and hatred of Joseph's brethren, the fact of his being sold, the fulfilment of Joseph's prophetic dreams in the very efforts intended to pre- tent his exaltation, the turning of his brothers' wick- 'A plot to the salvation of many, even of themselves, »nd of the house of Jacob, the spiritual sentence pronouuced on the treachery of the brethren, the victory of pardoning love, Judah's suretyship for Benjamin, his emulating Joseph in a spirit of re- ieeming resignation, Jacob's joyful reviving on hear- ing of the life and glory of his favorite son, whon he had believed to be dead. Concerning Israel's genesis in Egyp;, Delitzsch remarks : " According to a law of divine providences, to be found not only in tlie Old Testament, but also in the New (?), not the land of the promise, but a foreign country, is the place where the Clmrcb is born, and comes to maturity. This foreign country, to the Old-Testament Church, is the land of Egypt. To go before his people, to prepare a place for them, is Joseph's high vocation. Sold into Egypt, he opens the way thither to the house of Jacob, and the same country where he matures to maidiood, where he suf- fers ill prison, and attains to glory, becomes, to his f miily, the land where it comes to the maturity of a nation, — the land of its servitude, and of its re- demption. Thus far Joseph's history is the overture of Jacob's history — a type of the way of the Church ; not of Jehovah only, but of Christ in his progress from humiliation to exaltation, from subjection to freedom, from sufferings to glory." See Matt. ii. 15 ; Hosca xi. 1. Israel's riches of election and endow- ment are to be developed by contact with different heathen nations, and especially with Egypt. Just as Christianity, the completed revelation of the now covenant, developed itself formally for the world, by its reciprocal intercourse with a Gra;co-Komanic culture, thus was it also with the faith of the old covenant in its reciprocal intercourse with the old Egyptian world-culture, as shown especially in the history of Joseph, Moses, and Solomon who became the son-in-law of one of the Pharaohs. More prom- inently does this appear, again, in the history of Alex- andrian Judaism ; in which, however, the interchange of influence with Egypt becomes, at the same time, one with that of the whole Orient, and of Greece. The key of Jc«eph's history, as a history of prov- idence, is clearly found in the declaration made by him ch. xlv. 5-8, and ch. 1. 20. The full explanation, however, of its significance, is found in the history of Christ as furnishing its perfect fulfilment. Per- mission of evil, counteraction and modification of evil, frustration of its tendency, its conver- sion into good, victory over evil, destruction of evil, and reconciliation of the evil themselves, — these are the forces of a movement here represented in its most concrete and most powerful relations. The evil is conspiracy, treachery, and a murderous plot sigainst their innocent brother. The conversion of it is of the noblest kind. The plot to destroy Jo- seph is the occasion of his greatest glorification. But as God's sentence against the trembling con- scious sinner is changed into grace, so also the tri- umph of pardoning love overcoming hatred becomes conspicuous as a glorious omen in Joseph's lite. " Inasmuch," says Delitzsch, " as Israel's history is a typical history of Christ, and Christ's history the typic;il history of the Church, so is Joseph a type of il'hrist himself What he suffered from his brethren, and which God's decree turned to his own and Ida nation's salvation, is a type of Christ's suffermgs, caused by his people, but which God's decree turned to the salvation of the world, including, finally, the salvation of Israel itself." Says Pascal {Pensees, ii. St, 2): "Jesus Christ is typified in Joseph, the be- loved of his father, sent by his father to his brethren, the innocent one sold by his brethren for twenty pie ces of silver, and then becoming their Lord, theii Saviour, the saviour of those who were aliens tc Israel, the saviour of the world, — all which would not have been if thev had not cherished the desigf 582 GENESIS, PR THE FIRST BOOK ,F MOSES. of destroying him — if they had not sold and rejected him. Joseph, tlie imiocent one, in prison with two malefactors — Jesus on the cross between two thieves; Joseph predicts favoiably to the one, but death to the other; Jesus saves the one, whilst he leaves the other in condemnation. Thus has the Church ever regarded Joseph's liistory." Already is this inti- mated in the Gospels. What Pascal here says, and 13 is also held by the fathers, e. g,. Prosper Aqui- tanus, (/' Promissionibut et Praedictionibus Dei, is but a brief statement of the pious thoughts of all believers, in the contemplation of the history. It is this which imparts to the wonderful typical light here presented its irresistible chann. When, however, Joseph is made the exclusive centre of our history, and the patriarchal type of Christ (Kdktz, "History of the Old Testament," i. p. 343), Kcil presents, in opposition, some most im- portant considerations. It is, indeed, no ground of difference (as presented by him), that Joseph became formally naturalized in Egypt; for Christ, too, was delivered to the heathen, and died out of the camp. Nor does it make any important difference that Jo- seph received no special revelations of God at the court of Pharaoh, as Daniel did at the court of Nebuchadnezzar ; the gift of interpreting dreams he also, like Daniel, referred back to God. Of greater importance is the remark that Joseph is nowhere, in the Scriptures themselves, presented as a type of Christ ; yet we must distinguish between verbal references and real relations, .such as might be indi- cated in Zach. xi. 12, and in Chiisfs declaration that one of his disciples should betray him. There is, however, a verbal reference in Stephen's speech. Acts vii. 9. Tliere is no mistaking the fact that the Messianic traces in our narrative are shared both by Joseph and Judah. Judah appears great and no- ble througliout the history of Joseph ; the instance, however, in which he is wilhng to sacrifice himself to an unhmited servitude for Benjamin, makes him of equal dignity with Joseph. So in Abraham's sac- rifice, the Messianic typical is distrilmted between him and Isaac. Joseph's glory is preeminently of a prophetic kind ; the weight of a priestly voluntary self-sacrifice inchnes more to the side of Judah. Benjamin, too, has his Messianic ray ; for it is espe- cially on his account that the brethren may appear before Joseph in a reconciling light. On Hiller's " Typological Contemplation of Joseph," see Keil, p. 242. MEiNEitizHAGEN, in his "Lectures on the Christology of the Old Testament" (p. 204), treats of the typical significance of Joseph with great ful- ness. It is also to be noted that ever afterwards Benjamin appears theocratically and geographically coimected with Judah. .'5. The disposition of Joseph's history, and the lettlement of the Israelites in Egypt, as well as its -elation to the Ilyksos of whom Josephus speaks (contra A/tioii, i. 14), in an extract from Manetho's history, presents a question of great historical inter- est (see Delitzscii, p. 518). The extract concerning the Hyksoa has a mythical look. Still darker are other things which Josephus gives us from Manetho and Chajremon (contra Ap., i. 26, 32). Different Tiews : 1) The Ilyksos and the Israelites are iden- tical ; 80 Manetho, Josephus, lingo (irotius, Hof- mann, Knobel (p. 301), and, in a moiliUed form, H'jyffarth, ridcmann. 2) The Ilyksos are distinct from the iHraeliies; they were another Shemitic tribe — Arabians, or Phmnicians ; so Cuiiacus, Scal- iger, etc This view, says Delitzscb, is now the pre- vaihng one. So also Ewald, Lepsius, Saalsch iU but with different combinations. On these see De. LiTzscH, p. fi21. 3) The Hyksos were Scytiians so ChampoUiou, RosselUni. The first view is op. posed by the fact that the IsraeUtes Ibundcd no dynasties in Egypt, as did the Hyksos ; nor did they exist there under shepherd-kings, as the name Hyksoj has been interpreted. Against the second view De- litzscb insists that the people of Egypt, into who«j servitude Israel fell, appear as a people foreign to them, and by no means as one connected with them. The Shemitic idea, however, is so extended, tha* we cannot always suppose a theocratic element along with it. The most we can say is, t.:at the Hyksos, who, no doubt, were a roving band of conquerors, came from Syria, or the countries lying north and east beyond Palestine. In the Egyptian tradition, their memory seems to have been so mingled with that of the Israelites, that it would seem almost im- possible to separate the historical element from such a mixture. Since, however, the Israelitish history seems more obscured by that of the Hyksos than contradicted, it may be regarded as more probable that the latter came latest. The pressure of the Israelites upon the Canaanites, from the east, may have driven them in part to the south ; and the weakening of Egypt by the destruction of Pharaoh and his army, forty years before, might have favored a conquest. The chronological adjustment, however, must be left to itself. For a fuller treatment of this subject, see E. Bohmer, " The First Book of the Thora" (Halle, 1862); appendix, p. 205, etc. Accord- ing to Lepsius, the appearance of the Hyksos iij Egypt preceded the history of Joseph. At all events, this dim tradition bears testimony to the Israelitish history in many particulars (e. g., that they foimded Jerusalem in Judea). On the full confirmation of Joseph's history by Greek historians and by Egyp- tian monuments, compare Delitzsch, p. 524, etc. ; Hengstenberg, "The Pentateuch and Egypt," Ber- lin, 1841. 6. The history of Israel's settlement in Egypt ex- tends through the sections that follow : 1 ) The corrup- tion in Jacob's house, the dispersion of his sons, the loss of Joseph (ch. xxxviii.-xxxix.). 2) Joseph's elevation, and the reconciliation and gathering of his brethren (ch. xl.-l.). 3) Israel's transplantation to Egypt (cli. xlvi.-xlvii. 26). 4) The keeping of the divine promise, and the longing of Israel to return home to Canaan (ch. xlvii. 27-ch. 1.). EXEGETICAIj and CRITICAl. Contents : The conspiracy of Jacob's sons against their brother Joseph, considered in its awful dark- ness, or the deep commotion and apparent destruc- tion of Jacob's house : 1. The occasion (vers. 1-1 1); 2. the opportunity, and the plot of murder (vers. 12-20); 3. Reuben's attempt to rescue ; 4. Judah's effort to save, unknowingly crossing that of Reuben (vers. 26-27) ; 6. the crime, the beginning of mourn- ing, the hiding of guilt (vers. 28-32); 6. Jacob'f deep grief, and Joseph apparently lost (vers. 33-36), 1. T/te occasion (vers. 1-11). — In the land of Canaan. — It seems to have been made already hit permanent homo, but soon to assume a difl'crent ap pearance. — The generations (see above). — Joseph being seventeen years old. — A statement very important in respect both to the present oc<;urrenc« and the future history. la ch. xli. 46, be is men CHAP. XSXVn. 1-36. .•is; tioned a? tlurty years old. His sufferings, tlierefore, lasted about thirieen years. At this age of seveuteeu he became a shepherd with his brethren. Jacob did not send liis favorite son too early to the herds ; yet, though the favorite, he was to begin to serve be- low the rest, as a shepherd-boy. At tliis age, how- ever, .Joseph had great naiveness and simplicity. He therefore imprudently tells his dreams, lilce an inno- cent child. On the other hand, however, he w,is very sedate; he was not enticed, therefore, by the evil example of some of his brethren, but considered it his duty to inform his father. — And the lad was with the sons of Bilhah. — For the sons of Bilhah Rachel's servant stood nearer to him, while those of Leah were most opposed. He brought to his father ns"i Dr:n rs, translated by Keil, evil reports con- cerning them. A direct statement of their offences would doubtless have been differently expressed. They were an offence to those living in the vicinity. This determined him to inform his father, but it does not exclude a conviction of his own. It is inadmis- sible to refer this to definite sins (as, e. g., some have thought of unnatural sins). That the sons of the concubines surpassed the others in rude conduct, is easily understood. Joseph's moral earnestness is, doubtless, the first stumbling-block to his brethren, whilst it strengthens his father in his good opinion. The beautiful robe was the second offence. It is called C^SD n5r3, "an outer garment of ends," which extends, hke a gown, to the hands and the ancles. The Septuagint, which Luther's translation follows, renders it " a coat of many colors." Comp. 2 Sam. xiii. IS. The common tunic extended only to the knees, and was without arms. Already this preference, which seemed to indicate that Jacob in- tended to give him the i-ight of the first-born, aroused the hatred of his brethren. One who hates cannot greet heartily the one who is hated, nor talk with him frankly and peaceably. In addition to this, Jo- seph, by his dreams and presages (though not yet a prudent interpieter), was pouring oil upon the flames. At all events, the ^2^^ (lo), as repeated in his narra- tion, shows that he had a presentiment of something great. Both dreams are expressive of his future ele- vation. In Egypt he becomes the fortunate sheaf- , binder whose sheaf " stood up " du.ing the famine. The second dream confirms tiie first, whilst present- ing the further thought : even the sun and moon — that is, according to Jacob's interpretation, even his father and his mother — were to bow before him. Ra- chel died some time before this. On this account the word mother has been referred to Bilhah, or to Benjamin as representing Rachel, or else to Leah. The brethren now hated him the more, not merely as recognizing in his dreams the suggestions of am- bition, but with a mingled feeling, in which there was not wanting a presentiment of his possible exalta- tion— as their declaration, ver. 20, betrays. In Ja- cob's rebuke we perceive also mingled feelings. There is dissent from Joseph's apparently pretentious prospects, a fatherly regard toward the mortified brettrsn, yet, withal, a deeper presentiment, that caused him to keep these words of Joseph in his heart, as Mary did those of the shepherds. As the naivete of tie shepherd-boy was evidence of the tnth fulness oi these dreams, so the result testifies to the higher origin of a divine communication, con- ditioned, indeed, by the hopefully presagefiil life of Joseph. These dreams were probably intended to tustain Joseph during his thirteen years of wretch- edness, and, at the same time, to prepare him to b< an interpreter. The Zodiac, as here brought in b5 Knobel, has no significance, nor the custom of placing a number of sheaves together. 2. llie opportunUy and tk'' plot of niitrder (vera 12-211). — In Shechem. — There is no ground foi supposing another Shechem, as some have done, on account of what had formerly occurred there. It it more likely that Jacob's sons courageously returned to the occupation of the parcel of land formerly ac- quired by them. This very circumstance, however, may have so excited the anxiety of the cautious parent that he sent Joseph after them. That Joseph could have lost his way at Shechem is easily ex- plained, since he was so young when his father lived there. — In Dothan, — The Septuagint has Audaciu, .Judith iv. 6 ; vii. 3 ; viii. 3 ; AiuSaV 2 Kings vi. 13, Dothan. It was a place above Samaria, towards the plain of Jezreel, according to Josephus and Hierony- mus. " Thus it was found by Robinson and Smith :d their journey of 1S52, and also by Van de Velde, in the southeast part of the plain of Jabud, west of Genin. It is a beautiful green dell, always called Dothan, at whose south foot a fountain rises." De- litzsch. Through the plain of Tell-Dothan a high- way passes from the northwest to Ramleh and Egypt. — 'They conspired against him That Reuben and Judah were not concerned in this, is plain from what follows. — This dreamer cometh. — Spoken contemptuously — master of dreams, dream-man. The word nifen does not express contempt of itself, as is seen from ch. xxiv. 65, the only other place in which it occurs. It denotes something unexpected and remarkable. — Into some pit. — Cisterns (se« Winer : wells). — And wo shall see. — They thought by their fratricide surely to frustrate his ex- altation— a proof that his dreams alarmed them ; but by this very deed, as controlled by God's providence, they bring it about. 3. Reuhen's artful attempt at saviiig (vers. 21- 24). The text states directly that Reuben made his proposition in order to save Joseph. Knobel, by a frivolous criticism, would foist a contradiction upon the text, namely, that Reuben made the proposition in order to let him perish in the pit ; since a blood- less destruction of life seems to have been regarded as less criminal than a direct killing. But, then, the Reviser must have imparted to Reuben's proposition a different interpretation, by means of an addition. Reuben, it is true, had to express himself in such a way that the brothers might infer his intention to let him perish in the pit ; but this was the only way to gain their consent. — They stripped Joseph out of his coat. — The object of their jealousy and their wrath. — And the pit was empty So that he did not perish. His cries for mercy they remembered many years afterwards (ch. xli. 21). 4. JndaKs bold attempt to snve kim {vers.25-2^). — And they sat down. — Through this apparent insensibility their inward agony is betrayed; it ap- pears in their agitated looking out, so that they espy the Ishmaelites already at a great distance. — And behold, a company of Ishmaelites. — -^ caravan, nn~!< (Job vi. 19). " This caravan (as Robinson'j description shows) had crossed the Jordan at Beisan, and followed the highway that led from Beisan and Zerin to Ramleh and Egypt, entering the plain of Dothan west of Genin." Delitzsch. In vers. 25, 27, and 28, the merchants are called Ishmaelites. whilst in the first part of ver. 28 they are stylef 584 GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. Midianites, and in ver. 36 Medanites. Knobel, of course, regards them as different traditions (p. 29S). Ver 28, however, would seem to tell us that the Ish- maelites were the proprietors of the caravan, which was made up, for the most part, of Midianitish peo- ple. In a similar manner, probably, as Esau made a number of the Ilorites subject to hiiu, so had the Ishmaelites also brought under them a number of the Midianites. One hundred and fifty years, the time that had elapsed since Ishmacl's departure from Abraham, would give a sufficient increase tor tliis (see Keil, p. 2-14). As merchants, they were trans- porting costly products of their country to Egypt. Gum-tragacanth is found in Syria; the balm of Gilead was especially renowned, and was sold to Phoenicia and Egypt ; ladanum (myrrli), or the fra- grant rose of the cistus, is found in Arabia and Syria, as well as in Palestine (see Schdbert, iii. p. 114 and 174). Concerning the cisterns, or tlie artificially prepared reservoirs of rain-water, see the Diction- aries and geograi)hiial works. They might be full of water, or have mire at the bottom, or be entirely dry. They were frequently used as prisons (see Jer. xxxviii. 6; xl. 15). Schrodkr: "On his way to Damascus, Robinson found Khan Jubb Jiisuf (a kind of inn), tlie khan of Joseph's pit, so called after a well connected with it, and which for a long time, both among Christians and Mohammedans, was re- garded as the cistern into wliich Joseph was thrown." — ^And Judah said. — " Then Juilah began to use the language of a hypocritical self-interest," says De- litzsch. This, however, seems to be not at all justified by Judah's after-history. It must be presupposed that Judah was unacquainted with Reuben's inten- tion. The brethren were so much excited that Ju- dah alone could not have hoped to rescue Joseph from their hand. The ferocity, especially, of Simeon and Levi, is known to us from former history. Ju- dah, therefore, could think no otherwise than that Joseph nmst die from hunger in the pit. As in op- position to this, therefore, and not as a counteraction of Reuben's attempt at deliverance, is his proposal to be judged. He lived still, though a slave. There was a possibility of his becoming free. He might make his escape liy the caravan routes that passed south through his liome. Reuben, in his tenderness, had made a subtle attempt to save him. In the bolder policy of Judah we see that subtle attempt crossed by one more daring. No doubt both had some ill-feeling towards Joseph, and were, therefore, not c:ipiible of a nmtual and open undei'standing. That both, however, pre.served a better conscience than the rest, is evident from tlie later history. The unity of our story is not disturbed by Knobel's re- mark, " that a further tradition is given, EtrsEB. Prop. Kvantf., ix. 23, to the effect that, in order to escape the snares of his brethren, Joseph besought Arabians, who were near, to tal him to eat with his brethren in his then state of mind ; and he probably resorted to "olitude to think out a jilan of deliverance — And he rent hi» clothes. — The later custom (Matt. xxvi. 05) origin- ally sprung from vivid emotions of sorrow, — the rending as an exiiression of inward distraction. Afr terwards came this rending of garments upon the others (ch. xliv. 13).^And I, whither shall I go? — Not only as the first-born was he especially re- sponsible for the younger brother, but his tcndei fcehngs for him, and for the unhappy fiither, made hun the bearer of the agony of the guilty confede- racy ; and this to such a degree that he knew not what to do. — And they took Joseph's coat. — One transgression gives birth to another. With the consciousness that tried to conceal their guilt, there mingles the old grudge concerning the coat of many colors, which here turns itself even against the fa- ther. Doubtle-s, iu some degree, they thought them- selves justified in the tliought that the father had given them cause of irritation by providing such a coat for Joseph. Reuben and Judah are, njoreover, burdened by the ban of silence. 6. Jaeob's deep grief, and Joseph's appnreut loss (vers. .33-36).— It is nay son's coat. — Their decep- tion succeeded. In his agony he does not discover the fraud ; the sight of the blood-dyed garment led him to conclude : Surely an evil beast hath torn Jo- seph, and devoured him". — Sackcloth The sign of the deepest mourning (see Wmer : Trauer-sack ). — And mourned for his son Retaining also his garment of mourning. — And all his sons The criminals as comforters ! — And all Iiis daughters. — From this there arises the probaliility that Jacob had other daughters than Dinah, though the daugh- ter.--in-law may be so called. — For I will go down. — The "3 is elliptical, implying, nothing can comfort me, for, etc. — Mourning unto my sou.— There is, doubtless, somithing moie here than grief merely for the loss; there is also self-reproach for having exposed the child to such danger. — Into the grave (sheol). — In this mournful mood of Jacob does tiiis word sheol first occur. It was not the world bevond the grave considered as the gathering to the fatiiers, but the dark night of death and mourning. There are various derivations of this word. One that easdy suggests itself is that which marks it fiom iiSC, to demand — that place which inexorably demands all men back (Prov. xxx. 15; Is. v. 14; Heb. ii. 5). [See Excursus below, especially p. 586 sq. — T. L.] Ver. St). The word D^TD , according to its original significance, denotes an eunuch ; its later and more general interpretation is cour/ier. — Captain of the guard. — Literally a slayer, that is, au executioner (sec 2 Kings xxv. 8; Jer. xxxix. U). For purticulars, see Dei.itzsch, p. 531. On the chronology as con- nected with the remark that Josepli was sold when he was seventeen years old, see .-dso Deluzsch, p. 532. Joseph's history here suffers an intei'ruption by the in.sertion of an incident in the life of Judah. Ch. xxxviii. Delitzsch ascribes this to literary art on the part of the author, but of that we may doubt. It is, of itself, just the time that we should expect to learn something more about Judah. [Note on Genesis xxxvii. 35. The Piumitivi Conception of Sueoi,. — This is the first place it which the word occurs, and it is very important li CHAP. XXXVU. l-3o 58t irace, as far as we can, the earliest conception, or rather emotion, out of which it arose. "I will go down to ray son mourning to Sheol," — towards Sheol, or, on the way to Sheol,— the reference boiug to the decline of life terminating in that unknown state, place, or coudition of being, so called. One thing is clear : it was not a state of not-being, if we niiiy use so paradoxical an expression. Jacob was going to his son ; he was still his son ; there is yet a tie between him and his father ; he is still spoken of as a personality ; he is still regarded as having a being somehow, and somewhere. Compare 2 Sam. lii. 23, Tibx "bh ■'3S , "/ am going to him, but he shall not return to m«." The him and the vie in (his case, like the / and the my son in Genesis, are alike personal. In the earliest language, where all is hearty, such use of the pionoun could have been no unmeaning figure. The being of the one who has disappeared is no less real than that of the one who remains still seen, still found* to use the Shem- itic term for existence, or oul-bei?ip, as a known and visible state (see note, p. 273). The LXJ" have ren- dered it here eWASov, into Hades; the Vulgate, ad filium meum in infernwn. It was not to his son in his grave, for Joseph had no grave. Ills body was supposed to be lying somewhere in the desert, or torn in pieces, or carried off, by the wild beasts (see ver. 33). To resolve it all into figurative expressions for the grave would be simply carrying our meaning- less modern rhetoric into ancient forms of speech employed, in their first use, not for the reflex paint- ing, but for the very utterance of emotional concep- ■,ions. However indefinite they may be, they are too mournfully real to admit of any such explanations. Looking at it steadily from this primitive standpoint, we are compelled to say, that an undoubting convic- tion of personal extinction at death, leaving nothing but a dismembered, decomposing boiiy, now belong- ing to no one, would never have given rise to such language. The mere conception of the grave, as a place of burial, is too narrow for it. It, alone, wovdd have destroyed the idea in its germ, rather than have given origin and expansion to it. The fact, too, that they had a well-known word for the grave, as a con- fined place of deposit for the body ("i2J? riTns , a possession, or property, of a grave, see Gen. xxiii. 9). sfiows that this other name, and this other concep- tion, were not dependent upon it, nor derived from it. The older lexicographers and commentators gen- erally derived the word biXB (Sheol) from bxiT [Sha-al), to as/c, inquire, etc. This is a very easy derivation, so far a* form is concerned ; and why is it not correct ? In any way the sense deduced will seem near, or far-fetched, according to our precon- ceptions in respect to that earliest view of extinct or continued being. Ge.^enius rejects it, maintaining that bisU) is for bl'Stt," , and means cnvity ; hence a subterranean region, etc. He refers to bsilj , hollow of the hand, or fist. Is. xl. 12; 1 Kings xx. 10; Ezek. xiii. 19 ; and bsili', the name for fox or jackal, who digs holes in the earth, — this being all that ctm be 'onnd of any other use of the supposed root from * [Compare the Hebrew N]£'23 , as used Ps. xlvi. 1, from ivfaicli comes the frequent rabbinical use of the term for ex- .stence as that which is somehow present Comp. also the Arab, i^y^a and k::.j!fc^>'^« 4 M = rd oiTa, entia. Lit., 'Jlings to be found. — T. L.] which comes this most ancient word, so full of somii most solemn significance. There is n reference, also to the German hijlle, or the general term of tht northern nations (Gothic, Scandinavian, Saxon), de noting hole, or cavity; though this is the very ques tion, whether the northern conception is not a sec ondary one, connected with that later thought of penal confinement which was never separable from the Saxon hell, — a sense-limitation, in fact, of the more indefinite aid more spiritual notion priniarilj presented by the Greek Hades, and which furnishes the true parallel to the early Hebrew Sheol. Fiirst has the same view as Gesenius. To make bix'i' and blSIE equivalents, etymologically, there is supposed to be an interchange of S and S , a tiling qisite com- mon in the later Syriae, but rare in the Hebrew, especially the earlier writings, and whicli would be cited as a mark recentioris Hehraismi, if the ration- ahstic argument, at any time, required it. The S has ever kept its place most tenaciously in the Arabic, as shown by Robinson in the numerous proper names of places in which it remain^ un changed to this day. So it was, doubtless, in the most early Shemitic, though in the Syriae it became afterwards much weakened through the antipathetic Greek and Koman influence upon that language, and so, frequently passed into the more easily pronounced X . It is improbable that this should have taken place in the most ancient stage of the language, or at the time of the first occurrence of this word in the biblical writings. Gesenius would give to bx'i^ too, the supposititious primary sense of digging, to make it the ground of the secondary idea of search or inquiry ; but this is not tlie primary or predomi- nant conception of bsB ; it is always that of inter- rogation, like the Greek ipiordoo, or of demand, like a'lTfw, ever implying speech, instead of the positive -.ci of search, such as is denoted by the Hebrew ■^pn , to explore. Subsequent lexicographers and commentators have generally followed (Tesenius, who seems to pride himself upon this discovery (see Robinson : " Lex. N. Test." on the word Hades). Of the older mode of derivation he says : " Prior de etijmo conjectura vix memoratu digna est." By some it would lie regarded as betraying a deficiency in Hebrew learning to think of supporting an etymology so contemptuously rejected. And yet it has claims that should not be lightly given up, especially as they are so intimately connected with the important in- quiry in respect to the lirs' conception of those who first used the word. Was this, primarily, a thought of locality, however wide or narrow it may have been, or did the space-notion, which undoubtedly prevailed afterwards, come from an earlier thought, or state of soul rather, more closely allied to feeling than to any positive idea ? This conception of lo- cality in the earth came in very early; it grew natu- rally from something before it ; but was it fiist of all y Lowth, Herder, etc., are, doubtless, correct .n the representations they give of the Hebrew Sheol, as an imagined subterranean residence of the dead, and this is confirmed by later expressions we find in the Psalms and elsewhere, *uch as "going down to the pit" (compare "lia ■''^^''■' and similar lang.iage, Ps. xxviii. I ; xxx. 4; Ixxxviii. 5; Is. xiv. 19; xxxviii. 10, etc.); yet still there is the best of rea. sons for believing that what may be called th< emotional or ejaculatory conception was earlier that 586 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. this, and that the local was the form it took when it passed from an emotion to a speculative thought. From what source, then, in this earlier stage, could the name more naturally have come than from the primitive significance of that word 5XO, which, in the Arabic iJLw , and everywhere in the Shemitic family, haa this one old sense of appealing interro- gation,— first, simple inquiry, secondly, the idea of demand ? The error of the older etymologists, then, jonsisted, not in making it from bsffi, but in con- necting it with this secondary idea, and so referring it to Sheol itself as demanding, instead of the mourning, sighing surrivors asking after the dead. They supposed it was called Sheol from its rapacity, or unsatiableness, ever claiming its victims, — a thought, indeed, common in the earln language of mourning, but having too much of tropical artifice to be the very earliest. It belongs to that later stage in which language is employed, retroactively, to awaken or intensify emotion, instead of being its gushing, irrepressible utterance. In support of this view, the text constantly cited, as the standard one, wasProv. xxx. 16, -jin nn^S ^''■' r-iS^":: Kb - - bisiB, Sheol that ii nener satisfied, thu. never xat/», enough. See the old commentary of Martin Geier on the book of Pioverbs. Corresponding to this is the manner in which Homer speaks of Hades, and its vast popu- lation : KAvTa eBvia. veKpiav. So the dramatic poets represent it as rapacious, carrying oif its victims like a ferocious animal {see the "Medea" of Euripides, 1108), inexorable, i'tjAetjs, pitiless, ever demanding, but hearing no prayer in return. Ilenee it had settled into the clas- sical phrase rapax Orcus (see Catcllos, ii. 28, 29). But this, whatever form might be given to it, was not tlie first thought that would arise in the mind respecting the state of the departed. Instead of such an objective attribute of Hades, or Sheol, as a place demanding to be filled, it was rather the sub- jective feeling of inquiring wonder at the phenome- non of death, at the thought of th<' one who had disappeared, and of that inexplicable stale into which even the imaginalion failed to follow him. .Shadowy as all such language is, it is only ilie stronger evi- lence of that feeling of continued being which holds on so firmly tlirougli it all, as though in spite of the positive appearances of sense tcstifyiTig to the de- parture, or the negative testimony arising from the failure of the eye to pierce the darkness (wlienoe the (jreek Hades, the nnaeai), or of the ear to gather any report from the silence into which tlie dead had gone. See remarks in the note before referred to, p. 273, on the idea of deaih as a .'itale, a state of being, (he antithesis, not of being, but of the active life " beneath tlie sun." Now the idea of extinction, of abscilute not-buing, of a total loss of individual personality, would have excluded all questioning ; it would never have made such words as Hades, or Bheol, according to either conception, whether of Inquiry or of locality, whether as denoting a state or a ) 'ice, whether as demanding or as inierrogated, whether as aildrcased to the unseen, or to the voice- leBH and unheard. The man wa.s gone, but where ? According to a most ancient and touching custom, they thrice most solemnly invoked his name, but no answer came back. Their belii'f in his continued oeing was shown by the voice that went after liim, though no responding voice w;i8 returned to the living ear. bisoS (the infinitive used as a noi.i), to ask to inquire anxiously ; he had gone to the land thni denoted, that "undiscovered country from whosj bomne no traveller returned." The key-text here ia Job xiv. 10 : "Man dies, and wastes away; he givetb up the ghost (r'lxn s'}i'' , gig/iwah ha-adam, mac sighs, or gasps for breath), and where is he ? " "i'SS^ weai/yo, 0, where is he? See Zaoli. i. 5 : The fa'hen J D!l'n*n , where are they ? Compare also Job vii. 21, and other places of a similar kind, all showing how natural is the connection between the wailing, questioning weayyo, and the word Sheol so immedi- ately suggested by it. The disappearance of Enoch from the earth was stranger than that of the ordinary death, but gave rise to the same feeling of inquiry, only in a more intensive degree. " He was not found," oi/x €upitTK(To, says the LXX, and this gives the real meaning of the Hebrew 1i,3"'!< , not denoting non-existence, for that would be directly contrary to what follows, but that he was nowhere to be found on earth. Thus regarded, it is easy to see how the idea of some locality would soon attach itself to the primi- tive emotional conception, and in time become so predominant that the older germ of thought, that was in the etymology, would almost wholly disap- pear. Still the spirit of the word, its geist or ghost, to use the more emphatic German or Saxon, long liaunts it after the conception has changed so as to receive into it more of the local and definite. Trench has shown how tenacious is this root-sense of old words, preserving them, like some guardian genius, from misusage and misapplication, ages after it has ceased to be directly conceptual, or to be known at all, except to the antiquarian ])hilologist. Thus, although the cavernous or subteT-ranean idea had become prominent in the Psalms and elsewhere, this old spirit of the word still hovers about it in all such passages ; we still seem to hear the sighing weayyo ; there yet lingers in the ear tlie plaintive sheoiah, denoting tlie intense looking into the world unknown, the anxious listening to which no answer- ing voice is returned. That Sheol, in its primary sense, did not mean the grave, and in fact had no etymological associs tion with it, is shown by the fact, already mentioned, that there was a distinct word for the latter, of still earlier occurrence in the Sciiptures, common in all the Shemitic languages, and presenting the definite primary conception of digging, or excavation (":p, kbr, krb, 2'^3, 3"iJ , grb, grub, grav). There was no room here for expansion into the greater thought. The Egyptian embalming, too, to one who attentively considers it, will appear still less favorable. It wai a dry and rigid memorial of death, far less suggestive of continued being, somehow and somewhere, than the flowing of the body into nature througli decom- positiim in the grave, or its dispersion by fire into the prime elements of its organization. In the sup- posed case, howeTer, of Jose])h's torn and dismem- bered corpse, there was nothmg from any of theM Bouj'ces to aid the conception. Yet Jacob held on t< it: 1 will go mourning to my son, ■';3 bN, not bs or bK for bl" , on account of my son, as some would take it.* Had Joseph been lying by the side of hii • [In proof that bx may have the sense of b;P , Roaexir m&Uor rotors to 1 KinRs xiv. 5 ; and Rushi to 2 Sam. xxi. I 1 Sam. iv. 21. ButtboHG do notbearout thplnJcreuc«. Th. L'HAr. XXXVIl. 1-30. 58'^ mother in the field near Bethlehem Ephratah, or with Abraham and Sarah, i-nd Isaac and Rebekah, in the cave ot Machpelah, or in some Egyptian sar- cophagus, embalmed with costliest spices and wrapped in aromatic linen, the idea of his unbroken personality would have been no more vivid, Josepli himseir (liis very ip«e) would have been no nearer, or more real, to the mourning father, than as lie thought of his bodv lying mangled in the wilderness, or borne bv rapacious birds to the supposed four comers of the earth. I will go to my son mourning, theolah (niklU , with n of direction), Sheol-ward,— on the wav to the unknown land. This view of Sheol is strongly corroborated by the parallel etymology, and the parallel connection of ideas we find in the origin and use of the Greek Hades. Some would seek its primary meaning else- where, but it is clearly Greek, and no derivation is more obvious than the one given long ago, and which would make this word "AiStjs (Homeric 'Attijs, with the mild aspirate) from a privative and iotiV to see. We have the very word as an adjective, with this mi'aning of invuible or unseen, Hesiod : " Shield of Hercules," 477. It denotes, then, the unseen world, carrying the idea of disappearance, and yet of con- tinued being in some state unknown. The analogy between it and the Hebrew word is perfect. So is the parallelism, all the more striking, we may say, from the fact that in the two languages tlie appeal is to two diflerent senses. In the one, it is the eye peering into the dark ; in the other, it is ihe ear in- tently listening to the silence. Both give rise to the same question : Where is he ? whither has he gone ? and both seem to imply with equal emphasis that the one unseen and unheard yet really is. Some- times a derivative from the same root, and of the same combination, is joined with Hades to make the meaning intensive, as in the "Ajax" of Sophocles, 607 rbl* altoTfionov dcfiijAoc "Alfio** — The awful, unseen Hades. From this use has come the adjective iiSios, rendered ettrnal, but having this meaning from the association of ideas (the Hadean, the everlasting), since it is not etymologically connected with aloiv (see Jude 6, Ceofiois di'Siois, where the two conceptions seem to unite). In truth, there is a close connection between these two sets of words ('AtSTji and aidv, ^"S'.'J and blKC), one ever suggesting the other, — " the things that are seen are temporal (belong to time), the things that are unseen are eternal." Hence we have in Greek the same idiom, in respect to Hades, that we have in Hebrew in relation to 01am (oil?), the counterpart of aliii/. Thus, in the former language we have the expressions, oUos^AiSou — 5o^os"At5ou, etc., corresponding exactly to the Hebrew cbl'y n'^S, the house of eternity, poorly rendered his long home, Eccles. xii. 6. Compare the o'tKiav a'dimov, the sense of direciion. so clear everywhere else in the hundreds cf uases where this preposition 5X occurs, is not lost even in these. " Gone is the glory of Israel " (the glory th:it was). It is broken, impassioned Itinfruage, and we may suppose an llli psis : she said thi£ (looldng) to the taking of thi- ark, eic. ':o, in the chief case citt^d, it is most vividly rendered by iking it elliptically— ^ the house of Saul, 2 Sam. xxi 1 — hat is. 'Mook not to me for the cause," says the oracle, but ■* to Saul and his bloody house." At the utmost, these very tew doubtful cases cannot invalidate the clear sense that the lonmion rei isring makes here. -T. L.l " house eternal," 2 Cor. v. 1. Compare also XenO' phon's Ag'Mlaiis, at the close, where it is said of tht Spartan king, tt;;' aihiov o'iK'i^aiv KaTrjy ay €ro, " hi was brought back, like one who had been away, tc his eternal home." See, too, a very remarkable pa.ssage, Diodoros Sichlus, lib. i. ch. 61, respecting the belief of the mo.st ancient Egyptians: "The habitations of the living they call inns, or lodging places, KciTa.\i'iT(is, since we dwell in them so short a time, but those of the dead they style ol«out diSious, everlasting abodes, as residing in them forever, Tt» &niipov iioixa." See al.so Pareac ; De Jobi Notitiia. etc., on tlie early Arabian belief, p. 27. Why should not Jacob have had the idea as weh as these most ancient Egyptians ? That his thought was more indefinite, that it had less of circumstance and locality, less imagery every way, than the Greek and Egyptian fanev gave ii, only proves its higher purity as a divine hope, a sublime act of faith, rather than a poetical picturing, or a speculative dogma. The less it assumed to know, or even to imagine, showed its stronger trust in the unseen world as an assured reality, but dependent solely for its clearer revelation on the unseen God. The faith was all the stronger, the less the aid it received from the sense or the imagination. It was grounded on the surer rock of the " everlasting covenant '' made with the fathers, though in it not a word was said directly of a future life. " The days of the years of my pil grimage," says Jacob. He was "a sojourner upon earth as his fathers before him." The language has no meaning except as pointing to a home, an ai5io» oU-natv, an eternal habitation; whether in Sheol, or through Sheol, was not known. It was enougli that it was a return unto God, "his people's dweVing- place (isb "iiss , see Ps. xc. 1 ) in all generatious." It was, in some way, a '' Uving unto him," however they might disappear from earth and time ; for " he is not the God ol the dead." His covenant was an assurance of the continued being of those with whom it was made. '' Because he lived they should live also." " Art thou not from everlasting, Jehovah, my God, my Holy One? we shall not (wholly) die." " Thou wilt lay us up in Sheol ; thou wilt call and we will answer ; thou wilt have regard to the work of thy hands." The pure doctrine of a personal God, and a belief in human extinction, have never since been found conjoined. Can we beUeve it of the lofty theism of the patriarchal ages ? Hades, like Sheol, had its two conceptual stages, first of state, and afterwards of localily. To tht Greek word, however, there was added a third idea It came to denote, also, a power; and so was used for the supposed king of tlie dead, 'AiStjs, 'Ais, 'AiSajrelii, — SvaJ ivipuv (Iliad, XX. 61); and this personification appears again in the later Scripture, 1 Cor. XV. 55, 0 Hades, where is thy victory ? anf in Rev. vi. 8, xx. 13, 14, where Hades becomes lim !ted to Gehenna, and its general power, as keeper ol soids, is abolished. — T. L.] DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAi. 1. Jacob's fondness for the younger son forms tlu other extreme to Isaac's predilection for th« first-bom. He had, it is true, better reasons than Isaac ; for Joseph is not only the son of his beloved Rachel, but also the Nazarite (the consecrated oi sep- arate one) among his brethren, — a fact to which he testifies upon his death-bed (see Get. xlix. 22). Bu» 588 GENESIS, OR THE I'IRST BOOK OF MOSES. then he began to see clearly that Judah surpassed Joseph in what pertained to the future. The struggle between his predilection and his love of justice ap- pears in more than one instance. Joseph must en- ter service as a shepherd's boy ; nevertheless, his father provides for him a showy garment, and keeps him at home longer than the others. He ventures his favorite upon a distant and dangerous mission, and this is a reason why he refuses to be comforted at his loss. He rebukes him for his appaiently presumptuous dream, but feels compelled to keep the presaging omens in his vaticinating heart. 2. The Scrii)tures make no palUation of the sins of the twelve patriarchs — the fathers of the very people tfl whom they are sent. This shows their super- earthly origin. 3. By his dreams Joseph gets into misery, and by their interpretations he is deUvered from it. Tlie first fact would give him occasion to think closely on the ground-laws that regulate the symbolic language of dreams ; and both he, and the Xew-Testainent Jo- seph, are witnesses to the fact that there is a signifi- cance in them. Elsewhere have we shown the cir- cumstances favorable to this that were possessed by both. 4. The simplicity with which Joseph relates his dreams, reminds us of Isaac's naive question on the way to Mount Moriah : but where is the lamb ? It stands in beautiful contrast with that moral earnest- ness which had already, in early age, made him self- reliant in presence of his brethren. 5. Here, too, in the history of Joseph's brethren, ia there an example showing how envy passes over to animosity, animosity to fixed hatred, and hatred to a scheme of murder, just as in the history of Cain, and in that of Christ. The allegorical significance of our history, .is typical of that of Christ, appears in the most diversified traits. 6. .\s the murderous scheme was prevented by Reuben's plan of deUverance, and modified by Judah's proposal, so, i.i the life of our Lord, the scheme of the Sanhedrin was changed more than once by ar- resting circumstances. Thus providence turned the destructive plots to a beneficent end. It was the chief tendency of these schemes to promote the high- est glory of the hated one, whose glory they aimed to destroy. 7. Concerning the way in which these plans of Reuben and Judah cross each other, see the Exeget- ical and Critical. We have no right to suppose that Reuben behaved as he did in this case in order to appease his father for the wrong done in the case of Bilhah. The weakness, wliich, according to ch. xlix. 4, was the gri'at reproach of his character, had also its good side. Equally false is the supposition that Judah maliciously frustrated Reuben's good inten- tions. Both remind us of Joseph of Arimathea and Nioodemus, who did not consent to the sentence of the Sanhedrin ; but they were less incUned to the right, and their half-measures remind us of Pilate's attempt to save, though they had not, like him, the power in their hands ; since being implicated by tlieir foimcr anirao:ity towards Joseph, they could only weakly oppose their angry brethren. 8. The " coat of many colors " dipped in blood, reminds us of the deception that Jacob, in Esau's raiment, practised upon his father. Yet it must not be overlooked, that Jacob became reconciled at Peniel. lla*ds no body, no concupiscent organization, no appe- tites or fleshly motions, no nerves even, for the exercise of its devilish energies. It is a soul-poison, yet acting fear- fully upon the body itself, bringing more death into it than eeeraincly stronger and more tiunultuous passions thnt have their nearer seat in the fleshly nature. *' It is rottenness in the bones." We may compare this proverb of Solomon with, a terrific description of envy by ^schtlds, Agamem., SS3: TOV €VTV\OVtTa tTVV i^dof w ^AeTreii', Sva^ptov net' 'IO'5 KapSiav jrpocr^/iei'o5, avflos StirAoi^ei Tiu TTf7TaiJ.fj.ivut i'6a"oi' • Tot? T ain'o<; ainov TTTjfjaTTLV ^apvt'crai, xal TOi* Bvpaiov o^fiov elaopijv — areVet. Envy at others' ffood is evermore Malign:int poison sitting on the sotil ; A liouble woe to hira infected with it. Of inward pain the heavy load he bears, At sight of joy wUftout, he ever mourns. What inspired the Greek poets in such truthful description of the most intense evils of the sou! ! All bad passions are lain^iil, but envy has a double barb to stine itself.— T. L.] In the first there couH be only ten sheaves besidei Jasepli's, since Benjamin was not present, andJosepk said to liis brethren, Your nheaves. In the second, however, lie beliolds definitely eleven stars, there fore himself as the twelfth included. Sectioji Second. (Vers. 12-20.) Starke: Ver 15. Joseph enters upon his journey in the simplicit; of his heart, expecting no evil; and thus God leti liim run into the net against which he could hav« easily warned him. God's ways, however, are se cret. Whom he wishes to exalt he first tries, puri fies, tem|its, and humbles. [The Ralibins and one of the Targums tell us that this man, who directed Jo- seph in the field, was the angel Gabriel in the form of a man.] — Hall : God's decree precedes and is fulfilled, whilst we have no thought about it, yea, even fight against it. Though a Christian does not always prosper, though difficulties be- set his way, he must not be confounded, but ever continue firm and steadfast in liis calling. Ver 18. Here Moses shows what kind of ancestors ths Jews had (comp. Acts vli. 9, etc.). Thus they fell from one sin into another. Perhaps Simeon was the ringleader ; since he afterwards was bound as hostage for his brethren. — Schroder : Joseph goes in search of his brethren, and finds sworn enemies, bloodthirsty murderers. — Heim ("Bible Studies"): Shechem is about twenty-five leagues from Hebron. Joseph's mission to this remote and dangerous coun. try is a proof, at the same time, that Jacob did not treat him with too much indulgence, and that he did not );eep him home from any feelings of tenderness. Joseph's willing obedience, too, and his going alone, an inexperienced youth, upon such adangerous jour- ney, is a proof that he was accustomed to obey cheer- fully— a habit not acquired in an effeminate bringing- up. Section Third (vers. 21-241. Starke: So goes the world. Pious people ponder the welfare of the godless, whilst the latter are conspiring for their de- struction (1 Sam. xix. 5). God can raise up, even among enemies, helpers of the persecuted. " Woe to those who draw iniquity with cords of vanity and sin, as it were with a cart-rope " (Isa. v. 18). Section Fourth (vers. 25-27). Starkk : Luther : They take their seats as though they had well dona their work. Conscience is secure ; sin is asleep ; yet (iod sees all. — Schroder: [Unfavorable judgment of Judah.] LcTHER : 0, Judah, thou art not yel purified. In Calwer Handbuch Judah is even com- pared to Judas, who sold the Lord. But it is alle- gorising merely, when we are determined in our judg- ment by mere outward resemblances. See the Exe- getical and Critical. Judah's proposition arose from the alternative : He must either starve lo death in the pii, or he must be sold as a slave. Section Fifth (vers. 28-32). Starke : No matter what hindrances Joseph's brethren might put in the way of the dreams' fulfilment, against their will were they made to promote it (Ps. Iv. 10). — Bill. Tub. : Thus, there is yet a spark of good in tiature. If only man would not suppress this small light, ha would be preserved from the greatest sins. — Thk SAME : .loseph is a type of Christ in his exaltation, in his humiliation, and especially in his being sold for thirty [twenty] pieces of silver. Ver. 29. Jose- phus thinks that Reuben came by night so as not to be detected. [One of the Targums adds, that Reu- ben, on account of the iticest committed, had been fasting ainiuig the mountains, and. in order to find grace before his father, had intended to bring Joseph 590 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. tgain to him.] Ver. 32. Thus Joseph's brothers aiid sin to sin. Section Sixth (vers. 33-36). Starke : This was a punishment of GoJ. Jacob had deceived his fa- ther Isaac by putting around his neck and hands the skin of a kid ; he is himself now deceived by Jo- seph's coat dipped in the blood of a kid. — Hall: One sin is made to cover another; godless men, it is true, ever try to conceal their malignity, but it comes to light at last, and is punished. — Osia.\der : Seldom does misfortune come alone. It is but a short time since Jacob was deprived of Rachel ; now he has lost Joseph. In such a concealment of guilt they pass twenty-two years. And his father wept for him. [Ldther : This was Isaac, Joseph's grandfather, who uved still twelve years after this event.] He himself (Jacob) had several things to reproach him in his conscience : Why did he let the boy go alone oil such a journey '! Why did he send him into a coun try abounding in wild beasts ?- JiibL IVirt. : Ir grief we are inclined to overdo. — Us anokr : Pio-^a parents often blame themselves when things go bad- ly with their children, even when ihere is the leasl ground for it. — Calwer Handbuch After the crime comes the lie ; after the lie, a hypocritical comforting of the father. — Schroder: Lcthkr : During all this time, the brethren were unable to pray to Uod with a good conscience. — Observe, each one of the thre* patiiaichs was to sacrifice his dearest son. To the whale chapter. Taube : The selling of Joseph by liis brethren : 1. From what sources this horrible deed arose; 2. how the divine mouth re- mains silent, whilst the divine hand so much the more strongly holds ; 3. the types that lie concealed. SECOND SECTION. Judah's temporary separation {probably in sadness on account of the deed). His sons. TTiamar. Chapter XXXVIII. 1-30. 1 Anil it came to pass at that time, that Juiiali went down from his brethren, and 2 turned in to a certain Adiillamite, whose name was Hirah [noble, free]. And Judali saw there the daughter of a certain Canaaiiite, whose name was Shitah [cry for help] ; and H he took her, and went in unto her. And she conceived, and bare a son ; and he called 4 his name Er [n"i watcher]. And she conceived again, and bare a son ; and she called his 5 name Ontm [rtreugth, strong one]. And she yet again conceived, and bare a son; and called his name Shelah [peace, quietness, shiioh ?] ; and he was at Chezib [delusion], when she 6 bare him. And Judah took a wife for Er his first-born, whose name was Thaniar [palm], 7 And Er, Judah's first-born, ivas wicked in the sight of the Lord ; and the Lord slew him. 8 And Judah said unto Onan, Go in unto thy brother's wife, and marry her, and raise uj) 9 seed to thy brother. And Onan knew that the seed should not be his [of bis own name] : and it came to pass, that when he went in unto his brother's wife, that he spilled it on 10 the ground, lest that he shoidd give seed to his brother. And the thing which he did 1 1 displeased the Lord ; wherefore he slew him also. Then said Judali to Thamar Ins daugh- ter-in-law, Remain a widow in thy father's house, till Shelah my son be grown ; (for he said, Lest peradventure he die also, as his brethren did) ; And Thamar went and dwelt 12 in her father's house. And in process of time the daughter of Shuah, Judah's wife, died ; and Judah was comforted, and went up to his sheep-shearers to Timnath [possession], 13 he and his friend Hirah the Adullamiti-. And it was told Thamar, saying, Behold, thy 14 father-in-law goelli up to Timnath, to shear his sheep. And she put her widow's gar- ments ofl' from her, and covered her with a veil, and wrapped herself, and sat in an open place [uternlly, gate of two eyes] ' which is bv the way to Timnath: for she .«aw that Shelah 1.5 was grown, and she was not given unto him to wife. When Jiuhih .saw her, he thought 16 her to be an harlot; because she had covered her face. And he turned unto her by the *yay, and said. Go to, I pray thee, let me come in unto thee; (for he knew not that she was iii.s daughter-in-law) ; and she said, What wilt thou give mc, that thou niayest come 17 in unto me ? And he said, I wili send thee a kid from the tlock ; and she said, Wilt thou 18 giv^e me a |)lodge, till thou send it? And he said, What pleage shall I give thee? And she saiil, Thy signet, and thy bracelets, and thy staff that is in thy hand. And he 19 gave it lier, and came in unto her; and she conceived by him. And she arose, and went away, and laid by her vail from her, and put on the garments of her widowhood CHAP. XXXVIII. 1-30. 591 20 And Judah sent the kid by the hand of his friend the Adullamite, t receive his pledge 21 from the woman's hand : but he found her not. Then he asked the men of that place saying, Where is the harlot that was openly by the way-side? And they said There 22 was no harlot in this place. And he returned to Judah, and said, I cannot find her ; 23 and also other men of the place said, that there was no harlot in this jilace. And Judah said. Let her take it to her, lest we be shamed ; behold, I sent this kid, and 24 thou liast not found her. And it came to pass about three months after, that it was told to Judah, saying, Thamar thy daughter-in-law hath played the harlot ; and also, behold, she is with child by wlioredom. And Judah said, Bring her forth, and let hei 25 be burnt. When she was brougiit forth, she sent to her father-in-law, saying, By the man whose these are, am I with child ; and she said. Discern, I pray thee, whose art 26 these, the signet, and bracelets, and staff. And Judah acknowledged them, and said, She hath been more righteous than I • because that I gave her not to Shelah my son ; 27 and he knew her again no more. And it came to pass in the time of her travail, that 28 behold twins were in her womli. And it came to pass when she travailed, that the one put out his hand; and the midwife took and bound upon his hand a scarlet thread, say- 29 ing. This came out first. And it came to pass, as he drew back his hand, that, behold his brother came out ; and she said, How hast thou broketi forth ? this breach be upon 30 thee ; therefore his name was called Pharez [breach]. And afterward came out his brother, that had the scarlet thread upon his hand ; and his name was called Zarah [going forth, sun-rising], [' Ver. 14. — 0*^2^3? nnS3 . Rendered, in our translation, an open place ; margin, door of eyes, more literally, wltn reference to Prov. vii, 12, The LXX. have taken it as a proper name, rats irvAai? A'lvaf, which lias led some to regard it as the same with Enam mentioned Joshua xv. ^4, and referred to by Hieronymus as situated in the tribe of Judah, and called, in hifl day, Belh-enim, See Rnsenmuller. The dual form here is expressive of something peculiar in the place. It means (ujo eyes, or two fountains, probably the former, denoting two openings, that is, two ways, a place where she was lertain to be seen. This corresponds tn the Vulgate rendering, in 6 /t'i'o liineris. So the Syriac, |£s.m^o| a a V q»-^j Arabs Erpenianus the same, (Sj ^.JsJt (^ "^ ° ^ . The idea of there being a city there, at that time, or of her taking jer place by the gate of a city, is absurd. Aben Ezra says it was a place so called because there were two fountains there. This was an early use of the Hebrew "i^!? , the eye, arising from the beautiful conception that springs, or fountains, were fyee to the earth, as the herbs, in some places, are called n'i'l^X , lights coming from the earth. ~T, L.1 GENERAL PRELrMINABY REMAUKS, The story here narrated is not, aa Knobel sup- poses, ail insertion in Joseph's history, but a par- allel to it, considered from the one common point of view as the story of the sons of Israel. Accord- ing to the previous chapter, Joseph (that is, Ephraini) appeared to be lost; here Judah, afterwards the head tribe, appears also to be lost. But as in the history of the apparently lost Joseph there lay con- cealed the marks of a future greatness, so must we look for similar signs in the history of Judah's ap- parent ruin. Parallel to Joseph's spiritual ingen- uousness, patience, hopeful trust in the future, appears Judah's strong and daring self-dependence, fulness of life, sensuality combined with strong ab- stinence, besides the sense of justice which leads him to acknowledge his guilt. Examine it more closely, and we cannot fail to trace a strong feature of tlieocratic faith. It is a groundless conjecture of Knobel, that the object of this narrative was to show ;he origin of the levirate law among the Jews, that required the brother of a husband who died without Issue to take the widow to wife, and that the firet- born of this ctnnection should stand in the toledoth, or genealogical lists, in the name of the deceased, Deut. xxv. .5; Matt, xxii. 23: Ruth iv. See Winer on "Levirate Marriage," The law in question is of a later date, and needed no such illustration. The custom here mentioned, however, might have uie'ed before thi? time (see Delitzsch, p. 534). But why could not the idea have originated even m Judah's mind ? Besides this, Knobel presents chro- nological difficulties. They consist in this, namely, that in the period from Joseph's abduciion to Jacob's migration into Egypt — about twenty-three years — Judah had become not only a father, but a grand father by his son Pharez (according to ch, xlvi, 16) Now Judah was about three years older than Joseph, and, consequently, not much above twenty at his niai^ riage, provided he had intended it at the time when Joseph was carried off. On account of this difficulty, and of one that follows, Augustine supposes ihat Judah's removal from the parental home occurred several years previous. But tliis is contradicted tiy the fact of his presence at the sale of Joseph (see Keil, p, 246); whilst the remark of Delitzsch, that " such early marriages were not custom.iry in the patriarchal family," is of no importance at all, besides its leaving us in doubt whether it was made in respect to Judah's own marriage, or the early marriage of his nephews. " .Tacob," he says, "had already attained to the age of seventy-seven years,'* etc. In reply to this, it may be said, that early mar- riages are evidently ascribed to other sons of Jacob (ch. xlvi), though these children, it is probable, were for the most part born in Egypt, Between the pa- triarchs and the sons of Israel there comes a decisive turning-point : earlier marriages — earlier deaths (sec ch, 1, 20), Nevertheless, the twenty-three yeaii here are not sufficient to allow of Pharez having two sons already at their close. Even the possibilitj 5ft2 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST liOOK OF MOSES. that Pharez and Zarah were born before the migra- tion to Egypt, is obtained only from tlie supposition tliat Judali must liave married his sons very early. Supposing that they were seventeen or eighteen years old, the reason for so early a marriage may have been Judah's knowledge of Er's disposition. He may have intended to prevent evil by his marriage, but he did not attain his object. The marriage of Onan that resulted from this was but a consequence of the first ; and, in fact, Onan's sin seems to indi- cate a youthful Ijaseness. Judah, however, might have made both journeys to Egypt whilst his own fimilv was still existing. Witli respect to Judah's grandchildren, it is an assumption of Hengstenberg {Atit/ienfie, p. 354), that they were born in Egypt, and that they are considered to have come to Egypt, as in their fathers, together with Jacob (Dei.itzsch, p. 538). According to Keil, the aim of our narrative is to show the three principal tribes of the future dvnasties in Israel, and the danger there was that the sons of Jacob, through Canaanitish marriages, might forget the Idstoric call of their nation as the meilium ot redemption, and so ])erish in the sins of Canaan, had not God kept them from it by leading them into Egypt. It must be remarked, however, that, in this period, it was with difficulty that such marriages with Canaanitish women could be avoided, since the connection with their relations in Mesopota- mia had ceased. Undoubtedly the beginning of corruption in Judah's family, was caused by a Ca- naanitish mode of Ufe, and thereby the race was threatened with death in its first development ; but we see, also, how a vigorous life struggles with, and struggles out of, a deadly peril. EXEGETICAl AND CRITICAL. 1. Judah's separatinri, }tix marriage, and his sons (vers. 1-5).— And Judah went down.— He parted from his brethren at the time they sold Joseph. It was not, as in the case of Esau, the unbridled im- pulse of a rude and robust nature that prompted him prematurely to leave his paternal home, though he showed thereby his strong self reliance. On account of liis frank disposition, Judah could not long par- ticipate in offering, as his brethren did, false conso- lations to his aged lather (eh. xxxvii. 35). It weighs upon him that he cannot tell the true nature of the case without betraying his brethren ; and it is this that drivL'S him off, just as his grudge against those who liad involved him in their guilt separates him from I heir company. Hesides, a latter .■^adness may have come upon him on account of his own purpose, though meant lor good. Thus he tries to find peace n solitude, just as a noble-mimled eremite or separa- ist, leav.s a clun-ch that has fallen into corruplion. Like his antitype, the N ew-Te.stament Judas, hut in a nobler S[)irit, does lie try to find peace, as he did, after having sold his Lord. In a similar manner did the trib.' of Judah afterwards keep its ground against the ten tribes in their d«-cline and ruin. The question now arises, whether Judali went down from the Hebron heights in a westerly direction towards the Mediterranean Sea, to the plain of Sarepta us Delitzsch and Knohel suppose, or eastward toward the Dead Sea, where, according to tradition, the cave of Adulhmlav(l Sam. Xiii. 1), in which David c(m- cealed himself fioni Saul. Chezih (ver. 5) was sit- uated east from Hebron, if it be identical with Ziph of the desert o( Ziph. Timnatli, according to Jose- phus, XV. 57, was situated upon the heights of Jadah and could be visited as wt J from the low country il the east, as fiom that of the north. If, according tc Eusebius and Hieronymus, AduUam lay ten E?-!!.!!; miles, or four leagues, east of Eleutheropolis (£eil- chchibrin), this statement again takes us to thi- mountiuns of Judea. It is, therefore, doubtful Still it is worthy of note that David, like his ances- tor, once sought refuge in the solitude of Adullam. — And turned in to, etc. — " 'J*' and he pitched namely, ib.~X, his tent, ch. xxvi. 25, close by (IS, a man, belonging to the small kingdom of Adul- lam (Josh. xii. 15) in the plain of Judah (Josh. XV. 35)." Delitzsch. This settlement indi- cates friendly relations with Hirah. No wonder that Hirah gradually yields liimself, as a servant, lo the wiser Judah. Here Judah marries a i'anaanite woman. This should be noted in respect to Judah, who became afterwards the principal tribe, as also in respect to Simeon (ch. xlvi. 10), because '.t would be least expected of him, zealous as he was for the Is- r^ielitish purity in the murder of the Shecleinites. Without taking into view the unrestrained pesition of Jacob's sons, this step in Judah might lie ex- plained from a transient fit of despair respecting Is- rael's future. In the names of his tiiree sons, how- ever, there is an intimation of return to a more hopeful state of mind. — Er, Onan, Shelah (see 1 Chron. ii.3). — The place of Shelah's birth is mentioned, because there remained of him descendants who would have an interest in knowing their native district. 2. The marriage of the sons v:ilh Thamar. It may, at least, be said of Thamar, that she is not ex- pressly called Canaanitish. If we could suppose a westerly Adullam, she might have been of Philistine descent. By the early marriage of his sons, Judah seems to have intended to prevent in them a germ- inating corruption. That he finds Thnmar quahHed for such a state, that beside her Er appears as a criminal, whose sudden death is regarded as a divine judgment (then Onan likewise), and all this, taken in connection with the fact that, after the death of both sons, she hoped for the growing-up of the third, Shelah, seems to point her out as a woman of ex- traordinary character. — Till Shelah my son be grown. — .According to Knohel (Delitzsch and Keil), Judah regarded Thamar as an unlucky wife (comp. Tobit iii. 7), and was, therefore, unwilling to give to her the third son, but kept putting her off by promises, thus causing her to remain a widow. This, however, is inconsistent with Judah's character, and is not sustained by the text. It is plainly stated that Judah postponed Shelah's marriage to Thamar be- caused he feared that he might die also. It was not superstition, then, according to the analogy of later times, but an anxiety founded on the belief that the misfortune of both his sons might have been con- nected with the fact of their too early marriage, that made the reason for the postponement of hia promise. — In her father's house. — Thither widowi withdrew (Lev. xxii. 13). 3. Judah's crime with Thumar (vers. 12-16).— And (when) Jjrdah was comforted. — After tin expiration of the time of iiionrniiig, he went to the les tival of sheep-slieariiig at Timn.ith upon tlie inoun tiiins, in company with Ilinili. — And it was told Thamar. — The bold thouglit «hieh now flashed across the mind of Thamar is so monstrously enig matical, that it takes itself out of tlie range of all ordinary criticism. Mere lust would not manifeat CHAP. XXXVIII. 1-30. 59V itself in such a way. It might have been a grieved feeling of right. She seemed to herself, by Judah's command and her own submission to it, condemned to eternal barrenness and mourning widowhood. To "ireak these barriers was her intention. A thirst, however, for right, and Ufe, was not her only motive for assuming the appearance of a harlot, the reproach of legal incest (for the intimation of Er's baseness and of Onan's conduct leaves it a question whether it was so in reality), and the danger of destruction. Like the harlot Rahab, she seems to have had a knowl- edge of the promises made to Israel. She even ap- pears to cling, with a kind of fanatical enthusiasm, to the prospect of becoming a female ancestor in Israel. See the Introduction, p. 81. Ambrosius: "A'oh Umporalem itsum lihidinis requisivtf, Sfid successionem gralias concupivit." According to Keil, Judah came tn her on his return. Since the sheep-shearing festi- vals were of a jovial kind, this assumption might serve for an explanation and palliation of Judah's sin ; still it cannot be definitely determined from the text. — And sat in an open place. — Lange trans- lates : And sat in the gate of Ennaijim (Enam, in the low country of Judah, Josh. xv. 34). — Which is by the way to Timnath. — '' She puts off from her the common garments of a widow, which were destitute of all ornaments (Judith x. 3 ; xvi. 8), covers herself with a veil, so as not to be recognized (comp. Job xxiv. 15), and wraps herself in the manner customary with harlots." Knobel. "Th.amar," .says the same, ' wishes to appear as a kedescha " (a priestess of Astarte, the goddess of love). This, however, could hardly have been her intention, as appearing before Judah. The proper distinction may be thus made : According to ver. 15, he thought her to be a zona (n:iT), but in ver. 21 the question is asked, accord- ing to the custom of the country : Where is the kedescha? (nffln^n). As a son of Jacob he might have erred with a zona, but could not have had in- tercourse with a kedescha, as a devotee of the god- dess of love. Still the offence is great; though there is to be considered, on the one side, the custom of the times, together with Judah's individual tempera- ment, and the excitement caused by the sheep-shear- ing, whilst, on the other, there is to be kept in mind the enjgmatical appearance of the transaction, behind which moral forces, and a veiled destiny, are at work. This giving of the seal-ring, the cord, and the staff, shows tliat Judah has fallen within the circle of a magical influence, and that it is not fleshly lust alone that draws him. These pledges were the badges of his dignity. "Every Babylonian, says Herodotus, carries a seal-ring, and a staff, on the top of which there is some carved work, like an apple or a rose. The same custom prevailed in Canaan, as we see here in the case of Judah." Delitzsch. To this day do the town Arabians wear a seal-ring fastened by a cord aroimd the neck (Robinson: "Palestine," i. p. 68). " The he-goat appears also as a present from » m.in to his wife (Judg. xv. 1)." Knobel. — Lest we be shamed. — These words characterize the moral state of the country and the times. In his eager search for the woman and the pledges (which probably were of far more value than the kid), Ju- dah shows himself by no means so much afraid of moral condemnation, as of mocking ridicule. 4. Thamar and her sons (vers. 27-30). — And let her be burnt. — By this sentence the energetic Judah reminds us again of David, the great hero of his family. With a rash and angry sense of justice 8H he passes sentence without any thought that le is condemning himself, just as David did when con fronted by \athan, 2 Sam. xii. 5. There are ever it this line two strong nature^ contending with each other. " In his patriarchal authority, he commanded her to be brought forth to be burned. Thamar w regarded as betrothed, and was, therefore, to bt punished as .i bride convicted of unchastity. But in this case the Mosaic law imposes only the penalty of being stoned to death (Deut. xxii. 20), whilst burning to death was inflicted only upon the daugh ter of a priest, and upon carnal intercourse both with mother and daiighter(Lev. xxi. 19; xx. 14). Judah's sentence, therefore, is more severe than that of the future law." Keil. The severity of the decision ap- pears tolerable only upon the supposition that he really intended to give to Thamar his son Shelah besides, it testifies to an arbitrary power exercised in a strange country, and which can only be ex- plained from his confidence in his own strength and standing. How fairly, however, does Thamar bring him to his senses by sending him his pledges. The delicate yet decisive message elicits an open confes- sion. But his sense of justice is expressed not only in the immediate annulling of the decision, but also in his future conduct towards Thamar. The twin- birth of Rebecca is once more reflected. We see how important the question of the first-born still re- mains to the Israelirish mother and midwife. In the case of twins there appears more manifestly the marks of a striving for the birth-right. Pharez, how- ever, did not obtain the birth-right, as Jacob sought it, by holding on the heel, but by a violent breach. In this he was to represent Judah's lion-like manner within the milder nature of Jacob. According to Knobel, the midwife is supposed to have said to Pharez : A breacli upon thee, i. e., a breach happen to thee; and this is said to have been fulfilled when the Israelitish tribes tore themselves away from the house of David, as a punishment, because the Da- vidian family of the Pharezites had violently got the supremacy over its brethren. DOOTEINAL AUD ETHICAL. 1. Judah's beginnings as compared with those of Joseph. — A strong sensual nature ; great advances, great offences — strong p.issions, great self-condemna- tion, denials, struggles, and breaches. 2. Judah as Eremite, or Separatist, in the noblest sense ; the dangers of an isolated position. 3. Hirah, from a valuable comrade, becoming an officious assistant, — a witness to Judah's superiority. 4. The sons of Judah. The failure of his well- intended experiment to marry his sons early. 5. Onan's sin, a deadly wickedness, an examplf to be held in abhorrence, as condemnatory, not oul) of secret sins of self-pollution, l>ut also of all similar offences in sexual relations, and even in marriage It- self. Unchastity in general is a homicidal waste of the generative powers, a demonic bestiality, an out. rage to ancestors, to posterity, and to one's own life. It is a crime against the image of God, and a degra- dation below the animal. Onan's offence, moreover, as committed in marriage, wa« a most unnatuat wickedness, and a grievous wrong. The sin named after him is destrui tive as a pestilence that walketh in darkness, destroying directly the body and soul of the young But common fornication is likewisp t> unnatural "iolation of the person, a murHpr oi (« i 694 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK. OF MOSES. tonls, and a desecration of the body as the temple of God. There are those m our Christian communities who are exce&lingly gross in this respect ; a proof of the most defective development of what may be called, the consciousness of personality, and of perso- nal dignity. 6. The Levirate law. Its meaning and object. The theocratic moral idea of the levirate law is as- cribed in the Calwer Handbucli to the desire of imper- isUableness. Gerlach remarks: "An endeavor to preserve families, even in their separate lines, and to retain the thereby inherited property, pervades the laws of the Israelites, — a feeling that doubtless came down from the patriarchs. The father still lived on in the son ; the whole family descending from him was, in a certain sense, himself; and, through this, the place among the people was to be preserved. From the remotest antiquity, so much depended upon the preservation of tradition, upon the inheritance of religion, education, and custom, that these things were never regarded as the business of individuids, but of famiUes and nations. When afterward the house of Jacob became a people, this duty of the le- virate law necessarily made trouble, and the brother- in-law was no longer forced to it; but even then he was publicly contemned for his refusal (Deut. xxv. 5 ; Ruth iv. 7; comp. Matt. xxii. 23)l" The first mo- tive for the patiiarchal custom, or for Judah's idea, conies, doubtless, from a struggle of faith in tlie pro- mise with death. As the promise is to the seed ot Abraham, so death seems to mar the promise when he carries away some of .Jacob's sons, especially the first-bom, before they have had offspring. Life thus enters into strife with death, whilst the remaining brothers fill up the blank. The second motive, how- ever, is connected with the fact, that the life of the deceased is to be reflected in the future existence of their names in this world. Israel's sous are a church of the undying. There is a third motive ; it is to in- troduce the idea of spiritual descent. The son of the surviving brother answers for the legitimate son of the dead, and thus the way is prepared for the great extension of the adoptive relatioiiship, accord- ing to which Jesus is called the son of Joseph, and mention is made of the brothers of Jesus. The institution, however, being tyjiical, it could not be carried tlirough consistently in opposition to the right of personality. A particular coercive marriage would have been at war with the idea of the law itself. 7. Thamar's sin, and Thamar's faith. 8. The Hierodulai. Female servants of Astarte, Aschera, or Mylytta (see Delitzsch, p. 536). The he-goat sacred to Astarte. 9. Judah's self-condemnation and confession. 10. Judah's (Thamar's) twins; Isaac's (Rebecca's) twins. HOMILETICAIi AND PRACTICAL. See Theological and Ethical. It is only with great caution, and in a wise and devout spirit, that this nar- rative should be made the ground of homiletical di.><- coumcs. — Judah's solitude. — The apparent extinclion of the tribe. — God's judgments on the sins of unchas- tity. — The danger ari.sing from feasts (such as that of the phecp-sheariiig. — The keeping of promises. — Self- condrinnation. — The fall and the recovery in our nar- rative.— Apparent extinction, and yet a new life, through God's grace, in Judah's uprightness and sin- writT Section First. Vers. 1-5. Starkt: : Hall : God'i election is only by grace, for otherwise Judah nevei would have been chosen as an ancestor of Chrigt.— £ibl. Wirt, : Pious parents can experience no great- er cross than to have vile and godless children (Sirach xvi. 1). — Gerlach : This marriage of Judah i» nol censured, since it was impossible that all "''e sons of Jacob should take wives from tlieir kindred in Meso- potamia.— Schroder : Ver. 5. Chezit meaning de LosiON, on account of the delusions connected wit' this place. — Tlie false hope of Judah — afterwards of Thamar. — Then again of Judah. Section Second. Vers. 0-11. Starkk : This Thamar, very generally regarded as a Canaaniie, though by some of the Jews very improbably called a daughter of M elchizedek, has received a place in the Toledoth of Christ (Matt. L 3), to show that he is also the hope of the heathen. [The Jews might, in two ways, have suggested to them this strange hy- pothesis of Thamar's being the daughter of Melehize- dek : 1. Through ancestral pride ; 2. From conclu- sions derived from the law. They reasoned thus : If Judah intended to burn Thamar, she must have been the daughter of a priest. If she was the daughter of a priest, then probably the daughter of Melchizedek.] — Hall : Remarkably wicked sinners God reserves to himself for hisown vengeance. — Ver. 11 Judah spake deceitfully to his daughter-in-law. Judab may also have thought that his sons' early marriages hastened their death, especially if they were only fourteen years of age (?) ; and it may be that on this account he did not wish his son Shelah to marry so young. — Hall : Fulfilment of promises is the duty of eveiy up- right man, nor can either fear or loss absolve him. — ScnRoiiEK : The seed has the promise of salvation — the prouiise on which the fathers grew. The levirate law was but a peculiar aspect, as it were, of that universal care for oft'spring which formed ihe Old- Testament response to God's covenant faithfulness. Onan's sin a murder. It is as if tlie curse of Canaan descended upon these sons from a Canaanitish wo- man.— ScHWK.vKE: The sin of Onau, unnatural, de- structive of (iod's holy ordinance, is even yet so dis- pleasing to the Lord that it gives birth to bodily and spiritual death. — Heim ("Bible Studies"): 1 Cor. vi. 11. Why is it that the Holy (ihost meuiions first in this chapter the sin of Onan, and then points us so carefully to the Saviour of the world as descending from the incest-stained Judah and Thamar V Here only may we find salvation, forgiveness, the taking away of all guilt, and the curse that rests upon it. Sectifin 'I'hrd. Vers. 12-16. Hall: lunnodesty in dress and conduct betrays evil desires. — Chamkr : Widower and widow are to live lives of chastity. That Thamar desired Shelah to be given to her Wiis not unreasonable ; but her course in thus avenging herself is by no means approved, though some of the Christian fathers (Clirysostom, Ambrose, Theo- doret) praise her on this very account, and ascribe her design to a peculiar desire to become the mother of the .Mes.siah. — Ver. 24. It is not agrecii whether he spoke these words as judge or accuser. He was here among a strange people ; but as he has never subjected himself to them, he would be judge in his own affairs. — Cai.vi.n : Severe tis Judah had been against Thamar, he judges now indulgently in his own case. — Lisco has a remaikable view, namely, thai Jndah himself, after the death of his wife, was iindci obligation to marry Thamar, if he was not willing tc give her to his son. The same »iew is entertained' by Gerlach, undoubtedly from a misunderslandiut; of CHAP. XXXIX. l-2?u 59S Che later levirate law. — Schroder: Harlots only, in "ontrast with virtuous and domestic women, frequent Mie streets and markets, lurking at every corner- stone (Prov. vii. 12; Jer. iii. 2; Isaiah xvi. 25-31 ; Jos. ii. 15). iiection Fourth. Vers. 27-30. Starke : Ver 30. In Christ's birth-register, too, great sinners are found. — [Osiander: These two children signified two people, namely, the Jews and the Gentiles. For the Jews, though seeming to be tne first to enter eternal life, havt become the last ; whilst tliose of the Gon- tiles who heard the gospel of Christ have gone before them and become the first (according to Val. Her berger.)] — ^Schroder : Zarah, according to t-omei means brightness, as a name given to him on accouni of the scarlet color of the thread upon his hand. Ac cording to others, it means the sun-rising, as indica tive of his appearing first. — Ldther: Why did God and the Holy Ghost permit these sliameful things to bt written? Answer: that no one should be proud of his own righteousness and wisdom, — and, again, tha* no one should despair on account of his sins, etc. It may be to remind us that by natural right, Gentiles too, are the mother, brothers, sisters of our Loixi THIRD SECTION. Joteph in Potiphar's house and in prison. His sufferings on account of his virtue, and hU apparent destruction. Chaftee XXXrX. 1-23. 1 And Joseph was brought down to Egypt; and Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, captain of the guard [life-guardsmen, executioners], an Egyptian, bouglit him of the hands 2 of the Ishmaehtes, which had brought him down thither. And the Lord was with Joseph, and he was a prosperous man ; and he was in the house of his master the 3 Egyptian. And his master saw that the Lord was with him, and that the Lord made 4 all "that he did to prosper in his hand. And Joseph found grace in his sight, and he served him ; and he made him overseer over his house, and all that he had he put into 5 his hand. And it came to pass from the time that he had made him overseer in his house, and over all that he had, that the Lord blessed the Egyptian's house for Joseph's sake ; and the blessing of the Lord was upon all that he had in the house and in the 6 field. And he left all that he had in Joseph's hand; and he knew not aught he had save the bread which he did eat. And Joseph was a goodly person, and well-favored 1 [seech-xxix. 1?]. And it came to pass, after these things, that his master's wife cast her 8 eyes upon Joseph ; and she said, Lie with me. But he refused, and said unto his master's wife. Behold, m.j master wotteth not what is with me in the house, and he ,9 hath committed all that he hath to ray hand; There is none greater in this house than I ; neither hath he kept back anything from me but thee, because thou art his wife : 10 how then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God? And it came to pass as she spake to Joseph, day by day, that lie hearkened not unto her, to lie by her, or 11 to be with her. And it came to pass about this time, that Joseph went into the house 12 to do his business ; and there was none of the men of the house there within. And she caught him by his garment, saying. Lie with me : and he left his garment in her hand, 13 and Bed, and got him out [of the house]. And it came to pass, when she saw that he had 14 left his garment in her hand, and was fled fortli, That she called unto the men of her house, and spake tmto tliem, saying, See, he hath brought in an Hebrew unto us to 15 mock us ; he came in unto me to lie with me, and I cried with a loud voice : And it came to pass, when he heard that I lifted up my voice and cried, that he left his gar- 16 ment with me and fled, and got him out. And she laid up his garment by hei, until 17 his lord came home. And she spake unto him according to these words, saying, The 18 Hebrew servant, which thou hast brought unto us, came in unto me to mock me ■ Anc it came to pass, as I hfted up my voice, and cried, that he left his garment with mo. i9 and fled out. And it came to pass, when his master heard the words of his wife, whith she spake unto him, saying, After this manner did thy servant to me : tiiat his wrath 20 was kindled. And Joseph's master took him, and put him into the prison [stronghold]' a place where the king's prisoners [state-prisoners] were bound : and he was there in th* 21 ^ri3on But the TiOrd was with Joaet)h. and shewed him mercv and ?ave bim favoi 596 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. 22 in the sight of the keeper of the prison. And the keeper of the prison conjniit!* ] ti. Joseph's hand all the prisoners that were in the prison ; and whatsoever they did there, he 23 was the doer of it. The keeper of tlie prison looked not to anytliing th^it was under bis hand, because the Lord was with him, and that which he did, the Lord made it to prosr"-' \} Ver. 20. — "^nDH r)^2 . Literally, the round house, so called from its shape, which was different from the cozomov EgyptiaTi architecture — thus constructed, perhaps, as giving greater strength. Aben Ezra exprenses the opinion that thf word i^ Egyptian ; but it occurs in Hebrew, as in Cant. vii. 3 {nflO), where it evidently has the sense of roundness, and is 80 rendered in the ancient versions. This is confirmed by its near relationship to the more common "^nO , to goround^ from which the Syriac has its word |Zl-j»XO for tower or castle. Although Joseph, for policy, used an interpreter when ipeaking with his brethren, yet there roust have been, at this time, a great affinity between the Sheraitic and the old Egjrptian tongue. Very many of the words muet have been the same in both languages. The LXX. have rendere<1 1* m ^x^pw/Aart, in the stronghold , Vulg., simply in carcerem,— T. L.] QEKESAL PBELIMINARr REMAKKS. 1. The three chapters, xxxix.-xlii., form a dis- tinct section by themselves. Joseph in Egypt — in his misery and in his exaltation ; first, himself ap- parently lost, afterwards a saviour of the world. Ch. xl, presents the transition from his humiliation to his exaltation, 2. In the section from ch. xxxix.-xlii., Knobel re- cognizes the elements of the original text, mingled with the additions of the Jehovist. It is a matter of fact, that the elohistic relations predominate, but in decisive points Jehovah appears as the ruler of Jo- seph's destiny. 3. If the preceding chapter might be regarded as \ counterpart to ch. xxxvii., then the present chap- '.er forms again a eoimtorpart to the one before it. Both chapters agree in referring especially to sexual relations. In the former, Onan's sin, whoredom, and incest, are spoken of; in the one before us, it is the temptation to adultery. In the former, however, Judah, on account of sexual sins, seems greatly m- Tolved in guilt, though it is to be considered that he intended to restrain the uiichastity of his sons, that he upholds the levirate law, that he judges severely of the supposed adultery ol one betrothed, and that he purposely and decidedly shuns incest. Nevertheless, ne himself does not resist the allurement to unchas- tity, whilst Joseph persistently resists the temptation to adultery, and shines brilliantly as an ancient ex- ample of chastity. His first trial, when he was sold, was his suffering innocently in respect to crime, and yet not without some fault arising from his inconsid- eratenesa. His second and more grievous trial was his suffering on account of his virtue and fear of God, and, therefore, especially typical was it in the history of the kingdom of God. 4. Our narrative may be divided into three parts : 1) Joseph's good conduct and prosperity in Potiphar's house (vers. l-i'i); 2) Jo.scph's temptation, constancy, and sufferings (vers. 6-2U) ; 3) Joseph's well-being in prison (vers. 21-23). EXEGETIOAL AND OEITIOAI.. 1, Jo!ieph'$ good behavior and prosperity in Polipfiar's house (vers, 1-ti). — And Potiphar bought him {nar cli. xxxvii. 311). — As captain of the " executioners," he commanded the guard of the palace, or I'haraoli's body-guard, who were to exe- cute his deatli-sentences, and was named accordingly. Concerning this office among other ancient nations, »ec Knobki., p. 30:i The name eunuch also denotis a courtier in general ; but Knobel, without any ground, would regard Potiphar as really such ; though these were frequently married. — And the Lord was with Joseph. — Here the name Jehovah certaiidy corresponds with the facts. Joseph was not only saved, but it is Jehovah who saves him for the purposes of his kingdom. His master soon recognizes in him the talent with which he under- takes and executes everything entrusted to him. As by Jacob's entrance into Laban's house, so by Jo- seph's entrance into Potiphar's, there cornea a new prosperity, which strikes Potiphar as something re- markable. He ascribes it to Joseph as a blessing upon his piety, and to his God Jehovah, and raises Joseph to the position of his overseer. In this office he had, doubtless, the management of an extensive land-economy; for in this respect there was, for the military order, a rich provision. It was a good training for the management of the trust he after- wards received in respect to all Egypt. Upon thia new influence of Joseph tliere follows a greater pros perity, and therefore Potiphar commits to him his whole house. — Save the bread which he did eat. — Schroder : " There appears here that charac- teristic oriental indolence, on account of which a slave who has command of himself may easily attain to an honorable post of influence." Save the bread, etc. " This," according to Bohleii, " is an expression of the highest confidence ; but the ceremonial Egyp- tian does not easily commit to a stranger anything that pertains to his food." Besides, the Egyptians had their own laws concerning food, and did not eat with Hebrews. 2. Joseph^s temptations, covsolatioJis, and suffer- inr/s (vers. 6-20).— And Joseph was a goodly man. — His beauty occasioned his temjrtations. — His master's wife cast her eyes upon him — His temptations are long continued, beginning with lust- ful persuasions, and ending in a bold attack. Jo- seph, on the other hand, tiies to awaken her con- science ; he places the proposed sin in every possi- ble light ; it would be a disgraceful abuse of the con fidcnce reposed in him by his master ; it would be an outrage upon his rights as a husband ; it would be adultery, a great crime in the sight of God. Again, he shuns every opportunity the woman would give him, and finally takes to fliglit on a pressing occasicm which she employs, notwith.stii riding he is now to expect her deadly revenge. Knobel: " The ancients describe Egypt as the home of unohastity (Martial, iv. 42, 4 : nrguitias tellus scit dare nulla rnajfit), and speak of the great prevalence of mar- riage infidelity JIIerod. ii. Ill; Dion. Sin. i 59) as well as of their great sensuality generally Foi CHAP. XXXIX. 1-23. 5!»1 sample, the history of Cleopatra, Diod. ch. 51. 15." For similar statements respecting the later ami mod- ern Egypt, see Keil, p. 251, note. — To lie by her. — An euphemistic expression. — That she called unto the men. — Lust ch<«iges into hatred. She intends to revenge herself for his refusal. Besides, it ■3 for her own safety ; for though Joseph himself might not betray her, she miglit be betrayed by his gaiment that he had left behind. Her lying story is rharacteristic in every feature. Scornfully she calls her husband lie (" /i« hath brought in," etc.), and thereby betrays her hatred. Joseph she designates as " an Hebrew," i. e., one of the nomadic people, who was unclean according to Egyptian views (ch. xUii. 32 ; xlvi. 34). Both expr&ssions show her anger. She reproaches her husband with having im- perilled her virtue, but makes a show of it, by call- ing the pretended seductions of Joseph a wanton mockery, as though by her outcry she would put herself forth as the guardian of the virtue of the females of her house. — Unto me to mock me. — Her extreme cunning and impudence are proved by the fact that she makes use of Joseph's garment as the corpus delicti, and that in pretty plain terms slie almost reproaches Potiphar with liaving purposely endangered her chastity. — That his wrath was kindled. — It is to be noticed that it is not exactly said, against Joseph. He puts him into the tower, the state-prison, surrounded by a wall, and in which the prisoners of the king, or the state criminals, were kept. Ver. 10. Deliizsch and Keil regard this pun- ishment as mild ; since, according to Dion. Sic. i. 28, the Egyptian laws of marriage were severe. It must be remembered, however, that Potiphar decreed .hU penalty without any trial of the accused, and fhat his confinement seems to have been unlimited. At the same time, there is something in the opinion, expressed by many, that he himself did not fully believe his wife's assertion, and intended again, in iime, to reinstate Joseph. It may, therefore, have seemed to him most proper to pursue this course, in order to avoid the disgrace of his house, without sacrificing entirely this hitherto faithful servant. The prosperous position that Joseph soon held in the prison seems to intimate that Potiphar was punishing him gently lor appearance sake. * 3. Joxeph^s well-being in the prison {vers. 21-23). — Favor in the sight of the keeper. — This was a subordinate officer of Potiphar; and "thus van- ishes the difficulty presented by Tuch and Knobol, that Joseph is said to have had two masters, and that mention is made of two captains of the body-guard." Delitzsch. The overseer of the prison also recognizes Joseph's worth, and makes him a sort of sub-officer ; though he does not, by that, cease to be a prisoner. DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAI,. 1. Gerlach : The important step in the develop- ment of the divine plan is now to be made: the house of Jacob was to remove from the land of the promise into a foreign country, as had been an- nounced to .\braham many yeais before (ch. xv. 13). Jacob's numerous family could no longer remain vnong the Canaanite=, without dispersion, loss of unity and independence, and troublesome conflicts •rith the inhabit;ints of the country. ''Further on SI is said : They were 10 become a people in the most cultivated country then known, and yet most distinct- ty separated from the inhabitants." 2. .lehovah was with .losenh. The covenant fiod victoriously carries forward l.in decrees thiongii a. the need, sufferings, and ignominy of liis people Joseph, so to say, is now the support of the future development of the Old-Testament theocracy : and on the thread of his severely threatened life, as oin above whose head hangs the sword of the heathen executioner, there is suspended, as far as the liunian eye can see, the destiny both of Israel and the world, God's omnipotence may, and can, make its purposes dependent from such threads as Joseph in prison, Moses in the ark, David in the cave of AduUam. Providence is sure of the accomplishment of its object. 8. Joseph suffering innocently, yet confiding in God : a. a slave, yet still a free man ; b. unfortunate, yet still a cliild of fortune : c. abandoned, yet still standing firm in the severest temptations ; d. forlorn, yet still in the presence of God ; c. an object of im- pending wrath, yet still preserved alive ; /. a state- prisoner, and yet himself a prison-keeper ; g. every way subdued, yet ever again superior to his condi. tion. In this phase of his hfe, Jo.seph is :ikin tc Paul (2 Cor. vi. ), with whom he has this in common, that, through tlie persecutions of his brethreti, he is fore d to carry the light of God's kingdom into the heatlien world, — a fact, it is true, that first appears, in the life of Joseph, in a typical form. 4. Joseph, as an example of chastity, stands here in the brightest light when cotnpared with the con- duct of Judah in the previous chapter. Frotn this we see that the divine election of the Messiatiic tribe was not dependtmt upon the virtues of the Israelitish patriarchs. We should be mistaken, however, in concluding from this a groutidless arbitrariness in the divine government. In the strong fulness of Judah's nature there lies more that is undevelopeQ for the future, than in the immature spirituality and self-reliance of Joseph. It is a seal of the truth of Holy Scripture that it admits such seeming paradoxes as no mythology could have invented, as well as a seal of its grandeur that it could so boldly present such a patriarchal parallel to a people proud of its ancestry, whose principal tribe was Judah. and in which .ludah and Kphraim were filled with jealousy toward each other. 5. Joseph's victory shows how a man, and espe ciaUy a young man, is to overcome temptation. Thf first requirement is : walk as in the all-seeing pres- ence of God ; the second : fight with the weapons of the word in the light of duty (taking tne olfen- sive, which the spirit of conversion assumes accord- ing to the measure of its strength); tlie third: avoid the occasions of sin ; the fourth: firmness belore all things, and, if it must be, flight with the loss of the dress, of the good name, and even of life itself. fi. The curse of adultery and its actual sentencf in Joseph's speech and conduct. 7. The accusation of the woman a picture of cabal, reflecting itself in all times, even the most modern. The first exiuuple of gross cihimniation in the Sacred Scripture, coming from an adulterous woman, presenting a picture, the very opposite of Joseph's virtue, as exhibiting the mo.st impudent and revengeful traits of vindictive lying Thus, also, was Christ calumniated, in a way that might be railed tlie consummation of all calumny, the maste'-pieC€ of the prince of accusers. 8. Potiphar's wrath and irildness are indications that he had a presentiment of what the truth really was. It is also an example showing how the pridt of the great easily inclines them to sacrifice to th» wa GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF M16ES. honor of tKeir house the right and happiness of their depen laots. HOMUiETICAL AND PRACTICAL. See Doctrinal and Ethical. Joseph's destiny ac- cording to the divine providence : 1. His mislortune in his fortune. As Ibrmerly the preference of his father, his variegated coat, and the splendid dreams, prepared for him misfortunes, so now his important fimctioii in Potiphar's house, and his goodly person. 2. His fortune in his misfortune. He was to go to Egypt, assume the condition of a slave, enter prison, and all this in order to become a prophetic man, an Interpreter of dreams, an overseer of estates, lord of Egypt, a deliverer of many from hunger, a cause of repentance to his brethren, and of salvation to the house of Jacob. — Taube : The promise of suf- fering, and the blessing of godliness: 1. Its use: "godUness is profitable unto all things ; " 2. its suf- ferings : " all that will live godly shall suffer persecu- tion , " 3. its blessing in its exercise : " exercise thy- self unto godliness." Section First. (Vers. 1-6). Starke : There is no better companion on a journey than God. Blessed are they who never forget to take this society with them wherever they go. — Bibl. Tub. : God's blessing and grace are with the pious everywhere, even in their severest trials. — Cramer: Where God is present with his grace, there he will be soon known through his word, and other tokens of his presence. — Osias- DKR : Pious servants should be made happy in their service ; they should be loved as children, and ele- vated to higher employments. — Lange : A beautiful bodily form, and a disposition fundamentally enriched, both by grace and nature ! how fitly do they corres- pond.—-Schroder : In Egypt Jacob's family had a rich support during the tamine ; there could it grow up to a great and united people ; there it tbund the best school of human culture ; there was the seat of the greatest worldly power, and, therefore, the best occasion in which to introduce those severe suf- ferings that were to awaken in Israel a longing alter redemption, and a spirit of voluntary consecration to God (Hengstenberg). — God's being with Joseph, how- ever, is not a presence of special i-evelations, iis with the patriarchs, but a presence of blessing and suc- cess in all things (Baumgarten). — Joseph happy, though a servant. — Among the unplements of agri- culture delineated on the Egyptian tombs, there is often to be seen an overseer keeping the accounts of the harvest In a tomb at Knm el Ahmar there is to be seen the office of a household steward, with ill its appurtenances. Section Second. (Vers. 7-20). Starke : Luther : Thus far Satan had tempted Joseph on his left side, L e., by manifold and severe adversities ; now he tempts him on the light, by sensuality. This temp- tation is most severe and dangerous, especially to a young man For Joseph lived now among tlie Ilea- ilien, where such sins were frequent, and conld, ihiTefore, more (aisily excite a disposition in any way inclined to sensual pleasure. The more liealthy one is in body, the more violent is this sickness of the •oul (Sir. liv. 14). The more dangerous temptations are, or the more difficult to be overcome, so much the more plausible and agreeable are they. Nothing IS more alluring than the eyes. "And if thine eye iffend thee, pluck it out." — Ver. y. MuscuLus: In tU cases he who sing, ^ins against God, — even then when he is wronging his fellow-men. But he mo» especially sins against God who injures the forsaken, the miserable, the "' httle ones," and those who are deficient in understanding. For God will protect them, >ince they cannot be wronged without the grossest wickedness. — Acgustine : Imileiiiur ado lescentcs Joseph sanctum, pulchrum corpore, pulchri- orein inenie. — Lange : Since by nature shame is im- planted m women to a higher degree than in men (in addition to the fact, that in consenting and trans* gression she is exposed to more danger and shame), 80 much the more disgraceful is it when she so de- generates as not only to lay snares secretly for the other sex, but also impudently to importune them. — The SA.ME : The fear of God is the best means of grace tor avoiding sin and shame. — Hall : A pious heart would rather remain humbled in the dust than rise by sinful means. — Ver. 12. He preferred to leave his garment behind him, rather than a good conscience. — Lange: In a temptation to adultery and fornication, flight becomes the most pressing ne- cessity.— Ver. 18. Cramer: The devil will be true to his nature ; for as he is an unclean spirit, so also is he a liar. — Hall: Wickedness is ever artful in getting up false charges against the virtues and good works of others (Acts xvi. 20). We must be patient toward the diabolical slanders of the impious ; for God finally comes and judges them. — Beware of the act itself; against the lie there may be found a remedy. — Vers. 19, 20. He who beUeves easily is easily deceived. Magistrates should neither be par- tial, hasty, nor too passionate. Schroder; ^^ Joseph was a goodly person." With literal reference to ch. xxix. 17, Joseph was the re- flected image of his mother. They in whose hearts the Holy Spirit dwells, are wont lo have a counte- nance frank, upright, and joyful (Luther). — The love of Potiphar's wife was far more dangerous to Joseph than the hatred of his brothers (Rambach). — Now a far worse servitude threatens him, namely, that of sin (Krummaeher). — Joseph had a chaste heart, and, iherefore, a modest tongue (Val. Herberger). Un- chaste expressions a mark of unchaste thoughts. On the monuments may be seen Egyptian women who are so drunk with wine that they cannot stand. Of a restriction of wives, as customary afterwards in the East, and even in Greece, we find no trace. — Joseph lets his mantle go, but holds on to a good conscience. Joscpli is again stripped of his garment, and again does it serve for the deception of others. — Sensual love changes suddenly into hatred (2 Sam. xiii. 15). — Calwer Handbuch : Such flight is more honorable than the most heroic deeds. Section Tiiird. (Vers. 21-23). Starke : OsiAN- DER : To a pious man there cannot happen a severer misfortun than the reputation of guilt, and of de- served punishment therefor, when he is innocent (Rom. viii. 28). — Cramer : God sympathises with those who suffer innocently (James i. 3). God briiiguth his elect down to the grave, but bringeth tliein up again (1 Sam. ii. 6). Whom God would re- vive, can no one stifle. Whom God favors, no mis- lortune can harm. SciiRiiDER : Those who believe in God must suffer on account of virtue, truth, and goodness; not on account of sin and shame (Luther). Exalt ation in humiliation, a sceptre in a prison, seivant and Lor-d — even as Christ. — (iod's eyes behold tlie prison, the fetters, and the most sliamefnl death, as 111' beholds the fair ind shining sun. In Jo.-eph'a condition nothing is to be seen but death, the los/ CHAP. XL. 1-23. 59S »f his fair fame, and of all lii3 viituea. Now comes Christ with his eyes of grace, ami throws light iuto the grave. Joseph is to become a Lord, thougli he had seeiiiingly entered into the prison of be\l (Luther). Joseph's way is now for a time in the darliiiess, but this is the very way through which God often leads hie people. Thus Moses, David, Paul, Luther ; so lived the Son of God to his thirtieth year in Nazareth Nothing is more opposed to God than that impa tience of the power of nature which would violentl; usurp his holy government. — Stolbero justly com mends "the inimitablesimplicity of Joseph's liistory narrated in the most vivid manner, and bearing of its face the most unmistal^able seal of truth." FOURTH SECTION. J-'ieph as interpreter of the dreams of hi» fellow-prisoneri. Chapter XL. 1-23. 1 And it came to pass after these things that the butler of the king of Egypt, and hit 2 baker, had offended their lord the king of Egypt. And Pharaoh was wroth against two of his officers, against the chief of the butlers, and against the chief of the 3 bakers. And he put them in ward in the house of the captain of the guard, into 4 the prison, the place where Joseph was bound. And the captain of the guard charged Joseph with them ; and he served them ; and they continued a season 5 in ward. And they dreamed a dream, each man his dream in one night, each man according to the interpretation of his dream, the butler and the baker of the king of 6 Egypt, which were bound in prison. And Joseph came in unto them in the morning, 7 and looked upon them, and, behold, they were sad. And he asked Pharaoh's ofScera that were with him in the ward of his lord's house, saying, Wherefore look ye so sadly 8 to day ? And they said unto him, We have dreamed a dream, and there is no inter- preter of it. And Joseph said unto them, Do not interpretations belong to God ? tell 9 me them, I pray you. And the chief butler told his dream to Joseph, and said to him, 10 In my dream, beliold, a vine was before me. And in the vine were three brandies : and it was as though it budded, and her blossoms shot forth ; and the clusters thereof 1 1 brought forth ripe grapes : And Pharaoh's cup was in my hand : and I took the grapes, 12 and pressed ' them into Pharaoh's cup, and I gave the cup into Pharaoh's hand. And Joseph said unto him, This is the interpretation of it: The three branches are three 13 days: Yet within three days shall Pliaraoh lift up thine head, and restore thee unto thy place ; and tliou shalt deliver Pharaoh's cup into his hand, after the former manner 1^ when thou wast his butler. But think on me when it shall be well with thee, and shew kindness, I pray thee, unto me ; and make mention of me unto Pharaoh, and bring 15 me out of this house : For indeed I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews ; 16 and here also have I done nothing that they should put me into the dungeon. When the ciiief baker saw that the interpretation was good, he said imto Joseph, I also was 17 in my dream, and behold, I had three white baskets on my head ; And in tiie uppermost basket there ivas of all manner of bakemeats for Pharaoh ; and the birds did eat them 18 out of the basket upon my head. And Joseph answered and said. This is the inter- 19 pretation thereof: The three baskets are three days : Yet within three days shall Pharaoh lift up thy head from off thee, and shall hang thee on a tree; and the birds 20 shall eat thy flesh from off thee. And it came to pass the third day, which was Pharaoh's birthda}-, that he made a feast unto all his servants ; and he lifted up the 21 head of the chief butler, and of the chief baker among his servants. And he restored the chief butler unto his butlership again ; and lie gave the cup inti, Pharaoh's hand ; 22, 23 But he hanged ' the chief baker ; as Joseph had interpreted to them. Yet did not the chief butler remember Joseph, but forgat him. [^ Ver. Ll. — I3n'iJX* . J pressed. The word occurs nnly here, yet its meaning is siafBciently obvious from the context, and from the cognate'Chaldaic I^nD . It is onomatopic, representing the emission of the juice. It is allied to nPllC Vtth Its sense of waste and destruction, LXX., efe0Ati^a ; Vulg.. expre^si. — T. L.] (^ Ver. 22. — n?n. It does not here denote su^pgnsimi /ram, like han^lx^ &om a ^allows. The preposition 5^ « opposed to that, and shows that it denotes crucitaxiou. — T. L. 1 AOO GENESIS. OR THE FIKST BOOK OF MOSES. PEELIMINAEY REMAKKS. The contents of this chapter may be denoted, ihe silent preparation for the great turning in Jo- seph's destiny. In itself considered, however, our narrative shows us how the religious capacity of suf- fering for the Lord's sake develops itself, like a germ, in the people of God. Joseph's spiritual life shines resplendent in his prison. There may be dis- tinguished the following sections : 1. The imprison- ment of the two court-officers, and Joseph's charge over tliem (vers. 1—1) ; 2. their dejecteilness, and Joseph's sympathy (vera. 6-8) ; 3. the dream of the chief butler, and its interpretation (vers. 9-15); 4. the dream of the chief baker, and its interpretation (vers. 16-19) ; 5. the fulfilment of both dreams. EXEGETICAL AJ^D CRITICAIi. 1. Vers. 1-4. Tlie imprUonment of the two eourt-o'fficers^ atid JosepJCs charge over them. — The chief of the butlers and the chief of the ba- kers.— .\ccording to ver. 2 they are the chiefs in their respective departments of service. The ori- ental kiufis, as those of the Persians (Xenoph., Hd- lenirri, viii. i. 38), had a multitude of butlers, bakers, and CO iks. The office of chief butler was very hon- orable wiih the kings of Persia (HERon., iii. 34; Xeniiph., Viiroped. i. 3, 8). It was tiuce tilled by Nehemiali (Neh. i. 11 ; ii. 1). — In the house of the captain of the guard — i. e., in the house of Poti- pliar. The house of the cajitain of the guard was connected with the state-prison, and denotes here the prison itself. — Charged Joseph with them. — Here Potiphar again mingles himself with Joseph's fortune (and that by way of mitigating it) in the recognition of his talents. By this distinguished charge, he shows favor, at the same time, to Joseph and to his fallen colleagues. 2. Vers. 5-8. Their dejecifylnean and Joseph^ s tximpaihy. — According to the interpretation. — Both had dreamed — each one a ditl'erent ilream — each one a significant dream, according to the antici- pated occurrence upon which it was founded, and also according to its interpretation. Joseph's con- versation with the sad and dejected prisoners, proves his sagacity as well as his kindly sym|iathy. It shows, too, how misfortune equalizes lank, and makes the great dependent on the sympathy of those wlio are lower in po.sition. — And there is no in- terpreter of it. — .\n expression shoeing that the interpretation of dreams was much in vogue, and that it was one of the wants of persons of rank to have their dreams interpreted. — Do not inter- pretations belong to God ? — He admits lh:it then- are signilicant dreanjs, and tliat (iod could be.-tuw on men the gift of interpretation when ihey are re- ferred l)aek to him. He rejects, indirectly, the hea- then art of interpreting dreams, whilst, at the .same time, giving them to understand that it was, perhaj)s, inii)arted to himself. First, however, he is to he:ir their dreams. Kuobcl is inexact when he speaks in general terms of " the ancient view eoncennng dreams.*' Doubtless the Held of revelation admits dreams as sent bv God, but these ooincidt! with dr Niuis in general just as little tis the piophetic niode of interpreting them ecjincided with that of the hea- •Jifin, though, ajcording to Egyptian views, iill i)ro- phetic art "omes from the gods (Hkkod. ii. Mt Knobel. :-!. Vers. 9-16. Tlie dream of the chief bulla and its intirpretation. — In my dream, behold a vine. — k hvely description of a lively dream. The first picture is the vine, and the rapid developmen? of its branches to the miiturity of the grapes. On the vine in Egypt, see Knobkl, p. :;il7. In the sec- ond picture, the chief butler beholds himself in the service of Pharaoh, preparing and presenting to him the juice of the grapes. " The vine was referred to Osiris, and was already well known in Egypt. See Ps. Ixxviii. 47 ; cv. 33 ; Numb. xx. 6. The state ment, Herod., ii. 77, is, therefore, to be taken with limitations. Nor is it true that in the time of Psam- meticus fresh must only was drank, while fermented wine was prohibited. Knobel has shown that Plu- tarch, De Iside, vi. 6, says just the contrary. The people drank wine unrestrained; the kings, because they were priests, only so much as was allowed by the sacred books ; but from the time of Psannneti- cus even this restriction was abolished. The old monuments show great variety of wine-utensils, wine-presses at work, topers tired of drinking, even intoxicated women." Dehtzsch. "Wine had been prohibited before the time of Mohammed (Sh.^ras- TANi, ii. p. 346). The grapes he allowed (Koran, xvi. 11, 69). They evaded his prohibition by pressing the grapes and drinking the jiuce of the berries (ScHULTZ, Leifungen, v. p. 286). Such juice of grapes the Egyptian king drank also in Joseph's time. He was a ruler of the Ilyksos ('? ), who were an Arabian tribe." Knobel. The same: The dream- interpreter Artemidorus classes the vine with plants that grow rapidly, and regards dreams concerning it as having a quick fulfilment. Joseph's interpreta^ tion. — Three branches, three days. — Since Pha:- raoh's birth-day was at hand, and was known, per- haps, as a day of pardon, this presentiment may, to some degree, have been affected by it. — Lift up thine head. — To replace, again, in prosperity and honor, especially to bring out of prison (? Kings XXV. 27). — And show kindness, I pray thee, unto me. — Joseph is so sine of his inlerpretatioc that be employs the opportunity to plead ibr his owr right and liberty. — I was stolen. — An cxpressioc of innocence. They took him away from his father, but how it was done, his feelings do not allow him to relate; enough that he came to Egypt neither as a criminal, nor as a slave, rightly solil. With the same caution he speaks about his imprisonment without exposing the house of Potiphar. 4. Vers. 16-19. The dream of the chief of the bakers^ and its inhrpretation. The striking resem- blance of his dream to the one previously interpreted, caused the baker to overlook its ominous difference ; he, therefore, hopes also Ibr a favorable interpreta- tion. The interpreter, however, shows his discern- ment in recognizing the birds that did not eat the bakenieats out of the Ijasket upon his head, as the main ]ioint. He differs also from the heathen inter- preters in aimouneing tlie unfavorable meaning plain- ly and distinctly. Knobel: "In Egyjit men were accustomed to carry on their heads, «onien upon their shoulders. In modern Egypt women bear bur- dene upini their heads." " Even at this day in Egypt kites and hawks seize ujion ariieles of fooil carried up/e came unto me ; and he speaks thus, not of faithful martyrs only ; even among the guilty tliere is a spark of Christ's kinsmanship, — i. e., belonging to him. 4. How mightily misfortune takes away the distinc- tion of rank. Joseph has not only the heart's gift of sympathy for the unhappy, but also that open- hearted self-consciousness that fits him to associate with the great. Even wlien a child did he run be- fore his mother in meeting Esau. 5. The night-life with its wakefulness, as with its dreams, enters into the web of the divine providence jsee Book of Esther, Daniel, Matt. ii. xxvii. 19 ; Acts rvi. 9 ; Ps. exxxii. 4). Dreams are generally so un- meaning tliat they should never cause men to err in obedience to the faith, in duty, or in the exercise of a judicious understanding. Their most general sig- nificance, however, consists in tlieir being a reflection of th« feelings, remembrances, and anticipations of the day life, as .also in the fact, that all perceptions of the body give themselves buck in the mirror of the nightly consciousness, as imaged speech or pic- ture. The spirit of God may, therefore, employ dreams as a medium of revelation. He can send dream? and bestow the gift of interpretation. But, in themselves, the most significant dreams of rere lation never form ethical decisions, though they maj be signs and monitors of the same. Their highei significance, however, is sealed by their great am world-historic consequences for the kingdom of God. 6. Josepli very definitely distinguished betweet his own and the heathen mode of interpreting dreams ; and tliis he owes to his Israelitish con sciousness as opposed to the heathen. The divine certainty of his interpretation is seen in the fact, that, notwithstanding the greatest similarity in both dreams, he immediately recognizes the point of dis- similarity, and dares to make the fearful announce- ment in the assurance that the issue of the affair would be in correspondence. The apparent severity of such frankness could not make him falter in the feeling of what was due to truth. To narrate how he may have sought to mitigate it, by expressions of sympathy, lay not within the scope of this narration. 7. The joyous feasts of the great are sources both of life and death. 8. A man in prosperity soon forgets the com- panions of his former misery, just as tlie chief butler forgot Joseph. God's memory never fails, and it is, at the same time, the chief quickener of the memories of men. God keeps his own time. The ray of hope that shone for the prisoner at the release of the chief butler went out again for two years. When all hope seemed to have vanished, then divine help comp» in wonderfully. HOMLLETICAL AND PRACTICAL. See Doct. and Eth. Joseph's disciplinary trials. His preparation for his great calling of saviour and ruler: .a. by sufferings; b. by works of his vocation. — Traces of God in the prison; 1. Divine light; 2. holy love ; 3. divine monitions ; 4. hope of deliver- ance.— God's government in its great issues: 1. Of the smallest things ; 2. of the proudest events ; 3 of the most fallible judgments of men ; 4. of the darkest prisons ; 6. of the nightly life ; 6. of hopes and fears in human need. First Section. Vers. 1-4. Starke : Ver. 1. In what the offence consisted is not announced. The Rabbins, wlio pretend to know all things about which the Scriptures are silent, say that the butler had per- mitted a fly to drop into the king's cup, and that a grain of sand was found in the bread of the baker. The conjecture of Rabbi Joniitlian has more proba- bility ; he thinks that both had conspired to poison the king. Joseph was thirteen years in a state of humihation, and the last three (?) in a prison. Schroder : Information concerning the Egyptian wine culture and representations of it upon the monU' ments (according to Champollion and others, p. 576), — also concerning the modes of baking, which was quite an advanced art among the Egyptians. The Egyptians had for their banquets many different kinds of pastry. — The offices of chief Ijutler and chief baker were in high honor, and sometimes that of field-marshal was connected with them. — In th« East the prisons are not public buildings erected for this sole purpose, but a part of the house in which the prison officer resided. Second Section. Vers. 5—8. Starke : Crauek; There are different kinds of dreams: divine dreamt (ch. xxviii. 12; xU. 17; Daniel ii. 2Sl; diabolical dreams (Dent. xm. 2 ; Jeremiah xxiii. 16 ; xxvii. 9) ■ natural dreams (Eccles. v. 2). We must, tberefora 002 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. distinguish between dreams, and not regard them all alike (Sirrich xxiiT. 1). The godless and the pious may get into the same troubles, and have similar suf- ferings ; yet they cannot look upon them with the like dispositions and emotions. SchriIukr : Thi'V may have been dreams suggested by their official po- tition. Both of them may have gone to sleep with the number three upon their minds because of the thought that Pharaoh was to celebrate his birth-day within three days. No wonder that their imagination overflowed from the abundance of their hearts ; and who can tell how much tlieir consciences were con- cerned in tliese dreams. The culture and the char- acter of the Egyptians was every way mystical, or rather symbolical ; the less they are able to account for an occurrence the more divine it seemed. Night they considered as source of all things, and as a being to which they paid divine honors. The whole anaetit history of this wonderful people has a noc- turnal aspect about it. One might call it the land of dreams, of presentiments, enigmas. Joseph's des- tiny in respect to this country begins in dreams, and is completed by them (Krummacher). It is not every one that can read the writing of the human counte- nance ; this power is given to love only (Baumgarten). He preached in prison as Christ did (Richter). Third Section. Vers. 9-15. SrARKK : Ver. 14. The Jews charge that Joseph in thii! request demand- ed pay for his interpretation, and allege that, on this account, he had to remain in prison two years longer. There is, however, no ground for such an imputation ; but though he had the assurance of the divine pres- ence, and that God would deliver him from the prison, he had, nevertheless, a natural longing for liberty. Besides, he did not ask anything unfair of the butler (1 Cor. vii. 21). — Cramer: Ordinary means are from God, and he who despises them tempts God. — The same : We may assert our inno- cency, and seek deliverance, yet still we must not, on that account, speak ill of those who have injured us ( Matt. V. 44). Schroder : The dream of the chief butler, no doubt, leans upon the business of his life and office, but, on the other hand, it also has the imaginative impression of " the poet concealed within every man," as Schubert calls it. — Calwer Handhuch : Ver. 15. Amild judgment upon the act of his breth- ren, whom he would not unnecessarily reproach. Fourth Section. Vers. 16-19. Starke: Bibl. Wirt. : Whenever the word of God is to be expound- sd, it should be done in the way the Holy Spirit pre- >ent« it, and according to the word itself, no matter whether the hearers are disturbed, alarmed, or com forted. — Schroder : (Calvin :) Many desire the wore of God because they promise themselves simply en joymcnt in the hearing of it. — ^Calwer JIamilmch: In Hebrew, "to lift up the head," is a play upon words. It means to restore to honor and dignity, or to hang upon the gallows, or decapitation (taking off the head), or crucifixion (lifting up upon thi cross). Fifth Section. Vers. 20-23. Starke: Bibl. Wirt : Godless men in adversity, when they receive help from the pious, make the fairest of promises, but when prosperity returns they forget them all. Be not, therefore, too confiding. High station changes the manners, and usually makes men arro- gant.— Lange : How easily is a favor forgotten, and how seductive the courtier life ! — Schroder : These are times when men, through the prestige of birth, or by money, or human favor, may reach the summit of honor and wealth, without any previous schooling of adversity ; still such men are not truly great, whatever may be the greatness of their title and their revenues. They are not the instruments that God employs in the accomplishment of his great purposes. Thus to Joseph, who was to become Lord of Egypt, the house and prison of Potiphar, in both of wliich he bore rule on a lesser scale, were to be his prepara- tory school. The wisdom he was to exercise in great- er things begins here to show itself in miniature. Such a heart-purifying discipline is needed by all who would see God, and who would be clothed with authonty for the world's benefit. Without this there is no truly righteous administration. It never comes from passsionate overhastiness, sensual sloth, needless fear, selfish purposes, or unreasoning obsti- nacy. On the contrary, Joseph was purified, in prison, by the word of God ; so was Moses in Midian, David in exile, Daniel in Babylon. Thus became they fit instruments in the hand of God (Roos). Therefore is it that the pious Joseph was crucified, dead, and buried, and descended into hell. Now comes the Lord to deliver him, honor him, make him great (Luther). — Heim (Bible Studies): It was Jo- seph's single ray of hope in the prison — that which lighted him to freedom — that he could commend himself to the intercession of the chief butler. When this went out, according to every probable view, there seemed nothing else for him than to pine away his whole life in prison ; and yet the fulfilment of the dreams of the court officers might have strengthened him in the hope of the fulfilment of hLs own dreams in his native home. FIFTH SECTION. Joseph the interpreter of Pharaoh's dreams. Chapter XLI. 1-57. And it came to pass, at the end of two full years [lit., days], that Pharaoh dreamed and, behold, he stood by the river. And, behold, there came up out of the rivev sever well-favoured kine, and fat-fleshed; and ihey fed in a meadow' [butajshe? the giaes on thi bankoftherivor]. And, behold, seven other kine came up after them out of me river, ill- favoured ami lean-fl ished, and stood by the other kine upon the brink of the river. A ^i CHAP. XLI. 1-07. 61(3 the ill-favoured and lean-fl>^shed kine did eat up the seven well-favouied and fat kine. Sc 5 Pharaoh awoke. And he slept and dreamed the second time ; and, behold, seven ?ara 6 of corn came up upon one stalk, rank and good. And, behold, seven thin ears, and 7 blasted with the east wind, sprung up [in single stacks] after them. And the seven tlun ears devoured the seven rank and full ears. And Pharaoh awoke, and, behold, it wot 8 a dream. And it came to pass in the morning, that his spirit was troubled ; and he s«nt and called for all the magicians' [scribes: skilled in hieroglyphics] of Egypt, and all the wise men [magicians] thereof; and Pliaraoh told them his dreams; but there wo^ none 9 that could interpret them unto Pharaoh. Then spake the chief butler unto Pharaoh. 10 saying, I do remember my faults this day. Pharaoh was wroth with his servants, and 11 put me in ward in the captain of the guard's house, both me and the chief baker; And we dreamed a dream in one night, 1 and he; we dreamed each man according to the 12 interpretation of his dream. And there was there with us a young man, an Hebrew, servant to the captain of the guard ; and we told him, and he interpreted to us oui 13 dreams; to each man according to his dream he did interpret. And it came to pass, as he interpreted to us, so it was; me he restored unto mine office, and him he hanged 14 Then Pharaoh sent and called Joseph, and they brought him hastdy out of the dungeor [pit] ; and he shaved himself, and changed his raiment, and came in unto Pharaoh 15 And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I have dreamed a dream, and there is none that can interpret it ; and I have heard say of thee, that thou canst understand a dream to inter. 1 6 pret it. And Joseph answered Pharaoh, saying. It is not in me : ' God shall give 17 Pharaoh an answer of peace. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, In my dream, behold, 18 I stood upon the hank of the river; And, behold, there came up out of the river seven 19 kine, fat-fleshed, and well-favoured; and they fed in a meadow ; And, behold, seven other kine came up after them, poor, and very ill-favoured and lean-fleshed, such as I 20 never saw in all the land of Egypt for badness ; And the lean and the ill-favoured kine 21 did eat up the first seven fat kine; And when they had eaten them up, it could not be known that they had eaten them; but they were still ill-favoured, as at the beginning. 22 8o I awoke. And I saw in my dream, and, behold, seven ears came up in one stalk, full 23 and good; And, behold, seven ears, withered, thin, and blasted with the east wind, 24 sprung up after them ; And the thin ears devoured the seven good ears. And I told this 25 unto the magicians ; but there was none that could declare it to me. And Joseph said unto Pharaoh, The dream of Pharaoh is one ; God hath shewed Pharaoh what he is 26 about to do. The seven good kine are seven years; and the seven good ears are seven 27 years; the dream is one. And the seven thin and ill-favoured kine, that came up after them, are seven years ; and the seven empty ears, blasted with the east wind sliall be 28 seven years of famine. This is the thing which I have spoken unto Pharaoh; what 2^ God is about to do, he sheweth unto Pliaraoh. Behold, there come seven years of 30 great plenty throughout all the land of Egypt ; And there shall arise after them seven years of famine ; and all the plenty si:aH be forgotten in the land of Egypt; and the 31 famine shall consume the land; And the plenty shall not be known in the land, by 32 reason of that famine following; for it shall he very grievous. And for tbat the dream was doubled unto Pharaoh twice ; it is because the thing is established by God, and 33 God will shortly bring it to pass. Now, therefore, let Pharaoh look out a man discreet 34 and wise, and set him over the land of Egypt. Let Pharaoh do this, and let him 35 appoint officers over tlie land, and take up the fifth part of the land of Egypt in the seven plenteous years. And let them gather [lay in store] all the food of those good years that come, and lay up corn under tbe hand of Pharaoh, and let them keep food 36 in the cities. And that food shall be for store to the land against the seven years of famine, which shall be in the land of Egypt; that the land perish not through the 37 famine. And the thing was good in the eyes of Pharaoh, and in the eyes of all hia 38 servants. And Pharaoh said unto his servants. Can we find such a one as this is. a 39 man in whom the Spirit of God is? And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, Forasmuch aa 40 God hath shewed thee all this, there is none so discreet and wise as thou art; Thou shall be over my house, and according unto thy word shall all my people be ruled ; i 1 only in the throne will I be greater than thou. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, See, I 42 have set thee over all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh took off his ring from his band, and put it upon Joseph's hand. :nid arrayed him in vestures of fine linen, and put «04 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST ijdOK OF MOSES. 43 a gold chain upon liis neck; And lie made him to ride in the second chariot which h< had; and they cried before him, Pow the knee;' and he made him ruler over all the 44 land of Egypt. And Pharaoh .said unto Joseph, I am Pharaoh, and without thee shall 45 no man lift up his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh called Josepli'a uame Zaphnath-paaueail ' [gave him the title of Savior of the world ; preserver of Ufe, ic] ; and he gave him to wile Asenath [consecrated to Neith (the Egyptian Minerva)], the dauo-hter of Poti pherah [same as PotipLar ; near to the sun], priest of On [light ; sun ; Heliopolisl. And Joseph 46 went out over all the land of Egypt. And Joseph was thirty years old when he stood before Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from the presence of Pharaoh, 47 and went throughout all the land of Egypt, And in the seven plenteous year.s the 48 earth brought forth by handfuls [armful upon armful]. And he gathered up all the food of the seven years, which were in the land of Egypt, and laid up the food in the cities ; 49 the food of the field which was round about every city, laid he up in the same. And Joseph gathered corn as the sand of the sea, very much, until he left numbering; for 50 it was without number. And unto Joseph were born two sons before the years of famine came; which Asenath, the daughter of Poti-pherah, priest of On, bare unfo him 51 And Joseph called the name of the first-born Manasseh [the one that causes to forget ; viz., Jehovah] ; For God, said he, hath made me forget all my toil, and all my father's house 52 And the name of the second called he Ephraim [FOrBt: fruits ; Dehtzsch : double fruitfulness I 53 For God hath caused me to be fruitful in the land of my afQiction. And the seven 54 years of plenteousness that was in the land of Egypt were ended [npbsn"]. And the seven years of dearth began [nj'fenri] to come, according as Joseph had said ; and the bo dearth was in all lands ; but in all the land of Egypt there was bread. And when [also] all the land of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread ; and Pharaoh said unto all the Egyptians, Go unto Joseph; what he saith to yon, do. And the 56 famine was over all the face of the earth ; And Joseph opened all the store-houses, and 57 sold unto the Egyptians ; and the famine waxed sore in the land ef Egypt. And all countries came into Egypt to Joseph for to buy corn ; because that the famine was so sore in all lands. •' "Ver. 2. — iriX . A pure Egyptian word, say most of the commentators and lexicographers ; and yet no reason can DC given why it is not, at the same time, Shemitio. Its occurrence. Job viii. 11. is as good proof of the latter sujiposition, as Gen. sli. 2 is of the foi-mer. The thing signified, a reedy pasture, was more common in Egypt than in Judea or Arabia, and, therefore, it became better known in the early Egyptian tongue. The same may be said of "^N* .— T. L.] (2 Ver. 8.— "'lai:"!!! , Here is a word used of a thing most peculiarly Egyptian, and yet there can hardly he a doubt of its root being Shemitic. It is from M"in , stylus, a writing or gi-aving instrument. They were the sacred scribes. See Gesenius, and Bochakt, Hieroz. ii. p. 468. Comp. V^PI . — T. L.] [* Ver. 11).— "'"I^ba : Beside me, or sfmie one rise than me. The T.XX have rendered it, aceu tou Oeov ovk an-ojcpi^jjcreTai rb vutrriptov /"i"'". affl'clim. It occurs in the Koran, v. 39, 72; viL 91; Ivii. 33, in the very sense here demanded by the context. — T. L.] [' Ver. 28. — CS^ XS'1 , and 'heir heart went out. LXX. e^etm\ ij KapSia avruiy. Hence the Greek €»c(rrtMri9, ecstasy It may denote rapture^ astonishment, oi'crwiielmtiig sorrtiw — any condition of euul in which the thoughts and atfectioL seem to pass beyond the control of the will. The heart goes forth, the mind wanders, tlie soul loses command of itself It is the same imagery, and nearly the same terms, in many languages. Corresponding to it are the expressions for tht opposite state. Compare the Latin exire de riei'le, ratione, etc., to he or go out of rrne^s mirtd, and the opposite, coUigere k to tat:e emtrage, to recover one^s self. So the English, to be collected, or composed. There is a similar usage of the Greek tnivavaytlfit{ ije repetitance of bis brothers, marked by the antitliosis Joseph and Simeon (ch, xUi.); 3) the trial of the brothers, iz. which appears tbeir repentance anil .losep' 's lecoD " ciliation, marked by the antithesis of J..-epb and Henjamin (ch. xliii. 1 ; xliv. 17); 4) the s'ory of the reconciliation and lecogiiition, under the aniithesit of Judah and Josepb (cb. xliv. 18 ; xlv. 16) ; .'■) tht account of the glad tidmgs to Jacob (veri 7-28) CHAP. XLIl 1-38. •JU 1. The contents of the present section: 1) The ourney to Egypt (vers. 1-6) ; 2) the rough reception »er9. 7-17) ; 3 the tasks imposed and the urrange- noenta made by Joseph (vers. 18-34); 4) The volun- tary release, the return home, the report, the dark omen (vers. 25-35) ; 5) Jacob's lament (vers. 36-38). EXEGETICAIi AND CRITICAL. 8. Vers. 1-6. The first juurney of JosepKs h-ethren to Egypt. — When Jacob saw. — It is al- ready presupposed that the famine was raffing in Canaan. Jacob's observation was probably based upon tlie preparations of others for buying corn in Egypt. The word ^3B is translated corn, but more properly means a supply of corn (frutntnii cumulm, Gesen., Thesaur.), or vendible or mar- ket corn. — Why do ye look one upon another? — Their helpless and suspicious lookiug to each other seems to be connected with iheir guilt. The journey to Kgypt, and the very thought of Egypt haunts them on account of Joseph's sale. — And Joseph's ten brethren. — They thus undertake the ^urney together, because they received corn in pro- portion to their number. For though Joseph was humanely selling corn to foreigners, yet preference for his own countrymen, and a regard to economy, demanded a limitatit^n of the quantity sold to indi- ■r of angels. Therefore, he does not know creatures by means of the creatures, as we kuow them, but by himself (^asr nsni2), because all life leans upon him, and by his knowing himself he knoweth all things— since he and his knowledge also, as well as he and his life, are one. 'I'his is a matter which the tongue has not the power of ut- tering, nor the car of hearing, nor can the mind comprehend it ; but such is the reason of the change, and of its being eaid n;"3 T\, by the life of Pharaoh, in the omstruct state, si ce I'haranh and his life are two " Again, sec. si. andxii.: " All things beside the Creator, blessed l^e he, exist through his truth (or truthfulness) and becau.-e he knows himself, ho knows everything. And he s. as they had shown to hirn. Neither had he any means of knowing whether or not he could ever be on friendly terms with them. But that he is to pa,s3 through a great reUgious and moral struggle with himself, is evident from his wavering decisions, f.'om the time he takes for consideration, and espe- cially, from the fict that he postpones the trial even aftiu- they had brought Benjamin to him. He adopts a course in which both his aged father and his be- loved Benjaiijin are exposed, temporarily, to the greatest distress. Decidedly, from the very begin- ning, does he take a noble position, but by severe Btruggles is he to attain to that holy stand-point of complete forgiveness ; and for this j)urp08e his ■jrotlieis' confession of their guilt, and especially the appearance of Reuben, Benjamin, and Judah, are blessed to him, just as his own conduct a-ssistcd the brothers in bringing on their struggles of repentance ind self-Hacrificc by fiith. 6. The turning of judgment into reconciliation. A principal point in this is the invo'untary confea sion of the brethren in Joseph's hearir.g, the discov ery of Reuben's attempt to save hit. the atonement made by the proud-hearted Simeon, the melting of the brothers' obduracy, and, through it, of Joseph'i exasperation. Above all, the recognition that God'i searching providence is present throughout the wholl development. " Whatsoever maketh manifest il light " (Eph. V. 13). Thus under the Ught ot Chriei'i cross the entire darkness of the world's guilt wa« uncovered, and only in such an uncovering could it become reconciled. 1. Even now there already dawns upon Joseph the wonderful fact that bis exaltation was owing mediately to the eimaity of his brethren, and that they were together both conscious and unconscious instruments of God's mercy and of his providmtia design to save much people alive (ch. xlv. and 1.). 8. Jacob feels the burden of his house, ami bia alarming presentiments of evil become manifest more and more. We must imagine this to ourselves, if we would clearly understand his depression. He is not strengthened by the spirit in his household, but put under restraint and weariness. He feels that there is something rotten in the foundation of his house. 9. Here, too, death is not denoted as a descend, ing into Sheol, but as the dying from the heart's sor- row of an uncompleted life. Opposed to it is the going home to the fathers when the soul is satisfied with the life on ea rth, and its enigmas are all solved. HOMILETIOAI, AND PRACTICAL. See Doctrinal and Ethical. The brethren appear ing before Joseph. Thus the world before Christ, the oppressors in the forum of the oppressed, the wicked at the judgment-seat of the pious. — Joseph and his brethren as they stand confronting each other : 1. He recognizes them, but they do not rec- ognize him ; 2. the positions of the parties are changed, but Joseph exercises mercy ; 3. the judg- ment must precede the reconciliation ; 4. humao and divine reconciliation go together. We are verily guiltif concerning our brother. 1. This language considered in their sense ; 2. according to Joseph's understanding ; 3. in the sense of the spirit. The guilty conscience terrified, at first, by signs that were really favorable. Jacob's lamentation as the seem- ing curse of his house becomes gradually known. At the extremest need help is near. Benjamin's dark prospects (his mother dead, his brother lost_ himself threatened with misfortune), and their favor able issue. Tadbe : The hours of repentance that come to Joseph's brethren : 1. How the simier is led to re- pentance; 2. how repentance manifests itself; S the relation of the Lord to the penitent sinner. First Section (vers. 1-ti). Starke: The utility of coiumerce. The dift'erent products which God has given to different countries, demand mutual In- tercourse for their attainment. A believer must em- ploy ordinarv means, and not tempt God by theil refusal. Nothing can hinder God's decrees in behalf of the pious. — Schrooer : The guilt of Benjamic't brothers in respect to Joseph seems to weigh upon the father's heart as a kind of presentiiTient. — Cai viKK /Janilliuch: Joseph's brethren are they callet. because Joseph stands here in the foreground of his- tory, and the destiny of the family is co_iiected will CHAP. XLIII. 1— XLIV. 17. eis him. The very ten by hqoih he was sold must bow •hemselves before him, and receive the rigliteousand higher requital. — Heim ; Tlie expression xoits of Is- rael, instead of sons of Jacob, points to Israel the man of faith, whose children they were, who accom- panied them \rith his prayers, and for whose sake, although he knew it not, this journey to Egypt, so dark in its commencement, became a blesising to them til. Second Section {vers. 1-11). Starke: Formerly they regarded him as a spy — now are they treated as spies in turn. — Ver. 15. This expression is not an oath, but only a general asseveration. The first Christians, though making everything a matter of conscience, did net hesitate thus to affirm by the life of the Emperors, but they were unwillhig to swear by their divinity. Juratmis slcut non per genios C'cesarum, ifa per saliUem eornm qu(E est auf/itMior omnibus geniis. Tert. Apol.— Hall : The disposi- tion of a Chiistian is not always to be judged by his outward acts. — Gerlach : Ver. 9. Nothing is more common than this reproach upon travellers in the East, especially when they would sketch any parts of the country. — Schroper : He who was hungry when they were eating, now holds the food for which they hunger. To him (Joseph) there was committed, for some time, the government of a most important part rf the world. He was not only to bless, bu'j also to junish and to judge ; i. e., become forgetful of all auman relations and act divinely. [Krummachek: Still Joseph felt as man, not as though he were Provi- dence.] Joseph plays a wonderful part with his brethren, but one which humbles and exercises him greatly. A similar position God assumes towards believers when in tribulation : let us, therefore, hold assuredly that all our misfortunes, trials, and la- mentations, even death itself, are nothing but a hearty and fair display of the divine goodness towards us (Luther). Joseph's suspicion, though feigned in expression, has, nevertheless, a ground of fact in the fonner conduct of his brothers towards him. Third Section (vers 18-24). Starke : God knows how to keep awake the conscience. — Ver. 18. The tp.3t of a true Christian in all his doings, is the fear of the Lord. — Bibl. Tub, : How noble is religioi in a judge ! — Lange : Chastisements as a means o' self-examination. There may be times when sin3_ long since committed, may present themselves s< vividly before the eyes as to seem but of yesterday — The same: God's wise providence so brings it about, that though a guilty man may escape the d& sei'ved punishment for a time, the visitation wiL surely come, even though it be by God's permitting misfortunes to fall upon him through the guilt of others, when he himself is innocent. Fourth Section (vers. 26-35). Starke : Simeon may now let his thoughts wander back, in repentanca for his murderous deeds at Shechem, in weeping for the grief he had caused to Jo.seph, and in imploring God's forgiveiWLS. God does not bestow the bless- ing of the gospel on the sinner in any other way than in the order of the law, or in the knowledge of his sins. A frightened conscience always expects the worst (Wisd. of Sol. xvii. 11). — Schrodkr: Simeon is bound; probably because the leader at Shechen was also the prime mover against Joseph (Baum. garten. Fifth Section (vers. 36-38). Starke : He " who wrestled with God (and man) and prevailed, shows here great weakness of faith. Yet he recovers, and again struggles in faith, Uke Abraham his grand- father.— Cramer: When burdened with trials and temptations, wo interpret everything in the worst way, even though it may be for our peace. — Gerlach : Jacob's declarations betray a feeling that the broth- ers were not guiltless respecting Joseph's disappear- ance. He knew their jealousy, and he had expe- rienced the violent disposition of Simeon and Levi, — Schroder : There is nothing so restless or so great a foe to peace as a frightened heart, that turns pale at a glance, or at the rustle of a leaf (Luther). He had long suspected them in regard to Joseph (se« ver. 4) ; the old wound is now opened again. Reu- ben is once more the tenderhearted one. He offers everything (ver. 37) that he may prevail with his father. "But it is out of reason what he offers." Luther. — Heim: Jacob's painful language. There breaks forth now the hard suspicion which he had long carried shut up in the depths of his own lieart. SEVENTH SECTION. Hie tecond journey. Benjamin accompanying. Joseph malceth himself known lo hia brethtm. Their return. Jacobus joy. Chapter XLIII— XLV. A. The tri»l of the brethren. Their repentaiu* ».uC Joseph's reconcilableness. Joseph and Benjami*, Chapter XLIII. 1— XLIV. 17. 1, 2 And the famine was sore in the land. And it came to pass, when they had eatei up the corn which they had brought out of Egypt, their father said unto them, Go 3 ag.ii- buy lis a little food. And Judah spakn un^o him, saj..ig, The man did solemnh 516 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. 4 protest unto us, saying, Ye shall not see my face, except your brother he with you. II 5 tho" wilt send our brother with us, we will go down and buy thee food ; But if thoi will not send him, we will not go down ; for the man said unto us. Ye shall not see mj 6 face [again], except your brother he with you. And Israel said, Wherefore dealt ye at 7 ill with me, as to tell the man whether ye had yet a brother? And they said, Tht man asked us straitly of our state, and of our kindred, saying, Is your father yet alive 7 have ye another brother? and we tnld him, according to the tenor of tliese words; could 8 we certainly know that he would say, Bring your brother down ? And Judab .said unto Israel his father, Send the lad with me, and we will arise and go ; that we miy 9 hve, and not die, both we, and thou, and also our little ones. I will be surety for him ; of my hand shalt thou require him; if I bring him not unto thee, and set him before 10 thee, then let me bear the blame for ever ; For except we had Hngered, surely now we 11 had returned this second time. And their father Israel said unto them. If I'i must he so now, do this ; take of the best fruits in the land in your vessels, and carry down the man a present, a little balm, and a little honey, spices, and myrrh, nuts, and almonds i2 And take double money in your hand; and the money that was brought again in the mouth of your sacks, carry it again in your hand; peradventure it was an oversight; 13, 14 Take also your brother, and arise, go again unto the man ; And God Almighty give you mercy before the man, that he may send away your other brother, and Benjamin. 15 If I be bereaved of my children,, I am bereaved. And the men took that present, and they took double money in their hand, and Benjamin, and rose up, and went down to 16 Egvpt, and stood before Joseph. And when Joseph saw Benjamin with them, he said to the ruler of his house. Bring tliese men home, and slay, and make ready ; for thest 17 men shall dine with me at noon. And the man did as Joseph bade; and the man 18 brought the men into Joseph's house. And the men were afraid, because they were brought into Joseph's house ; and they said. Because of the money that was returned in our sacks at the first time are we brought in ; that he may seek occasion against us, 19 and fall upon us, and take us for bondmen, and our asses. And they came near to the steward of Joseph's house, and they communed with him at the door of the house. 20, 21 And said, 0 sir, we came indeed down at the first time to buy food ; Anr' it came to pass, when we came to the inn, that we opened our sacks, and, behold, ^very man's money was in the mouth of his sack, our money in full weight ; and wj have brought 22 it again in our hand. And other money have we brought down in our hands to buy 23 food; we cannot tell who put our money in our sacks. And he said. Peace he to you, fear not; your God, and the God of your father, hath given you treasure in your sacks; 24 I had your money. And he brought Simeon out unto them. And the man brought the men into Joseph's house, and gave them water, and they washed their feet; and he 25 gave their assas provender. And they made ready the present against Joseph came at 26 noon ; for they heard that they should eat bread there. And when Joseph came home, they brought him the present which was in their hand into the liou;>e, and bowed 27 themselves to him to the earth. And he asked them of their welfare, and said, Is your 28 father well, the old man of whom ye spake? Is he yet alive? And they answered. Thy servant our father is in good health, he is yet alive. And they bowed down tlfeir 29 heads, and made obeisance. And he lift up his eyes, and saw his brother Benjamin, his mother's son, and said, Is this your younger brother, of whom ye spake unto me ? And he said farther [without waiting for an answer] God be gracious unto thee, my son. 30 And Joseph made haste ; for his bowels did yearn upon his brother; and he sought 31 where to weep; and he entered into his chamber and wept there. And he washed hia 32 face, and went out.and refrained himself, and said. Set on bread. And they set on for him by himself, and for them by tiiemselves, and for the Egyptians, which did eat with him, by themselves; because the Egyptians might not eat bread with the Hebrews: J3 for that is an aliomination unto the Egyptians. And they sat before him, the first bom according to his birthright, and the youngest according to his youth; ami the nieli 34 marvelled one at another. And he took and sent messes unto them from before him ; but Benjamin's mess was five times so much as any of their's. And they drank, and were merry with him. Cl'. XLIV. 1. And Joseph commanded the steward of his house, saying, Fill the men's sackx with food, as much as they can carry, and put every man's money in hif CHAP. XLIV. 18— XLV. 28. 61" 2 sink's mouth. And put my cup, the silrer cup, m the sack'.s mouth of the joimgest, 3 and his corn-money. And he did according to the word that Joseph had spoken. Aa 4 soon as the morning was Hglit, the men were sent away, they and their asses. AnA when they were gone out of the city, and not i/et far off, Joseph said unto his steward. Up, follow after the men; and when thou dost overtake them, say unto them. Where 5 fore have ye rewarded evil for good? Is not this it in which my lord drinketh, and 6 v/her.^by indeed he divinelh ? Ye have done evil in so doing. And he overtook them, 7 End he spake unto them these same words. And they said unto him. Wherefore saitfe my lord these words? God forbid that thy servants should do according to this thing 8 Behold, the money which we found iu our sacks' mouths, we brought again unto thee out of the land of Canaan ; how then should we steal out of thy lord's house silver oi 9 gold ? With whomsoever of thy servants it be found, both let him die, and we also 10 will be my lord's bondmen. And he said. Now also let it be according unto your words; 11 he with whom it is found shall be my servant; and ye shall be blameless. Then thej speedily took down every man his sack to the ground, and opened every man his sajk 12 And he searched, and began at the eldest, and left at the youngest; and the cup was 13 found in Benjamin's sack. Then they rent their clothes, and laded every man his ass, 14 and returned to the city. And Judah and his brethren came to Joseph's house ; for 15 he was yet there ; and they fell before him on the ground. And Joseph said unto them, What deed is this that ye have done? Wot ye not that such a man as I can 16 certainly divine? And Judah said, What shall we say unto my lord? what shall we speak? or how shall we clear ourselves? God hath found out the iniquity of thy servants ; behold, we are my lord's servants, both we, and he also with whom the cup i,^ 17 found. And he said, God forbid that I should do so ; but the man in whose hand the cup is found, he shall be my servant ; and as for you, get you up in peace unto your father. B. The narrative of the reconciliation and the recognition. Judah and Joseph. Chap. XLIV. 18— XLV. 28. 18 Th^n Judah c.ame near unto him, and said, 0 my lord, let thy servant, I pray thee, speak a word in my lord's ears, and let not thine anger burn against thy servant; for 19 thou art even as Pharaoh. My lord asked his servants, saying. Have ye a father, or a 20 brother? And we said unto my lord. We have a father, an old man, and a child of his old age, a little one ; and his brother is dead, and he alone is left of his mother, and his 21 father loveth him. And thou saidst unto thy servants. Bring him down unto me, that 22 1 may set mine eyes upon him. And we said unto my lord, The lad can not leave his 23 father; foi i/he should leave his father, Ats/a^ ij| | v*^ In Josh. vii. 8, where the sajne phrase occurs, the Syriac has left it out entirely. — T. L.1 PREIiZMINAEY REMARKS. Contents: a. The trial of the brethrea Their repentance and Joseph's forgiveness. Joseph and Benjamin. Ch. xliii. 1-xliv. 17 : 1. Judah as surety for Benjamin unto his father, vers. 1-14 ; 2. Joseph and Benjamin, vers. 1.5-30 ; 3. the feast in honor of Benjamin, vers. 31-34; 4. the proving of the breth- ren in respect to their disposition towards Benjamin, especially after the great distinction shown to liim, ch. xliv. 1-17. b. The story of the reconciUation, and of the recognition, as presented under the an- tithesis of Ju'Jah and Joseph, ch. xUv. 18, xlv. 13. 1. Judah as surety and substitute for Benjamin, ch. xliv. 18-34 ; 2. Joseph's reconciliation and making himself known to them, ch. xlv. 1-5 ; 3. Joseph's divine peace and divine mission, vers. 5-13; 4. the Bolemnity of the salutation, vers. 14, 16. c. The glad tidings to Jacob, vers. 16-28. 1. Pliaraoh's message to Jacob, vers. 16-20 ; 2. Joseph's presents to Jacob, vers. 21-24; 3. the return of Joseph's brethren ; Pharaoh's wagons and Jacob's revivifica- tion, vers. 25-28. EXEGETICAI, A:S0 CRITICAL. u. The proving of (he brothers. Their repentance and JoxejMs forgiveness. Joseph and Benjamin, ch. xliii. 1 ; xliv. 17. 1. vers. 1-14 ; Judah as sure- ty for Benjamin unto the father. — Buy us a little bfead. — In death and famine a rich supply is but little ; so it was especially in Jacob's numerous fam- ily, in regard to what they had biought the first time. — And Judah spake Judah now stands forth as 11 principal personage, appearing more and more glorious in his dignity, his firmness, liis noble dispo- sition, and his unselfish heroism. He, like Reuben, could speak to his father, and with even more free- dom, because he had a fjeer conscience than the rest, and regarded the danger, therefore, in a milder light. Judah does not act rashly, but as one who has a grand and siipificant purpose. His explana- tion to the wounded father is as forbearing as it is firm. If they did not bring Benjamin, Simeon was lofl and they themselves, according to Joseph's threatening, would have no admittance to him — yea, whey might even incur death, because they had not removed from themselves the suspicion of their being ipies. — Wherefore dealt ye ao ill with me ? — Knobel : " His grief and affliction urge him on to reproach them without reason." Unreasonable, oowever, as it appears, it becomes significant on the •iipposilinn that he begins to read their guil'.y con- sciences, and, especially, when, with the one pr» ceding, we connect the expression that follows : Ma have ye bereaved of my children. — The mat asked us straitly. — [Lange translates the Hebrew C-isn bsa ilsffl literally, or nearly so : er fragU mid fragte uns ans ; or, as it might be rendered, still closer to the letter, he asked to as/c ; or, if we take the infinitive in such cases as an adverb, he askea inquisitively, and then proceeds to remark] : This expressive connection of the infinitive with the in- dicative in Hebrew must not he effaced by grammatr ical rules ; we hold fast to its literalness here. They did not speak forwardly of their family relations, but only after the closest questioning. By this pas- sage and Judah's speech (ch. xliv.), the account in the preceding chapter (ver. 32) is to be supplemented. They owed him an answer, since the question was to remove his suspicion ; and, moreover, they had no presentiment of what he wanted. — Send "the lad with me. — 'FIX [with me) says the brave Judah. He presents himself as surety ; he will take the guilt and bear the blame forever. The strong man prom- ises all he can. To offer to the grandfather his own grandchildren, as Reuben offered his sons, that he might put them to death, wa-s too unreal and hyper- boUcal to occur to him. We become acquainted with him here as a man full of feeUng, and of most energetic speech, as ver. 3, and ch. xxxiii. had be- fore exemplified. He eloquently shows how they are all threatened with starvation. The expression, too : Surely now^ w^e had returned the second time, promises a happy issue. — If it must be so now. — Jacob had once experienced, in the case of Esau, that presents had an appeasing effect on hos- tile dispositions. From this universal human expe- rience there is explained the ancient custom, es- pecially in the East, of rendering rtdeis favorably disposed by gifts (see 1 Kings x. 25; Matt. ii. 11 ; Prov. xviii. 16 ; xix. 6). — Of the first fruits of the land. — (Lange translates : Of that which is most praiseworthy.) Literally, of the song ; i. e., that which was celebrated in song. The noblest products of nature are, for the most part, celebrated and svm- bolizeil in poetry. In presents to distinguished per. sons, however, the simple money-value of the things avails but little ; it is the peculiar quality, or some poetic fragrance attached to them, that makes them effective. Delitzsch doubts this explanation, but without sufficient reason. They are especially to take halm, the pride of Canaan, but in particular of Gilead. Then honey. Knobel and Delitzsch su(> pose it to be the honey of grapes, Arab., dibt ■' Grane syrup ; L e., must boiled down to one third dW GENESIS, OK THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES. an article, o( w'jich, even at the present day, there are sent yearly three hundred camel-loads from He- bron's Ticinity to Egypt." Delitzseh. But this very abundance of the syrup of grapes would lead us to decide rather lor the honey of bees, were it not for the consideration, that in the Egypt of to-day great attention is given to thp raising of bees, and that it is no wine country, although not wlioUy without the culture of the vine (ch. si. 10). — Spices. — (Lange, frai/acanth-r/um ) A kind of white rrfinou< inedica- noeut (see Winer, Tragacanth). — Myrrh. — Fraiik- hicenso, salve medicament (see Winer, Ladanum). — Nuts. — The Hebrew word 0'^ a 3 occurs here only, but by the Samariian translation it is interpret- ed of the fruit of the Pistacia vera, ''a tree siuiilar to the terebinth — oblong and angular nut- of the size of a liazel-nut, containing an oily but very pal- atable kernel, which do not, however, grow any more in Palestine (as is stated in Schubert's ' Travels in the East,' ii. p. 478; iii. 114), but are obtained from Aleppo (comp. Rosen., in the ' German Orient. Mag- azine,' xii. p. 502)." Keil. — Almonds. — (See Winer, Aliiiond-tree.) On the productions of Palestine in general, see C'alwer Bibt. " Natural History," etc. — - And take double money. — (Lit. second money. They are not to take advantage of the mistake, even though no unfavorable construction should be put upon it, or it should occasion them no harm. — And God Almighty. — Here, wlien some stroug miracu- lous help is needed, he is again most properly desig- nated by the name El Shadai. — If I be bereaved of my children. — Be it so. An expression of resignation (Esth. iv. Iti). As his blessing here is not a prayer full of confidence, so the resignation has not the full expression of sacrifice ; for Jacob's 30ul is unconsciously restrained by a sense of the ban resting upon his sons. He is bowed down by the spiritual burden of his house. 2. Vers. 15-30. Joseph and Benjamin. — And stood before Joseph. — Knobel justly states that the audience they had with Joseph did not take place until afterwards. The meaning here is that they took their place in front of Joseph's house, to- gether with Benjamin and the presents, and so an- nounced to him their arrival. — Bring these men home. — With joy had Joseph observed Benjamin with them, and concludes from thence that they had practised no treachery upon him, through hatred to the children of Rachel, the darlings of their father. Benjamin's appearance sheds a reconciling light upon the whole group. He intends, therefore, to re- ceive them in a friendly and hospitable manner. His staying away, however, until noon, characterizes not only the great and industrious statesman, but also the man of sage discretion, who takes time to Jonsuli with himself about his future proceeding. — And stay. — Bohlen's assertion that the higher -■astes in Egypt ale no meat at all, is refuted by Kxo- BEI,, p. :!'2fi. — At noon. — The time when they i)ar- took of their principal meal (ch. xviii. 1). — And the men were afraid. — Judging from their for- mer treatmeirl they know not what to make of their being thus led into hia house. If a distinction, it is an incomprehetisibly great one ; they, therefore, ap- prehended a plan for tlieir destruction. Some nion- Itrous intrigue they, perhaps, anticil>ate, having its introduction in the reappearance of the money in their Racks, whilst the leaiful imagination of an evil conscience begins to paint tlie con8e(iuencc8 (see ver. 18). ' A thief, if unable to make restitution, wa.s sold as a. slave (Exod. xxii. 3)." Therefore they in not willing to enter until they have justified them selves about the money returned in their >acks. They address themselves, on this account, to Joseph'! steward, with an explanatory vindication. — When "we came to the inn. — In a sumujary way they here state both fads (eh. xlii. 27 ; and xlii. 35) to- gether. For afterwards they might have concluded that the money fnund in the sack of one of them was a sign that that money had been returned in all the sacks. — In lull weight. — Tlieie was, as yet, no coined money, only riu^s ur )iieces of metal, which were reckoned by weight. — Peace be to you. — It can hardly be supposed that the steward was let into Joseph's plan. He knew, however, that Joseph him self liadordeied the return of the money, and might have supposed that Joseph's course toward theiu, as his countrymen, had in view a happy issue. In this sense it is that he encourages them.— Tour Goo and the God of your father. — The shiewd stew- ard is acquainted with Joseph's religiousness, and, perhaps, has adopted it himself. He undoubtedly regards them as confessor.- of the same laitli with Joseph. KsoBEL : " His own good fortune each man deduces from the God he worships (Hos. ii. 7J." — ■ Has given you treasure. — Tims intimating soma secret means by which (jod bad given it to them but for all this they still remain uneasy, though suf- ficiently calmed by his verbal acknowledgment of receipt : I had your money, but more so by tliB releasing of Simeon. It is not until now that they enter the house which they had before regarded as a snare. Now follow the hospitable reception, the disposition of the presents, Joseph's greeting, and their obeisance. — And he asked them of their ■welfare. — This was his greeting. See the contrast, eh. xxxvii. 4. For the Inqvury after their father's welfare they thank him by the most respectful obei- sance, an expression of their courtesy and of their filial piety. They represent their father, just as Ben. jamin represents the mother, and so it is that his dream of the sun and moon fulfils itself (ch. xxxvii. 9). If we suppose Benjamin born about a year be- fore Joseph's sale, he would be now twenty-threa years of age. Knobel does not know how to under- stand the repeated expressions of his youth ("i"3, etc.). Hut they are explained from the tender care exercised towards him, and from the great difl'erence between his age and that of his brothers. — And he said. — It is very significant that Josejih does not wait for an answer. He recognizes him immediately, and his heart yearns. — My son. — .\u expression of inner tenderness, and an indication, at the same time, of near relationship. — And Joseph made haste. — His overwhelming emotion, the moment he saw his brethren, like Jacob's love of Rachel, hiis a gleam of the New-Testament life.* . It is not, however, to ♦ fA glimpse of the New-Tettnmtni life. It is very coai- mon to represent the Old Testament as eontaining thi harsher dispensation, and as presenting tho t*terner attari* l)utes both of God and man. Tliis is often dune without much thoufiht, or discrimination of the respects in vliieh it may bt* false or true. The old Testament is, indeed, a Irse full revi'lafion of mercy as a doctrine, or a scheme of salva* tion, but the mercy itself is there in ovei-flowinfr measure, ami expressed in the most pathetic lan^uape. It is peculia'-- ly the emotional part of Holy Scripture, piesentiti^' eveiy. thintr in tho strongest manner, and in stroUMest cuiitrast, wiiettier it be wrnth or teDdcrn'ss, indi^rnatil u aptinst apostasy or love for the oft-times apostate and rcbellioul peuplc. It may even be maintained that tlu' New 'i'csta- ment, Ihoupb more didactic, is less tender in its hiDKuaKe less uboundinL' in pictures of lueltini? cempa-ssioD D" th< CHAP. XLIU. 1— XLV. 28. H5i) he regarded a8 a simple feeling ; it is also an emotion of joy at the prospect of that reconciliation which he had, for some time, fearea\'id'3 forgiving tenderness towards Saul, and even Esau's reception of -lacoh (Gen. xxxiii. 4-lo) alter all the wrong ht had apparently, or iu reaHty, received fi-om him. In this latter case, we may regard Esau as one who had but little if any grace, and yet tlie feeling here, viewed tts growin-^ out of the patriarchal life and religious ideas, may well be Compared with any general intlufnce of our nom- inal Christianity in arousing men to deeds of tenderness and heroism. This iatse ^-iew of the Old Testament, which ig- norance of the Bible is causing more and more to prevail, is a great wrong to the ^vhole cause and doctrine of revelation. Even the most tender dialect of the New Testament, is drawn from the Old. Its HeViaisms are its most pathetic parts. Of this there is a good example in the very style of language here employed. The expression I^TSni ^1^33, rendered, his bowels did yearn (rather, warmed)^ has been naturalized in the New-Testament Greek, where inTK6.yxva is used for r'^^n*^. It may be said, however, that both the Hebrew and the Greek are marred for the English read- er by the rendering bowels, especially if taken in the sense of inlestina, instead of the larger meaning that belongs to the Latin viscera. It may be doubted whether C'^'Cm does ever, of ftself, denote any part of the body, either more or less interior. When the singular is used for the womb, it is rather to be retjarded as a metaphorical use of its primiiry sense of cherishing, or as that which loves and chi^rishes. The Greek counterpari, r is Ua'.'d for wisdom, prudence, and cnrdatus is eciuivalent to e^^pwi', a wise and prudent man. The (Jreek popular language placed thought in the (/ipet-es, not in the e-y*ce'0aAo5, or brain, although the latter is sometimes referred to in tins light, especially by Aristotle. Demosthenes once makes a fiopular allusion to some such notion in the oration De Ha- oneso ; but the poetical language, the best representative yf fhp popular feeling, is all the other way. So in the He- 3. Vers. 31-34. TTie banquet in honor of Benj