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w45

PEEFACE
It is less than half a century since the publica
tion of " Essays and Reviews " startled the ortho
dox party in England and brought upon its
authors a storm of criticism. Of those Essays
perhaps none was more severely criticised than
that of Dr. Frederick Temple, now Archbishop of
Canterbury, on " The Education of the World," in
which he affirmed that Rome, Greece, Asia, and
Judea each contributed something to the growth
of the future church ; Rome, law ; Greece, science
and art ; Asia, the spiritual imagination ; Judea,
the discipline of the human conscience ; in which
also he traced in the Bible a development of re
ligious teaching, from an earlier and cruder to a
later and better spiritual conception of truth and
life. Some of his statements he would probably
himself now modify; but the two fundamental
principles of his essay, that God's processes of
education have not been confined to the Hebrew
race, and that in the Hebrew race they were grad
ual, the affirmation of which aroused such fierce
antagonism in 1860, are accepted as axiomatic by
a large and increasing body of Biblical scholars in

IV PREFACE
1900. This school of Biblical interpretation may
be termed modern, because it has come into exist
ence in England and America during the present
century ; it may be termed scientific, because in
the study of the Bible it assumes nothing respect
ing the origin, character, and authority of the Bible,
but expects to determine by such study what are
its origin, character, and authority ; it may be
termed literary, because it applies to the study
of Hebrew literature the same canons of literary
criticism which are applied by students of other
world-literature ; it may be termed evolutionary,
because it assumes that the laws, institutions, and
literature of the ancient Hebrews were a gradual
development in the life of the nation, not an in
stantaneous creation nor a series of instantaneous
creations. The other school may be termed the
ancient school, because it prevailed in the church
from a very ancient period until the latter half
of the nineteenth century ; the theological school,
because it assumes as settled that the Bible is a
revelation from God and consequently possesses
certain characteristics which it thinks such a reve
lation must be assumed to possess ; the traditional
school, because it accepts as presumptively, if not
conclusively true, certain opinions respecting the
date, authorship, and character of different books
in the Bible which have been traditionally held in
the church from a very early period.

PREFACE V
I accept frankly, fully, and without reserve the
first of these schools, and have written this book
for a double purpose : first, to tell the general
reader what is the spirit and what the methods
and the general conclusions of this school respect
ing the Bible ; and second, to show that these do
not imperil spiritual faith, — that, on the contrary,
they enhance the value of the Bible as an instru
ment for the cultivation of the spiritual faith.
What will the New Criticism do with the Bible,
is a fair question to ask, and the time has come
to give it at least a partial answer. The believer
in the New Criticism replies that it has already
brought back into the Bible some books which had
almost dropped out of it, such as the Song of
Songs, Ecclesiastes, and Job ; that it has relieved
from some ethical difficulties some other books,
such as Joshua and Leviticus; that it has made
credible as fiction some passages which had been
incredible as history, such as the legend of the
Fall and the satire of Jonah ; that it has made
practically applicable to our own time other por
tions of the Bible, such as the civil laws contained
in Exodus and Deuteronomy ; that it has given a
new and deeper spiritual significance to still other
portions, as to some of the Psalms and to the latter
half of the Book of Isaiah. The end is not yet ;
but enough has been accomplished to satisfy the
believer in the New Criticism that its effect will

VI PREFACE
be to destroy that faith in the letter which killeth,
and to promote that faith in the spirit which mak-
eth alive ; to lead the Christian to see in the Bible
a means for the development of faith in the God
of the Bible, not an object which faith may accept
in lieu of God's living presence ; to regard the
Bible, not as a book of philosophy about religion,
but as a book of religious experiences, the more
inspiring to the religious life of man because
frankly recognized as a book simply, naively, di
vinely human.
I am indebted to so many authors of whose
original investigations I have made free use that I
attempt no acknowledgment to them here. Recog
nition of my obligations to them will be found in
the notes scattered through the volume.
It should be added that in the preparation of
this volume I have followed the lines and used
freely the material employed on the course of Sun
day evening lectures on the Old Testament given
in Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, N. Y., in the win
ter of 1896-97, and the subsequent course of lec
tures given before the Lowell Institute of Boston
on the same theme, in the winter of 1899-1900;
but that the book is not a reproduction of either
course. LYMAN ABBOTT.
CORNWAIili-ON-THE-HtrDSON, N. Y.

CONTENTS

CHAF. I. The Bible as Literature .
II. Hebrew History ....
ELI. Prehistoric Traditions rewritten
IV The Book of the Covenant
V. The Deuteronomic Code
VI. The Canon Law ....
VII. Hebrew Fiction ....
VLTI. Some Hebrew Stories retold ,
IX. A Drama op Love ....
X. A Spiritual Tragedy .
XI. A School op Ethical Philosopht. I.
XII. A School op Ethical Philosophy. II.
XIII. A Collection of Lyrics
XIV. Preachers op Righteousness .
XV. Preachers of Redemption .
XVI. The Message op Israel

1
2752
81
116129164177
201
229 263287305 328352372

THE WRITINGS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT
IN THE ORDER OF THEIR COMPOSITION
WITH AUTHORS AND APPROXIMATE KATES
In case «. book is ascribed to a period rather than a year, the
date of the terminus ad quem determines its position in this table.
In the main Driver's Introduction to the Literature of the Old Tes
tament has been followed. By reference to the chronological table
on pages xi.-xiii. the reader may see under what circumstances
the various writings were composed.

Dath, B. v.

Writings.

Authors (oe Editors).

1250

" Book of the Covenant" (virtually
as in Exod. xx. -xxiii.) and prob
ably other traditional portions of
the Hexateuch.

Moses.

1000

Earlier psalms, probably.

David (?)

940

Earlier proverbs, probably.

Solomon (?)

940-882

Song of Songs, though by Borne con
sidered as late as 247-221, in the
Greek period.

Anonymous.

874-800

Proverbs x.-xxii. 16.

" Wise Men."

900-750

(jehovistic narrative) ???UT*?°1
\ Elohistic narrative \ ^ueh

" J " (a Judaic writer).
"E" (an Ephraimitic

(Much uncertainty aa to which is

writer).

earlier.)

760-746

Amos.

Amos.

746-734

Hosea.

Hosea.

740-701

Isaiah i.-xxxix.

Isaiah.

700

I. and II. Samuel, though in part
nearly contemporary with the
events narrated.

Anonymous.

700 circa

Ruth, though by some considered as
late as 4-15.

Anonymous.

722-685

Micah.

Micah.

690-610 circa

Deuteronomy.

Anonymous.

626 circa

Zephaniah.

Zephaniah.

667-604

Nahum.

Nahum.

600 seq.

Judges.

Anonymous.

608-597

Habakkuk.

Habakkuk.

586

I. and II. Kings.

Anonymous.

686

Jeremiah.

Jeremiah.

686

Lamentations.

Jeremiah or contempo
raries.

686 seq.

Obadiah, though possibly later.

Obadiah.

600-570

Code of Holiness (Lev. xvii.-xxvi.).

"H."

X THE WRITINGS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT
The Writings of the Old Testament — continued.

Date, b. o.

Weittngb.

AUTHOES (OE EDITOEB).

593-570

Ezekiel.

Ezekiel.

549 circa

Isaiah xl.-lxvi. (Second Isaiah).

Unknown prophet or
prophets.

549 circa

Job.

Anonymous.

593-537

Many psalms.

Various anonymous
authors.

570-530

Priestly narrative.

"P."

570-530

Leviticus.

"P."

520-518

( Haggai.
t Zechariah i.— viii.

Haggai.

Zechariah.

464 circa

"Malachi" (i.e. "My Messenger").
Pentateuch virtually completed.

Anonymous.

431

Anonymous.

(JoBhua not included in the canon

until later.)

410
Joel. (It is maintained by some,
however, that Joel is as early as
836.)
I. and 11. Chronicles.
Joel.
333 seq.
A Levite.
333 seq.
1 Ezra | based on authentic me-
I Nehemiah 1 moirs.
I A Levite, perhaps
\ "the Chronicler."
332 seq.
Esther.
Anonymous.
332-306
The Book of Jonah.
Anonymous.
350-300
Book of Proverbs compiled.
Anonymous.
333-280
Zechariah ix.-xiv.
Anonymous.
200
Ecclesiastes, — though possibly as
early as 333.
Pseudonymous.
516-168
Many psalms. The Psalter prac
tically as at present compiled.
Anonymous.
168
Daniel.
Anonymous.
165 seq.
Probably some later psalms, during
Various anonymous
the Maccabean period.
authors.
CHRONOLOGY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT

The Chronology of the Old Testament is to a certain extent
hypothetical ; prior to the Exodus it is wholly so. In preparing
this table, use has been made of The Religion of Israel, by Karl
Budde, and the Commentaries on Isaiah and on The Twelve Pro
phets, by George Adam Smith. The latter has been accepted and
followed without question in the period of which he treats, —
that is, from the disruption of the kingdom, B. 0. 940.

Dates B. C.

Peophetb.

Events.

3000) to [
1250)

Scene of Job and
Genesis stories.

J Patriarchal Age.

1250

Book of Covenant.

Exodus from Egypt; giving of the law on
Sinai ; foundation of Mosaism.

Mt.

1000

Earlier Psalms
written.

David becomes king.

960

"Wisdom literature
begins. Scene of
Song of Songs

Solomon.

and Ecclesiastes.
Division of the kingdom.
Judah.
Israel.
940
Rehoboam.
Jeroboam I.
Establishment of calf worship
in Northern Israel.
923
Abijam.
920
Asa.
918
Nadab.
915
Baasha.
891
Elah.
888
Zimri, Omri
876
1 f
Ahab.
874
Jehosaphat.
854
- Elijah. -j
853
1
Ahaziah, son of Ahab.
852
_
Joram or Jehoram, sod
of
849
Jehoram, son of
Jehosaphat.
Ahab.
844842
EUsha.
Ahaziah.Athaliah.
836
Joash, son of
Ahaziah.
Jehu.
814
Jehoahaz.
798
.
Joash, son of Jehoahaz.
xii CHRONOLOGY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT
Chronology of the Old Testament — continued.

Events.

Dates

Prophets.

B. 0.

Judah.
Israel.
797
Amaziah.
783 J
3nah (2 Kings xii
Jeroboam II.
778
25).
Uzziah ( Azariah).
775-1 765 J
Jeroboam reconquers Moab,
Gilead, etc.
763
Total eclipse of the sun
?£-} *
mos.
(Amos viii. 9)-
743 )
Zechariah, Shallum, Menahem.
740
Death of King Uz
Hosea.
ziah. Jotham sole
ruler.
737
Pekahiah.
736
Ahaz.
735
Pekah.
730
Hoshea.
727
Hezekiah.
725
722 )
- Isaiah i.-xxxix.
Siege of Samaria.
or
1 c
Fall of Samaria.
721 )
Captivity of Israel.
715
Samaria colonized by Assyr
> Micah. -
ians.
701
Invasion of Judah.
Deliverance of Jerusalem.
695 )
690 [
Manasseh.
685 )
676
Manasseh tributary to Assyria.
641
Amon.
639
Josiah.
627
Jeremiah appears.
626 Z
ephaniah.
621
Book of the law (Deuteronomy) discovered.
Josiah's reforms begin.
Passover (2 Kings xxii., xxiii.).
620 1
Habakkuk (?).
608
Necho II. defeats and slays Josiah at Megiddo;
Nahum (?).
Judah Egyptian vassal.
I Jehoahaz.
602-1 600 f
J Jehoiakim.
Jeremiah.
1 Judah vassal of Babylon.
1 Jehoiachin.
597
Temple plundered ; Zedekiah vassal to Babylon.
First Great Exile to Babylon.
593
Ezekiel.
Jewish revolt against Babylon ; opposed by Jere
miah.
587-)586 i >
Obadiah (?)
Jerusalem taken by
Exile to Babylon.
Nebuchadnezzar ; Second Great
CHRONOLOGY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT Xlll
Chronology of the Old Testament — continued.

Dates B.C.

Peophets.

Events.

Judah.

549

537

520516404458445 444432431 410
350-1345 J

332
320 306 264
260 1G0

The " Second Isa
iah," also called
the "Great Un
known." (Isaiah
xl.-lxvi.)

( Haggai.
¦ Zechariah
( viii.
' Malachi."

Joel.

! Zechariah ix.-
xiv.
Book of Jonah.
Probable close of
prophetic canon.

Release assured to the Jews by the appearance of
Cyrus against Babylonia.

The Jews return to Jerusalem from Babylon under
Zerubabbel and Joshua.
Restoration of altar and sacrifice.
Building of the temple by Zerubabbel and Joshua.
Completion of the temple.
Ezra arrives at Jerusalem.
Nehemiah arrives at Jerusalem.
Establishment of the law.
Rebuilding of walls.
Nehemiah's return to Jerusalem.
Pentateuch virtually completed.
Insurrection in Judah. Much bloodshed there
(Jos. Ant. B. xi. ch. 7, § 1).
Jews subdued by Holofernes (Book of Judith).
Many Jews taken to Hyrcania.
Ptolemy takes Jerusalem (?).
Egypt's wars for Palestine.
About this time Greek translation of the Penta
teuch.

LIFE AND LITERATURE OF
THE ANCIENT HEBREWS

CHAPTER I
THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE
The word " Scriptures " means writings ; the
word " Bible," a transliteration of the Greek word
" Biblia," means books. In both cases the plural
form indicates the fact that from the earliest ages
the Bible has been recognized to be, not a writing or
book, but a collection of writings or books. When
the singular form is used in the New Testament, the
reference is generally, if not always, to a specific
passage ; when the writer is referring to the whole
collection of the Old Testament, he uses the plural
form.1 The Bible is a library of sixty-six different
books, written by a great number of writers, writ
ing for the most part without cooperation. These
books have for convenience' sake been bound
1 Illustrations of the use of the singular to denote a particular
book or passage are afforded by Mark xii. 10 ; xv. 28 ; John vii.
38 ; x. 35 ; Acts viii. 32 ; Rom. iv. 3 ; Gal. iv. 30 ; 1 Tim. v. 18.
Illustrations of the use of the plural to indicate all the books of
the Old Testament are afforded by Matt. xxi. 42 ; xxii. 29 ; xxvi.
54 ; Luke xxiv. 27 ; John v. 39 ; Rom. i. 2 ; xv. 4.

2 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF TEE HEBREWS
together, but for careful study they must be con
sidered separately. This is not equivalent to the
declaration that there is no other unity in this
book than the mere mechanical unity made by the
binder's art. That there is a real ethical and
spiritual unity will appear all the more clearly
from a study of them as separate books or writ
ings ; but that they are really, not merely formally
or apparently, independent is the first fact which
the student of the Bible must recognize. There is
nothing new or startling in this assertion ; it has
always been known that the Bible is a collection
of independent writings by different authors ; but
modern criticism is at once using this fact in its
study of the Bible, and laying emphasis upon it as
the result and by the methods of its study.
Scientific investigation of any subject may be
said to consist of the two correlative processes of
analysis and synthesis. By the first the object is
separated into its several parts ; by the second it
is put together again into an organic whole. The
Bible has always been subjected to these processes ;
but in the older form of study it was to a consider
able extent regarded as one book, by one divine
author, though divided into separate books, chap
ters, and verses for convenience of study. The
analysis then consisted in this separation of the
one book into separate books, chapters, and verses,
and was a mechanical rather than a literary ana
lysis ; the synthesis consisted in putting these
verses together in new relations for the purpose

THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE 3
of constructing a system of theology or perhaps of
ethics. In this synthetic process little or no atten
tion was paid to the fact that the Bible is a
collection of books written by_different^uthors, at
different times, under different circumstances, for
different purposes, and possessing different degrees
of spiritual development. Sometimes the text was
wrested from its context, and made to bear a
meaning which it certainly did not bear in the
mind of the original writer, as in the common
citation of the verse, " As a tree falls, so shall it
lie," cited as a proof-text against the possibility of
a future probation ; 1 sometimes it was used to sup
port a doctrine the opposite of that intended by
the author, as in the not infrequent citation of
the text, " Touch not, taste not, handle not," as
authority for total abstinence, when in the original
it is quoted by Paul from ascetic teachers only for
the purpose of condemning it, and the philosophy
which he supposes it to represent.2 Occasionally
1 " It may be noted, as an illustration of the way in which the
after-thoughts of theology have worked their way into the inter
pretation of Scripture, that the latter clause has been expounded
as meaning that the state in which men chance to be when death
comes on them is unalterable, that there is ' no repentance in the
grave.' So far as it expresses the general truth that our efforts
to alter the character of others for the better must cease when the
man dies, that when the tree falls to south or north, towards the
region of light or that of darkness, we, who are still on the earth,
cannot prune, or dig about, or dung it (Luke xiii. 8), the inference
may be legitimate enough, but it is clear that it is not that
thought which was prominent in the mind of the writer.'' The
Cambridge Bible, Ecclesiastes, p. 206.
2 Col. ii. 21. See Alford's Greek Testament and T. K. Ab
bott's International Critical Commentary.

4 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
this use of texts regardless of their authorship and
original intent led to amusing results. Many years
ago, when this use of the Bible was more common
than it is now, a Judge of the Supreme Court of
New York said in a legal decision, " We have the
highest possible authority for saying ' Skin for
skin, yea, all that a man hath will he give for his
life.' " The next morning the New York " Herald "
commented on this opinion substantially as follows :
" We find that it was the devil who said, ' Skin for
skin, yea, all that a man hath will he give for his
life : ' now we know who it is that our Supreme
Court Judges regard as the highest possible
authority." But this textual use of the Bible was by no
means confined to misuses such as these. One has
only to turn to any theological sermon of one of
the older New England divines, such as Jonathan
Edwards or Nathaniel Emmons, or to the collection
of texts accumulated in footnotes in support of the
articles of the Westminster Confession of Faith,
or in such a Roman Catholic collection as " The
Divine Armory of Holy Scripture," to see that in
this older method of Bible use no attempt was
made to consider the comparative weight, tjiejocal
meaning, or the original application of Scripture
texts; all were treated as of equal value, and
applied regardless of their literary significance and
human authorship.1
1 Thus the Divine Armory cites as authority for " the noble
lineage, immaculate conception, and virginity" of the Virgin

THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE 5
And such use of Scripture was measurably justi
fied by the conception which the fathers more or
less consciously entertained concerning the Bible
as one book, whose real author was God, though it
was written by many human amanuenses. In
studying the statutes of a State we do not inquire
who reported them, nor even what legislator pro
posed their enactment; for the authority of the
statute is in the legislature, not in the reporter
nor in the individual legislator. In studying the
decisions of a court, all we care to know about
the reporter is that he has given a fairly correct
report of the decision ; even the personality of the
individual judge who wrote the opinion is a matter
of wholly secondary significance ; for the authority
rests in the court whose decision is announced, not
in the judge who announces it nor in the reporter
who records it. Somewhat similarly, the character
and circumstances of the individual writer in the
Bible were not improperly ignored by those who
held that he was only an amanuensis or reporter,
or at least quasi private secretary, who recorded,
though to a certain extent in his own language, the
authoritative and inerrant, if not absolutely verbally
dictated, utterances of an omniscient God. It was
even sometimes affirmed that we can only think in
Mary, the verse from the Song of Songs : " Thou art all fair, O
my love, and there is no spot in thee ; " and the Westminster
Confession of Faith cites in support of the doctrine that the hopes
of the unregenerate are illusory and vain the argument of Bil
dad that Job must have been a great sinner or his prosperity
would not have come to naught (Job viii. 13, 14).

6 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
language, and therefore, if the thoughts of the
writers were inspired, the words must have been
dictated.1 Those who entertained this conception
of the Bible paid little or no attention to the
specific character of the different writers or the
different writings. No account, for example, was
made of the fact that the Book of Job is largely a
hot debate between disputants who take absolutely
antagonistic views of the same problem ; their
utterances were quoted as of equal authority. A
quotation from an old poem affirming that the sun
and moon stood still to prolong the victory of
Joshua and make more overwhelming the defeat
of his enemies was regarded as scientifically author-
1 " Calovius was the author of the theory which is usually de
nominated the Orthodox Protestant theory. According to him,
inspiration is the form which revelation assumes, and nothing
exists in the Scriptures which was not divinely suggested and
inspired (divinitus suggestum et inspiratum). Quenstedt, Baier,
Hollaz, and others followed, affirming that the writers were de
pendent upon the Spirit for their very words, and denying that
there were any solecisms in the New Testament. The Buxtorfs
extended inspiration to the vowel-points of the Old Testament.
This view was adopted in the Formula Cons. Helv., and Gisbert
Voetius extended inspiration to the very punctuation. This doc
trine was an absolute novelty." Religious Encyclopedia, Schaff-
Herzog, article Inspiration. Compare also article on Inspiration
in Encyclopaedia Britannica. These extreme views were not, how
ever, those of the most eminent of either the Roman Catholic or
the Protestant divines ; the Westminster Confession of Faith
implies a spiritual rather than a literalistic doctrine of inspiration
in its declaration (chapter i., § 5), "our full persuasion and as
surance of the infallible truth and divine authority thereof is
from the inward work of the Holy Spirit bearing witness by and
with the word in our hearts."

THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE 7
itative, to be reconciled if possible with the postu
lates of modern science, but, whether reconciled or
not, to be accepted.1 Such inconsistencies in the
historical narratives as the statement in one account
of the Deluge that the animals went by twos into
the ark, and in another that some of them went by
sevens,2 or in the Book of Samuel that Jehovah
moved David to number Israel, and in the Book of
Chronicles that Satan tempted him,3 it was thought
necessary to harmonize on the theory that both
statements proceeded from one infallible author
and were recorded by infallible penmen. Inter-
1 " ' The Book of Jasher ' was in all probability a collection,
rhythmical in form and poetical in diction, of various pieces
celebrating the heroes of the Hebrew nation and their achieve
ments." The Cambridge Bible, Josh. x. 13. Compare The Bible
Commentary on the same. Compare also the Polychrome Bible,
Book of Joshua, p. 72. Of this passage (Josh. x. 12, 13) it
says : " The quotation is poetic and figurative, as in the Song of
Deborah (Judg. v. 20), the stars fought against Sisera; it seems,
however, to have been misunderstood and taken literally by sub
sequent editors. It means simply : May God grant us victory
before the sun sets. Similarly Agamemnon prays to Zeus that the
sun may not set before Priam's dwelling is overthrown (B. 2,
413 ff.). At the bidding of Athene the sunset was delayed for
the sake of Ulysses (Od. 23, 241 ff.^'and, on another occasion,
hastened at the command of Hera, fh order to save the Greeks
(II. 18, 239 ff.). Of course, if there were an adequate motive for
a miracle here, or any appreciable evidence that a miracle took
place, scientific objections would be irrelevant, because, from the
very idea of a miracle, its physical antecedents and mechanism
are unintelligible and cannot be discussed. But there is no reason
to suppose that the narrative originally stated that a miracle
happened." 2 Compare Gen. vi. 20, and vii. 9, with Gen. vii. 2, 3.
3 2 Sam. xxiv. 1 ; 1 Chron. xxi. 1.

8 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
pretations of history found in the Bible which
attributed the wholesale massacre of the Canaanite
to Jehovah's direct command,1 expressions con
tained in it of the natural feeling of the persecuted
exiles crying out to Jehovah for vengeance on
cruel Babylon,2 it was deemed necessary to make
congruous with the command of Christ, "But I
say unto you, Love your enemies," since both were
assumed to have emanated equally directly from
the same divine Author.3
The modern student of the Bible frankly recog
nizes these self-contradictions in the Bible, and they
do not trouble him, because they do not militate
i Josh. viii. 2 ; x. 40.
2 Ps. cxxxvii. 8, 9. Stanley in his History of the Jewish Church
treats of the apparent contradiction between certain teachings in
the Old Testament and others in the New Testament thus:
" That this inferiority of the Old Dispensation was an acknow
ledged element in the ' gradualness and partialness ' of Revela
tion, inevitably flows from the definition of Revelation as given
by the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, ' God who in sundry
times and in divers manners spake in times past to our fathers ' ' '
(p. 280), and refers to Chrysostom's Homily on 1 Cor. ch. xiii.,
where he says, quoting Ps. cxxxix. 21, 22: "Now because he has
brought us to a more entire self-command ... he bids us rather
admit and soothe them. . . . We must not hate but pity." This
is an application of the evolutionary philosophy long before
evolution was recognized as a philosophy.
8 Much ingenuity has been displayed in the endeavor to recon
cile the apparent contradictions in the Bible between different
authors, or between Biblical authors and scientific conclusions, or
the moral consensus of mankind. Some treatises of considerable
ability have been devoted wholly to this task. See, for example,
J. W. Haley's An Examination of the Alleged Discrepancies of the
Bible (1873), and Robert Tuck's A Handbook if Biblical Difficul
ties, 2 vols.

THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE 9
against his conception of the inspiration of the
writers or the character and authority of their writ
ings. The differences between the old view and the
new view are radical and even revolutionary, and
the advocates of the new method seem to me mis
taken when, to guard against the fears of the timid,
they endeavor to minimize the differences between
the new and the old. The question between the
two is not merely whether there are some errors in
the science or history of the Bible, still less whether
there were any in the original autographs, long
since lost. The point of view, the methods of study,
the theological assumptions which underlie that
study, and the results attained, differ, and differ
very widely. It is a great deal better to recognize
these differences frankly than to attempt to conceal
them either from others or from ourselves.
By the modern school the method of dividing the
Bible into a series of texts, treating them all as of
equal authority and weight, because equally words
of God, and constructing a system of theology by
piecing them together, is not only abandoned as
antiquated ; it is frankly condemned as unscientific
and erroneous. A new method is proposed to take
its place ; this new method goes by the infelicitous
title of the " Higher Criticism." I call it infelici
tous because, while to scholars its meaning is per
fectly clear, to many people it is not, for the simple
reason that it is a technical term, and in it the
words are used in a technical and non-popular sense.
To the non-scientific reader criticism of anything

10 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
signifies judgment of it, and generally such judg
ment as discovers and exhibits its imperfections ;
to such the phrase " higher criticism " suggests a
superior kind of judgment of the Bible, and con
notes a kind of spiritual egotism in the higher critic.
To the scientific student the word " criticism "
applied to the Bible means " inquiry into the origin,
history, authenticity, character, etc., of the literary
documents " 1 of which it is composed. Lower criti
cism means such inquiry into the text or into par
ticular texts, and is equivalent to textual criticism ;
higher criticism means inquiry into the documents
as a whole, their integrity, authenticity, credibility,
authorship, circumstances of their composition, and
the like, and is equivalent to literary criticism.2
Applied to the study of Shakespeare, the question,
Is the disputed line to be read " To the manner
born " or " To the manor born " ? would belong to
lower criticism ; the question, how largely the son
nets of Shakespeare are really autobiographical in
their character, how largely they are dramatic im
personations of sentiment, would belong to higher
1 Century Dictionarg.
2 Higher Criticism is sometimes called philosophical study of
the Bible. " It is named the Higher Criticism because it is higher
in its order and in its work than the Lower or Textual Criticism.
This department of criticism has lived and worked under this name
for more than a century. . . . The Higher Criticism devotes its
attention to the literary features of the Bible. It has four great
questions to answer : As to the integrity of the writings ; as to the
authenticity of the writings ; as to literary features ; as to the
credibility of the writings." C. A. Briggs, D. D., The Study cf
Holy Scripture, pp. 92 and 95.

THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE 11
criticism. It would be a mistake to suppose that
either lower criticism or higher criticism is peculiar
to the present half -century; there have always been
both a textual and a literary study of the Bible,
both a lower and a higher criticism ; but in our time
new emphasis has been attached and new impor
tance given to the literary study, or higher criti
cism. In these articles I shall discard technical
expressions, because the book is not intended pri
marily for technical students ; I shall, therefore,
speak of the literary study, rather than of the
higher criticism, of the Bible.
Employing a new method in its study of the Bible,
the new school approaches this study with a differ
ent theological assumption from that of the old
school. The difference is not easily defined ; but
it is all the more important because it is rather spir
itual than philosophical, and therefore transcends
exact definition. The old theology laid emphasis
on what is called the transcendence of God ; the
new theology on his immanence. The old theology
regarded God as apart from matter, and creating
the world as an architect or builder by mechanical
processes ; as apart from nature, and directing it as
an engineer his engine ; as apart from humanity,
and ruling over his subjects as a. king ; as apart
from man, and mysteriously joined to him in the
incarnation of the God-man. The new theology
conceives of God as dwelling in matter, shaping it
as the soul shapes the body ; dwelling in nature,
and ruling it as the soul rules the body ; dwelling

12 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
in man, and controlling him less by law and power
than by influence, less as a king rules his subjects
than as a father controls his loyal son ; entering
into man in the incarnation, and becoming God
manifest in the flesh, Christ being the God-in-man
rather than the God-and-man.1 This theological
point of view applied to the Bible changes our con
ception of inspiration and revelation. The new view
believes in revelation, but conceives it less as a dis
closing of an external God to man than as an unveil
ing of God in human experience ; it believes in
inspiration, but it conceives of inspiration less as an
addition to human experience of something super
human than as a transfusion of human experience
by a Spirit who is superhuman. It consequently
regards the Bible, not so much an addition to human
knowledge of certain truths before unknown if
not unknowable, as the record of a spiritual con
sciousness in certain souls, which is possible, in vary
ing degree, to the souls of all. Taking as its defini
tion of religion " the life of God in the soul of man,"
it regards the Bible as a book of religion rather than
as a book about religion ; that is, as the transcrip
tion of the experiences of men who were conscious
of the life of God in their times, their nation, and
their own souls. This consciousness of God in them
selves constituted their inspiration ; and in this con
sciousness of God in their own souls God was
1 For an excellent outworking of this doctrine of the divine im
manence as applied to all branches of theology see The Religion of
To-morrow, by Frank Crane.

THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE 13
revealed to them. Just in so far as this conscious
ness of God awakens a corresponding consciousness
of God in us, is it a revelation of God to us, and no
further. The Bible is, therefore, to be conceived,
not as an unnaturally divine book, nor as a book
partly divine and partly human ; it is a divine-in
human book, and to us all the more divine because
human. Through it God is revealed to our con
sciousness, because in it God is seen revealed in the
consciousness of its writers. We see God in it, not
apart from human consciousness, but in human con
sciousness, not as he is in himself, but as he was
seen, felt, realized, by holy men. As the supreme
revelation of God to man in life is God dwelling in
man in the incarnation, so the supreme revelation
of God to man in literature is God dwelling in the
writers of the books which constitute the literature.
When, therefore, he who is accustomed to the
conception of an infallible and inerrant book asks
the modern student how, on this conception of the
Bible as a divine-in-human book, it is possible to
separate the divine from the human, and tell what is
divine and what human, the answer is that it is no
more possible to make such a separation in the Bible
than it is to separate the divine from the human in
Christ. The Bible is not a composite of divine gold
mixed with human alloy, which we must somehow
separate from the alloy in order to get a standard
degree of fineness. It is rather like oxygen mixed
with nitrogen in the air that we may better breathe
it. What reader can tell how much of his thinking

14 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
is inspired by Carlyle, how much by Robertson, how
much by Thackeray, how much by Browning ? The
more thoroughly he has thought over what he has
read, and the more he has made that thought his
own, the less he can distinguish the sources and the
inspiration of his thinking. So the closer these
holy men were to God, the less possible it was for
them to tell what of their thoughts were divine in
source and what were their own ; still less can we
make such a discrimination. Nor is it desirable to
do so. What we need is not merely God, but God
in us ; and therefore a book which gives us a record
of the experiences of men in whom God dwelt is a
more valuable book to conduct us to God than a
book which should give us, were such a book possi
ble, a representation of God apart from men. The
fact that the writers were men of like passions as
we ourselves are, that they saw in part and prophe
sied in part, and saw as in a glass darkly,1 makes
them the better interpreters of the life of God to us,
in our partialism and our imperfection. This col
lection of books is a record of the experiences of
men who had in larger or lesser degree the con
sciousness of God dwelling in them. It is a record
of religious experience, and that is a record of the
life of God in the soul of man ; not of the life of
God only, but of the life of God in the soul of man ;
and the man in whom God dwells is quite as essen
tial to the religious revelation as the God who dwells
in him, because religion is the combination of the
two, God and man, dwelling together.
1 1 Cor. xiii. 9, 12.

THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE 15
It does not, therefore, disturb us in the least to
find human error and imperfection in the collection.
We find, and we should expect to find, writers hold
ing the scientific opinions of their times, thinking
the world was flat ; that the province in which they
lived was nearly the whole of it ; that the Mediter
ranean was the " Great Sea " ; that the stars and
sun and moon revolved around the earth on which
they lived, and were made simply to light it. We
find them absolutely ignorant of the laws of nature ;
never, therefore, even entertaining the question
whether laws of nature were violated or not, but
looking at all phenomena with childlike interest,
as little children look at such phenomena now.
We find them with as little ability to exercise criti
cal historical judgment as to exercise scientific
judgment, accepting without criticism the legends
that come down to them, and seeking in them for
some vision or some modification of their vision of
God in his world. We find them from the first
believing that God is a righteous God, and de
mands righteousness of his children ; but in the
earlier stages not knowing what righteousness is,
and growing to a broader and better conception of
righteousness as the race grows in age and in ex
perience. And to find such errors, scientific, his
torical, philosophic, in this record of the religious
experience of a race, does not disturb in the least
our faith that the collection contains a revelation
of God in man and to man.1
1 See chapter ii., "The Evolution of the Bible," in my Evolution

16 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
With this radical change in our theological con
ception comes a change scarcely less radical in our
process of analysis and synthesis. We study the
Bible no longer by texts ; we analyze it no longer
into texts ; we no longer even print it in texts, or
we indicate the texts by numbers in the margin, as
in the Revised Version. We study the Bible by
books and by authors ; we compare, not text with
text, but author with author. We endeavor to
ascertain the character of the author, his tempera
ment, the time in which he lived, the audience to
which he spoke, the immediate purpose which ani
mated him. Single texts are no longer conclusive ;
they are valuable just in the measure in which they
are an interpretation of what a devout soul thought
under the inspiration of God about the truth of
God. We no more go to the Bible for a text to
settle for us what is the truth, or what the teach
ing of the Bible, or what even the teaching of the
individual writer, than we go to a single sentence
in a speech of Daniel Webster to settle for us what
is his teaching. We measure Paul by entire Epis
tles ; the Psalmist by an entire Psalm ; each writer
by the totality of his writing. In brief, we apply
to this collection of writings the same methods of
critical study which we apply to any other, sure
that the best method of getting at the thought of
God is to get at the life of the man in whom he
dwelt and whose experience he inspired.1
of Christianity, for some illustrations of the principle embodied in
this paragraph.
1 Excellent illustrations of the fruit of this method of study are

THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE 17
This method of study by literary, not textual,
analysis, founded on the theological assumption
that God's revelation to man is in and through a
human experience, gives, of course, very different
results from the former method. Subjecting this
book to this literary analysis, we find it, not a
book, but a collection of writings.1 If we suppose,
as I do, that the oldest book of the Bible, the Book
of the Covenant,2 is, as to its essential contents,
though not as to its literary form, as old as Moses,
say about B. C. 1250, and that the Epistles of John
are probably the latest books of the Bible, and
were written about the close of the first century,
then a period of thirteen or fourteen centuries
elapsed between the earliest and the latest of these
writings 3 ; and if we can ascertain even approxi-
fumished by Prof. J. F. Genung's monograph on Job, The Epic of
the Inner Life ; by Dr. W. E. Griffis's monograph on the Song of
Songs, The Lily among Thorns ; and by some of the volumes of
The Expositor's Bible, especially that of Dr. Samuel Cox on The
Boole of Ecclesiastes and that of Dr. George Adam Smith on The
Book of Isaiah.
1 Professor Moulton's Modern Reader's Bible (The Macmillan
Company) represents this fact to the eye by printing the Bible in
separate volumes, each of them arranged, as far as practicable,
as a complete volume and in the literary form which he supposes
would characterize it, in order to bring out its true literary char
acter. 2 Exod. xx. 1-xxiv. 7. See post, chapter iv., " The Political
Institutions of the Hebrews."
8 If modern scholars are correct in attributing the second epis
tle of Peter to the middle or late part of the second century (see
A. C. McGiffert's Apostolic Age, pp. 602, 603) the period covered
by the Biblical writings must be extended.

18 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
mately the date of the intermediate writings, we
can trace the rise and progress of that conscious
life of God in the soul of man which constitutes
the essence of religion. Thus the Bible becomes
to us what I may call a record of the biology of
religion. We further find in this volume an illus
tration of almost every type of literature, at least
what appears so to be, and our theological assump
tion does not require us to suppose that the appear
ances are deceptive. We find ancient legends,
constitutional law, political statutes, ecclesiastical
law, history, epic poetry, lyric poetry, gnomic
poetry, drama, folklore, fiction, ethical culture,
oratory — both secular and spiritual — biography,
philosophy — both rational and mystical — and
dream literature.
But the student does not stop in his analytical
study of this Hebrew anthology with this result.
With the aid of scholars he pursues the analysis
further. He analyzes the historical books, and by
the analysis discovers in them clear traces of the
materials which the historian employed. He traces
in the law books the development of political insti
tutions from their earlier and simpler to their later
and more complex form. He discovers in the his
tory of the Hebrew Church the same antagonism
between simplicity and elaborateness of ritual which
characterizes the Church of the Middle Ages, and
the same consciousness of God in the ancient Puri
tan and the ancient sacerdotalist which he can, if
he will, discern in both the analogous types of a

THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE 19
later time. He discovers evidences of many authors
of different temperaments in the collection of lyrics
brought together under the general title of the
Psalms. He becomes convinced that the Book of
Proverbs is not a book by a single royal author,
but a collection of apothegms gathered from many
sources and representing the practical experience
of the ancient Hebrew people. He discovers evi
dence that the writings of a school of preachers
have sometimes been grouped together under the
general title of one of their number. These and
kindred facts which his analysis brings to light very
materially modify the interpretations which are to
be given to these different writings. For no one
reads fiction as he reads philosophy, or poetry as
he reads law, or dream literature as he reads his
tory. Nor does he expect science in an unscien
tific age, nor philosophy from a purely practical
age, nor Christian ethics in a barbaric age, nor the
highest and purest spiritual experiences before the
spiritual nature of man has received its later devel
opments. I believe that the final result of this analysis will
be to extend the use of the Bible, and to enhance
affection and reverence for it ; that when we dis
cover God interpreted in the consciousness of im
perfect men like ourselves, we shall find that he is
nearer to us than we thought he was ; and when
every man finds in this library an interpretation of
this God-consciousness in that form of literature
which most appeals to him, its influence will be

20 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
both strengthened and diffused. The child will
find it in the story, the youth in the romance and
the drama, the lawyer in the political institutions,
the ecclesiastic in the canons, the moralist in the
apothegms, the rationalist in the philosophy, the
mystic in the visions, the man of action in the his
tory, and all in the supreme biography which con
stitutes the natural climax of the whole collection.
This is perhaps to anticipate the conclusion to
which I hope in this volume to conduct such read
ers as have an inclination to read it to the end.
Suffice it to say here that the synthesis of the
modern study differs as much from that of the
ancient method as does the analysis which I have
here described from that of the older method.
The modern student can no longer take texts from
Genesis, Leviticus, Kings, Job, the Song of Songs,
Isaiah, and Romans, and, ignoring the fact that
the first book is one of ancient tradition, the second
a book of ecclesiastical canons, the third a political
history, the fourth an epic poem, the fifth a drama,
the sixth a collection of odes and orations, and the
seventh an epistolary treatise on theology, treat
them as though they are all to be interpreted in the
same fashion, and can be combined in a textual
mosaic which should be accepted as a standard in
theology. But he can study the writings of the
various authors, ascertain the thought and catch
the spirit of each, and, comparing them with one
another, learn in what they agree and in what they
differ. I believe that such a synthesis will make

THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE 21
it clear that these men of dissimilar epochs, condi
tions, and temperaments, widely as they differ, not
only in their form of expression, but in their mode
of thought, agree in their essential spirit, and, in
so far, in their essential religious message. If out
of such a synthesis there emerges a system of
theology not so definite as that framed by the
old method, I believe it will be less scholastic and
more spiritual. If so, the gain will far counter
balance any possible loss.
There is one objection, if not to the literary
method of study here defined and defended, at
least to the results here indicated and summarized,
which ought to be frankly stated and as frankly
met. The Old Testament existed, substantially in the
form in which we now possess it, certainly two,
probably three, and perhaps four centuries prior
to the time of Christ, and there was a practically
uniform tradition existing in the time of Christ
respecting the date and authorship of most of
these books. It was almost universally agreed
among the Hebrew rabbis at that time that Moses
wrote the whole of the Pentateuch ; that Joshua
wrote the Book of Joshua ; that Samuel wrote the
Books of Samuel, Esther, and Judges ; the Books
of Kine-s and Chronicles were conceded to be writ-
ten by unknown authors ; Job was thought to be
written by Moses ; the great majority of the
Psalms by David or by men of his age ; the great
majority of the Proverbs, the whole of Ecclesi-

22 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
astes, and the Song of Songs by Solomon ; Daniel
by a prophet bearing that name; Isaiah by the
son of Amoz ; and the other prophets by the
writers whose names they bear. The one possible
exception to this was the Book of Jonah, which
was regarded by some Hebrew scholars from a
very early period as not being written by Jonah
and as not being historical. The traditionalist,
that is, he who bases his conclusions concerning
Scripture upon tradition, considers that this long-
lived belief substantially settles the question of
date and authorship. He says that here is a tradi
tion which has existed for two thousand years
practically undisputed. It is true that it has been
in some of its parts denied. Luther doubted it ;
Calvin denied it in part ; but, on the whole, it has
been accepted down to about the year 1750 with
very little discussion. This undisputed tradition,
the traditionalist thinks, establishes the date and
authorship of these books ; and he feels this the
more strongly because he thinks these traditions
were accepted and indorsed by Paul and by Jesus
Christ, since they both cited from the books of
Moses and from the different prophets without
any intimation that these books were not written
by the persons whose names they bear.1
To this tradition the literary student, or higher
critic, pays little attention ; the most conservative
of his class is not stopped by it, the more radical
1 For a full statement of this argument see The Old Testa
ment under Fire, by A. J. F. Behrends, D. D., chap. iii.

THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE 23
disregards it altogether, for a variety of reasons.
The fact that the tradition was for so long a time
undisputed deprives it of weight. A tradition is
of little scientific value until it has been subjected
to careful investigation ; and this tradition was
never investigated until about a hundred and fifty
years ago. It is, therefore, as a tradition, entitled
to no more consideration than the Ptolemaic tradi
tion in astronomy, or the long undisputed but now
wholly discarded traditions respecting the early
history of Greece and Rome. This particular tra
dition is of the less value because of the age in
which it first appeared. If we trace it back to the
fourth century before Christ, its birth is a thousand
years after the time of Moses. The scientific
thinker can see no reason for accrediting men who
lived a thousand years after Moses with any better
facilities for determining the authorship of their
sacred books than have the scholars of our own
time. A tradition concerning the authorship of a
volume written ten, five, or even two centuries
before the tradition first appears is not, to the sci
entific scholar, of any considerable value. If we
could suppose that at that time the question was
carefully studied by intelligent and unprejudiced
scholars, some weight might be given to their con
clusions. But this tradition had its rise among a
school of rabbis whose methods were as far re
moved as possible from those of a rational and
unprejudiced investigator. Paul, reared in the
rabbinical school, has treated these traditions with

24 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
no respect, saying that when the rabbis read the
law in their synagogues they had a veil over the
face.1 Christ spoke of them with even greater
severity, saying that by their traditions the rabbis
had made the word of God of none effect, and tell
ing his disciples that their interpretations of the
Old Testament showed them to be fools and blind.2
Theologians who soberly maintained that the law
existed two thousand years before the creation,
and that Jehovah himself studied it in the heavens
with his holy angels,3 cannot be regarded as au
thority on questions of literature by Christian
scholars in this close of the nineteenth century.
Nor does Christ give to this Jewish tradition any
endorsement. There is nothing inconsistent with a
rational recognition of his divine character in the
opinion that he shared on these questions the com
mon impressions of his time. But if he did, he
never gave to those impressions the weight of his
authority. He never undertook to speak with au
thority on the question of the date or authorship of
Biblical books. He never makes Biblical criticism
the subject of his teaching. He never bases his au
thority on that of the authors of the Biblical books.
Sometimes he sets their authority aside, as in the
Sermon on the Mount. Sometimes he cites their
own Scriptures against his critics, in much the same
1 2 Cor. iii. 15. 2 Matt, xxiii. 17 ; Mark vii. 13.
3 For illustrations of the spirit of traditionalism in the time of
Christ see Edersheim's Life and Times of Jesus, Book I. chaps.
vii. and viii.

THE BIBLE AS LITERATURE 25
spirit as that in which Paul, speaking in Athens,
cites " certain of your own poets." It is true that
he often refers to these books, and when he does,
refers to them by the name by which they were
known in_ .his time ; but such a reference does not
even indicate his opinion as to their authorship,
still less does it indicate any intention on his part
to make an utterance on the subject which loyalty
to him must regard as final. No popular writer
or speaker would hesitate to refer to iEsop's Fables,
although he might agree with the conclusion of
modern scholarship that iEsop did not write them,
but only gathered together the collection which
bears his name from a mass of fables current
among the Greeks of his time.1
I invite the reader, then, who will follow me
further in this volume to follow me in the spirit of
this Introduction ; to imagine that there stands
before him on the table, not a book, but a library
of sixty-six different books, which represent the *"
literature of a peculiar people, extending over a
period of twelve hundred years or more, and are a
survival of the fittest, out of a much larger number
1 " His [Christ's] allusions to the Old Testament books and
narratives are sometimes made a touchstone for determining ethi
cal and historical questions, which were as foreign to the thought
of his time as were the researches of anthropology or modern
science. If his assertion ' Moses wrote ' discredits modern criti
cism, does not his affirmation that the sun rises destroy modern —
astronomy ? " G. B. Stevens, D. D., The Theology of the New
Testament, p. 77. Compare Delitzsch on Genesis : Introduction,
p. 21.

26 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBEREWS
which have not survived ; 1 to remember that this
library has produced a profound moral impression
on all that portion of the human race who have
ever known it ; to believe, therefore, that this col
lection is well worth his careful study ; to assume,
however, that it is to be studied, not as a collec
tion of texts, out of which, by a process of mosaic
work, a theology may be constructed, but as a col
lection of vital literature, out of which, by a course
of literary study, life may be promoted and truth
made both more apparent and more effective ; and
to enter on the study of these books in the spirit
in which they were conceived, and with the purpose
for which they were written, as that purpose has
been defined by one whose writings are recognized as
among the loftiest in the whole collection : " Every
scripture inspired of God is also profitable for
teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruc
tion in righteousness, that the man of God may be
complete, furnished completely unto every good
work." 2
1 Though some of the books to be found in the apocryphal
Old Testament are morally equal to some of those included in the
canon. 2 2 Tini. iii. 16, 17.

CHAPTER II
HEBREW HISTORY
The history of the Hebrew nation, as it is re
corded in the Bible, begins with the exodus from
Egypt of the before-enslaved tribes ; this exodus
took place, according to the opinions of modern
scholars, about B. C. 1250.1 But the earlier history
contained in the books of Exodus, Leviticus, and
Numbers may properly be regarded as constitu
tional history, and is so interwoven with the con
stitution and laws of the Hebrews that it will be
more appropriately considered in the chapters de
voted to a consideration of the origin and growth
of those laws.2 The distinctively historical books
are those of Joshua, Judges, First and Second
Samuel, First and Second Kings, First and Second
Chronicles, Ezra, and Nehemiah. If we assume
that the exodus took place about 1250 B. C, and the
restoration of Israel to her land and the rebuilding
of the city and temple, as described by Ezra and
Nehemiah, about the year 450 b. c, the history of
the ancient Hebrews, as narrated in the Old Testa
ment, covers a period of about eight hundred years.
1 See chronological table on page xi.
2 See chapters iv. and v.

28 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
How were the facts which are narrated in these
histories ascertained by the narrator?
A journalist lives and a biographer may live in
the times when the events which he records took
place, and then he may tell what he has himself
seen ; but a historian rarely is the narrator of
events of which he was an eye-witness ; he generally
gathers his information from various sources, and
in his history gives an account of the facts as he
has ascertained them by historical research. There
is no reason to suppose that the Hebrew historian
pursued any other course.1 We should expect that,
writing of events occupying a period of something
like a thousand years, he would have given us in
his history the substance of accounts, documentary
or oral, in which the history of those years had
been preserved ; in other words, we should expect
that other materials than his own personal know
ledge would enter into his history. This expecta
tion is confirmed by a study of Oriental literature.
Oriental histories, so the scholars tell us, are rarely
original ; they are compilations. The Oriental
historian does not, as the modern historian, ex
amine and investigate original sources, and give in
his own language the results of his investigations ;
he takes what I may call the raw materials of his
tory which he has discovered, and weaves them
together, connecting them by utterances of his own.
When a new edition is to be prepared, the new
1 Luke expressly declares that he gathered the materials for
his Gospel to some extent in this way (Luke i. 1-4).

HEBREW HISTORY 29
writer simply takes this conglomerate and inter
calates the new material which he has obtained, or
appends it in additional pages.1
If, then, we suppose that Hebrew history was
prepared as other Oriental histories have been pre
pared, we shall assume it possible by painstaking
study to ascertain to some extent what are the
materials of which it was composed. This is what
modern students of Hebrew history have done ;
they have separated it into its constituent parts.
They are not all of one mind in the details, but
they are all of one mind in the belief that the
Hebrew history is not only composed from pre
existing materials, as Macaulay's history or Green's
history, but that it is so composed of preexist
ing materials that, through linguistic peculiarities,
forms of expression, historical references, and other
indications, the various elements of the history can
be measurably distinguished. Even the English
reader of the Bible cannot fail to distinguish two
of these constituent elements in the later history
of the Hebrews, because these elements are not com
bined in one narrative. From the time of David,
1 " It is the law of Oriental history writing, in fact, that one
book should annihilate its predecessor. The sources of a com
pilation rarely survive the compilation itself. A book in the East
is rarely recopied just as it stands. It is brought up to date by
the addition to it of what is known, or supposed to be known,
from other sources. The individuality of the historical book does
not exist in the East ; it is the substance, not the form, which is
held of importance, and no scruple is felt about mixing up authors
and styles. The end sought is to be complete, and that is all."
The History of Israel, by Ernest Renan, vol. iii. pp. 50, 51.

30 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
that is, about 1000 b. c, to the time of the cap
tivity, that is, about 600 b. C, the history is con
tained in two narratives, parallel in time but very
different in spirit — the First and Second Books
of Kinsrs and the First and Second Books of
o
Chronicles. Thinkers may be roughly divided into two great
types, one of which lays emphasis on truth, the
other on organization. The first, fixing its atten
tion on truth, forgets that to be efficient in society
truth must be embodied ; the second, fixing its
attention on the mediating organization, forgets
the truth which alone can vitalize it. Men of the
first type, having no objective standard, often make
a standard of their own personal opinions ; indif
ferent to the cooperation of their fellow-men and
strenuous in their own opinions, they refuse to
compromise the latter to gain the former ; and thus
become irreconcilables and impracticables. Men
of the second type, overestimating the force of
numbers and of authority, and underestimating the
force inherent in moral principles, too readily yield
principles to gain recruits. They may, indeed, be
quite ready to sacrifice self to truth, but they are
too ready to sacrifice truth to organization. Lack
ing a standard in themselves, they seek it in the
body to which they have attached themselves. In
philosophy the first type of man is always a moral
reformer, generally an independent, often a doc
trinaire. His loyalty to his own convictions is
strong ; his loyalty to party is slight. The second

HEBREW HISTORY 31
seeks to carry moral reform only so far as he can
carry it through a political organization ; he is
generally an opportunist ; he sometimes degener
ates into what is called a "machine politician."
In religion the first has faith, but no creed; he
worships, but without a ritual ; he is religious, but
unchurchly. When organization meant the Church
of Rome, he was a Protestant ; when it meant the
Established Church, a Puritan ; when it meant
Presbyterianism, an Independent ; and when it
meant Congregationalism, a " Come-outer." The
second is always a Churchman, though he may
be a Roman Churchman, an Anglican Churchman,
a Presbyterian Churchman, or a Congregational
Churchman. He is a defender of creeds, of the
established order, of the ancient traditions — or, if
he is inclined to reform, he will not carry reform
so far as to break with the traditions of the past or
the recognized authorities of his own ecclesiastical
organization. In the history of the world the first
is interested in the progress of ideas, the second in
the development of institutions. Is he a historian ?
the first writes the story of popular life, the second
that of institutional life. John Richard Green,
writing the history of the English people, repre
sents the first; Lord Macaulay, measuring all
events by their relation to Whig principles and
policies, or Lord Clarendon, measuring them by
their relation to the Royalist principles and policies,
represents the second.
This distinction is apparent upon even a most

32 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
cursory comparison of the Books of Kings and of
Chronicles. The Book of Chronicles — really one
book in two parts — is written by an ecclesiastic
who identifies the religion of the Hebrew people
with its churchly forms. His history is essentially
Levitical in contents and in spirit — the history of
Jerusalem, of the Temple, and of the Temple ordi
nances. National events are measured by their
relation to the institutions of religion. When the
separation of the before-united kingdom takes
place, and the ten tribes form a nation by them
selves in northern Palestine, leaving Jerusalem in
the hands of the southern tribes, the author of
Chronicles does not include them in his subsequent
history, for they have no Temple, no Levitical
priesthood, no orthodox ritual; to him, therefore,
they are to all intents and purposes as pagans.
Even the intensely religious and dramatically ro
mantic lives of Elijah and Elisha do not concern
him ; they are in the northern kingdom, and they
are unrelated to the ecclesiastical institutions of
Hebraism. On the other hand, he gives in great
detail the organization of the hierarchy, the furnish
ing of the Temple, the genealogies of the tribes,
lists of the cities of the Levites, and makes much
of the glory of Solomon, the builder of the Temple,
and nothing of his decadence and fall. The Book
of Kings — for this also is one book in two parts —
is as distinctly prophetic as the parallel history is
priestly in its character. " The writer records the
fulfillment of the promises which God had made to

HEBREW HISTORY 33
David and his line. A son was to succeed David
whose kingdom should be established of the Lord,
who should build a house for the Name of Jehovah,
and to whom God would be a Father and from
whom the name of the Lord should not depart.1
To show that this prophecy was fulfilled is the
object of the Book of Kings, and what does not
conduce thereto is passed over by the compiler
with Tittle notice." 2 It is he alone who tells the
story of Elijah and Elisha, he alone who records
the influence of Isaiah in the reforms of Heze-
kiah, he alone who, in telling the story of Josiah's
reform, indicates the extent to which the pollutions
of the Temple and the priesthood had been carried
in the previous reign of Manasseh. Each deals
with the nation as the people of God ; but to the one
the divine life is centred in the ecclesiastical organi
zation, to the other that life is manifested in the
activity of the prophets, who belong to no order
and are representatives of no organization. So
marked is the difference between the two narratives
that some scholars have attributed the Book of
Chronicles to Ezra, the Book of Kings to Jere
miah ; it is certain that the one is continued with
out a break, except a purely formal one, in the
history of Ezra ; it is equally certain that the other
is pervaded by the spirit, not of the Levitical code,
1 2 Sam. chap. vii.
2 Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges, Book of Kings,
Introduction, p. xxiv.

34 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
but of the prophetic law contained in the Book of
Deuteronomy.1 The modern scholar, seeing these two types of
history, the priestly and the prophetic, in the later
historical books of the Bible, has looked for and
found them in the earlier books, though woven to
gether into a single strand. The priestly narrative
and the prophetic narrative, apparent to the casual
English reader, in the form of our English Bible,
from the reign of David to the Captivity, appear
scarcely less evident to the modern literary student
of the Bible in the historical narrative from the
creation of the world to the time of David. In his
analysis of the composite narrative the modern
student may be sometimes mistaken ; but that
there were originally two such narratives, and that
the two have been united in the one narrative which
we now possess, is regarded by all scholars who
apply literary and scientific methods to the study
of the Bible as beyond all question.
In the first century after Christ, Tatian con
structed a harmony of the Gospels which is known
1 "Jewish tradition assigns the authorship of Kings to Jere
miah. Modern criticism neither unreservedly accepts nor wholly
rejects this ascription." Canon F. C. Cook, Bible Commentary.
" The recurrence of the final passage of our present copies of
Chronicles at the commencement of Ezra, taken in conjunction
with the undoubted fact that there is a very close resemblance of
style and tone between the two books, suggests naturally the
explanation, which has been accepted by some of the best critics,
that the two works, Chronicles and Ezra, were originally one and
were afterward separated." Ibid.

HEBREW HISTORY 35
as the Diatessaron. It has been recently discov
ered in the Vatican, translated, and published. If
the Four Gospels had disappeared, we should have
in this Diatessaron one Gospel composed of the
four narratives previously existing. Modern schol
ars are unanimously of the opinion that the Old
Testament historical narratives, prior to the Book
of Kings, are, in a somewhat similar manner, com
posed of two or more previously existing narratives,
and that it is possible, to some extent, to separate
the history into its different elements. One of
these narratives is known as the priestly, or some
times the Elohist narrative, because in it the He
brew word Elohim is used to designate God ; the
other is termed the prophetic, or sometimes the
Jahvist narrative, because in it the Hebrew word
Jahveh or Jehovah is generally used to designate
God. When the two words Jahveh-Elohim, or, as
rendered in our English Bible, the Lord God, are
used, the two narratives have been combined in
one by an unknown editor. The opinion that the
historical books are thus composed of preexisting
documents is what is known as the Documentary
Hypothesis. But the scientific or literary student
of the Bible regards this opinion as no longer hypo
thetical. He also thinks that these original elements them
selves are not original writings, but are composed
of preexisting materials, and these materials also,
by painstaking study, he endeavors to discover and
make clear. It would involve too great detail

36 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
and carry me too far from my main purpose to re
port here the conclusions to which this analysis has
led modern students,1 but the principle is clearly
illustrated by original elements easily discernible
in the Bible by the English reader. Whole books
are embodied in this history ; as, the Book of
the Covenant in the Book of Exodus, or the larger
Book of the Covenant in the Book of Deuteron
omy.2 Ancient songs are embodied in it, like the
song of Deborah and Barak in the Book of Judges,
or the elegy of David over Saul and Jonathan in
the Book of Samuel.3 Other books now lost are
referred to by name and quoted verbatim by the
Hebrew historians. There are twelve such books
mentioned in the Old Testament as authority for
statements made. They are : The Wars of the
Lord, the Book of Jasher, the Book of Samuel
concerning the Kingdom, the Book of Solomon,
the Chronicles of David, the Acts of Solomon, the
Acts of Nathan, Samuel, and Gad, the Book of
Ahijah the Shilonite, the Visions of Iddo, the Book
of Shemaiah the Prophet, the Book of Jehu, the
Sayings of the Seers.4 In some cases these books
1 The object of the Polychrome Bible is to make clear to the
reader by colors the different material of which scholars believe
the narratives are composed. The principle applies also to other
than the historical books.
2 Exod. xx.-xxiv. 7 ; Deut. xii.-xxvi.
8 Judg. v. ; 2 Sam. i. 17-27.
* Num. xxi. 14 ; Josh. x. 13 ; 2 Sam. i. 18 ; 1 Sam. x. 25 ;
1 Kings iv. 32, 33 ; 1 Chron. xxvii. 24 ; 1 Kings xi. 41 ; 1 Chron.
xxix. 29 ; 2 Chron. ix. 29 ; xii. 16 ; xx. 34 ; xxxiii. 19.

HEBREW HISTORY 37
are simply referred to ; in some there are definite
and explicit quotations from them. One quotation
may, perhaps, serve as well as many to illustrate
the kind of use which these Hebrew historians
made of preexisting material, acknowledging their
indebtedness therefor : —
" And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until
the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies.
Is not this written in the Book of Jasher ? So the sun
stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go
down about a whole day."
This famous passage in Joshua, which has been a
puzzle to so many men, is explicitly said to be
quoted from a more ancient record — the Book of
Jasher — which is now believed to have been an
ancient war-song.1 In addition to these are offi
cial records incorporated in the Old Testament
histories. In the Book of Ezra, for example, we
have a copy of what purports to be a letter sent to
Darius by certain opponents of the Hebrews, seek
ing to secure an edict from the king to prevent the
rebuilding of Jerusalem ; a copy of a second letter
sent by the Hebrews in reply, seeking for permis
sion to continue the rebuilding of Jerusalem ; and
a copy, or what purports to be a copy, of the offi
cial edict which came back from Darius the king
1 Josh. x. 13 ; compare 2 Sam. i. 18. " From these passages
(and no other are extant which can be proved to be extracted
from it), the general character of the book and its contents seem
apparent. Both passages are unquestionably rhythmical in struc
ture and poetical in diction." Bible Commentary, on Josh. x. 13.

38 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
in response.1 It is possible, of course, that these
are not copies ; that they are written by the his
torian in his own language, and for the purpose of
imparting a dramatic vigor to the narrative ; but the
indications are that he had access to certain official
records which had come down to his time and of
which he made use in telling his story.
Finally we have early traditions and popular
folk-lore — songs the mothers sing to their children,
stories the mothers tell their children — ¦ inserted in
the narrative for the purpose of illustrating phases
of life with which the historian was concerned, and
which he was endeavoring to interpret to his read
ers. Such are the story of Balaam's ass, the Sam
son stories, and perhaps some of the Elisha stories.2
Thus a careful examination even of our English
Bible makes it clear that it is composed of pre
existing material, some portions of which it is pos
sible for us to distinguish, showing whence it came
and what is its character. The difficulty of doing
this is enhanced and the appearance of unity in the
narrative is increased by the fact that the ancients
had none of those mechanical contrivances of which
we make such free use to indicate selections and
quotations. Quotation marks, parentheses, foot
notes, and appendices are all comparatively mod
ern. When an editor of previous writings desired
1 Ezra iv., v., vi.
8 See The Bible and its Supremacy, by Dean Farrar, chap.
xvii. ; Scriptures Hebrew and Christian, by E. T. Bartlett, D. D.,
and John P. Peters, D. D., vol. ii. part 3.

HEBREW HISTORY 39
to add something from some other writer, or an
interpolation of his own, he had no other method
of doing this than by incorporating the addition
directly and immediately in the narrative, of which
it henceforth became an indistinguishable portion.
How, then, the question will be asked, can we
know what is true and what is false in this Hebrew
history ? If the historian gathered all sorts of
material, — official records, popular songs, current
stories, ancient documents, prehistoric legends, —
and out of all this material composed his history,
how can we tell what of it is trustworthy ? And
if we cannot tell what of it is trustworthy, if there
is no unfailing standard of judgment, does not the
motto, " False in one, false in all," apply? This
question will perhaps press upon the honest and
candid inquirer with greater force if he recalls the
undoubted fact that the age in which the Bible
was composed was not a critical age. John Adding-
ton Symonds, in his history, " The Renaissance
in Italy," has discriminated very justly between
three stages in the history of scholarship : the age
of passionate desire ; the age of indiscriminate ac
quisition ; and the age of critical scholarship.1 If,
as the modern scholars believe, the historical books
of the Old Testament were finally edited in their
present form about the time of the Restoration,
say 450 b. C, the editing took place in an era of
indiscriminate acquisition, and this fact, while it
lends additional sanction to the theory that the
1 The Age of the Despots, by J. A. Symonds, pp. 20-22.

40 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
history of the Hebrew people, as we possess it, is
a composition of earlier materials, not critically
weighed and measured, does by just so much de
tract from its scientific accuracy as a historical
record. It might suffice in reply to quote the conclusion
concerning the historical value of these ancient
records recorded by one of the most radical of the
modern critics, Professor C. H. Cornill. In " The
Rise of the People of Israel," he says : —
" I hold the firm and well-grounded conviction that the
traditions of the people of Israel itself regarding its ear
liest history are thoroughly historical in all essential
points, and can sustain the keenest and most searching
criticism. Poetic legends have, indeed, woven about
those ancient traditions a misty, magic veil which charms
the eye and captivates the heart, and in which lies the
spell that those traditions cast over every unbiased mind.
Not with rude vandal hand should we tear away this
veil, but with loving care resolve it into its single threads
and remove it with considerate hand, so that the origi
nal image may stand forth in its unadorned simplicity
and naked chastity, and then we shall see that it is really
a noble human figure, and not a mere creature of the
imagination that was concealed beneath the protecting
cover of this veil.''
Have we not a stronger basis for our faith in all
that is important in Hebrew history, after that
history has been searched by one inspired by the
scientific spirit who has no preconceptions in regard
to its truth, and who is perfectly ready to subject

HEBREW HISTORY 41
it to the same kind of searching criticism to which
he will subject any other literature, and who, as
the result of that searching criticism, reaches the
" firm and well grounded conviction that the tradi
tions of the people of Israel . . . are thoroughly
historical in all essential points," than we could
have had if there had been no such critical investi
gation into its historical truthfulness ?
Nevertheless, I think it must be conceded by the
candid student that we have no such assurance as
our fathers thought they possessed as to the accu
racy of the statements of fact of the Bible history;
but it does not follow that our faith in its truth is
any less clearly established. There is an evident
and an important difference between statements of
fact and statements of truth, and ignoring that
difference has involved Bible students in needless
perplexity. A statement which agrees with an
outward and objective existence is a fact, or, more
accurately, the statement of a fact; a statement
which agrees with a subjective and invisible prin
ciple is a truth. Strictly speaking, truth includes
fact, that is, all correct statements of fact are
truth ; but all truths are not facts. It is a fact
that Caesar crossed the Rubicon ; it is a truth that
God is love.
Now, it is a matter of absolute unimportance to
us whether in all particulars the Hebrew history
accords with the facts; but it is of the utmost
importance for us to know whether or not its
statements accord with the truth. A single illus-

42 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
tration taken from the New Testament will make
this distinction clear. Whether Jesus Christ was
born in Bethlehem or in Nazareth is not a question
which materially affects the moral character of
mankind. A man may be as good and as devout
a man, and as sincere a follower of Jesus Christ,
if he believes that Jesus Christ was born in Naza
reth as if he believes that he was born in Bethle
hem. But the question whether the life of Christ
corresponds to the divine ideal, whether it is such
a life that men ought to follow it, whether his
character is such as corresponds to that of the
Divine, the Eternal, the Invisible One — that is a
profound question, the answer to which must deter
mine the quality of the answerer's devotion and the
course of his life. That is a question of truth ; the
other is a question of fact. It is a matter of no
more concern to us to know of how many thou
sand men David's army was composed on some
great occasion than it is for us to know how many
men some Greek general had in his campaign ; but
whether the fundamental principles of national life
are rightly interpreted by the Hebrew historian —
that concerns our very life, national and individual.
History may be divided into three classes : the
factual, the philosophical, and the epic. By factual
history I mean history which undertakes simply to
tell the facts. The writer of such history cares for
nothing else. He does not inquire what the facts
signify ; what is their human interest ; what is
their moral meaning : he simply seeks to know

HEBREW HISTORY 43
what is the fact, and he will sometimes spend
weeks and even months in the investigation of a
date, in order to secure accuracy in his facts. The
official report of a department may be taken as an
illustration of factual history. The head of the
department te not supposed to have, though he
sometimes does, any ends to serve, any lessons to
teach, any interest to awaken ; it is his business
simply to give the statistical results of his investi
gation. There is not much that is philosophic or
epic about the records of a census. The philosophic
historian is one who is interested in facts only
or chiefly because they illustrate or enforce some
theory. The facts are not ends ; they are simply
instruments in his hands : he summons his facts as
a lawyer calls his witness, that they may testify
on his behalf. Few scholars would go to Buckle's
" History of Civilization " to get an accurate state
ment of the facts of the periods with which he dealt.
Buckle wished to demonstrate a certain theory of
civilization, and with great ingenuity he brought
together facts which would help to demonstrate his
theory. He wrote a philosophical history. Some
where between these two is what I will call epic his
tory. The epic historian is not interested in mere
fact, nor has he a philosophy or theory which he
wishes to demonstrate. He is interested in certain
phases of human life, and he uses the facts of his
tory, as the dramatist uses the creations of his imag
ination, to interpret human life. Froude's " Life
of Erasmus " is a good illustration of epic history.

44 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
The history of the ancient times was epic history.
The ancient peoples did not discriminate carefully
between fact and fiction, between observation and
imagination, between what they had seen and what
they pictured to themselves. Their poetry, there
fore, is historical poetry, having its roots in history ;
and their history is poetical history, portrayed for
the purpose of interesting their readers in certain
phases of human life. Hqmer's Iliad we now know
is based on certain facts of life far back in Greek
history; the historicity of' the siege of Troy has
been pretty well established by Schliemann's in
vestigations ; but to what extent Homer's repre
sentation of the facts of that siege is historically
accurate in detail it is impossible to determine.
On the other hand, Herodotus does not hesitate to
use tradition, story, fiction, myth, anything that
will aid him to make interesting the story which he
writes. And yet Herodotus is called the "father
of history." He writes for a purpose. His pur
pose is not to tell exactly what has happened — his
history is not factual; nor is his purpose to estab
lish a philosophy which he desires to demonstrate
— his history is not philosophic ; his purpose is to
illustrate certain phases of Greek life and char
acter in which he is profoundly interested. He has
stated this purpose very explicitly in the very first
sentence of his history. "This," he says, "is a
publication of the researches of Herodotus of Hali-
carnassus, in order that the actions of men may
not be effaced by time, nor the great and wondrous

HEBREW HISTORY 45
deeds displayed both by Greeks and barbarians de
prived of renown : and amongst the rest, for what
cause they waged war upon each other." This is
the purpose of Herodotus's history — to make clear
to all future time the renown of the Greek people.
To this class Hebrew history belongs. It is not
factual history ; it is not written by men who spent
time and labor in securing accuracy in historical
detail. They rarely give a date; the dates of
Biblical history, so far as we possess them at all,
have been ascertained by subsequent and more
scientific historians. In some cases, as in the
early history of David, two apparently incongruous
accounts current in their time are incorporated in
the narrative without any attempt to explain the
incongruity or to harmonize the narratives. That
has been left for subsequent scholars to attempt.
It is clear from such facts as these that these his
tories are not compiled by men whose interest was
in minute historical scholarship. Nor were they
compiled by philosophical historians whose object
it was to prove or to illustrate a theory. They do
not resemble Buckle's " History of Civilization."
The Hebrew was rarely a philosopher; he had
few theories, and those were of the simplest de
scription. The Bible histories are epic histories. The his
torians were interested in one phase of human life
— a phase which may be expressed by the single
sentence, God is in his world. They believed in a
living God, a God who dwelt with his people, who

46 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
guided and inspired them, who rewarded them
when they did right and punished them when they
did wrong, who was stronger than the strongest,
and was about them as the mountains about Jeru
salem. They believed in the faith of the prophets
that Jehovah was able to pluck up and pull down
and destroy the nation, or to build it and to plant
it at his will.1 They saw in the history of their
own people the witness of this presence and power
of the Living God. They wrote history, not as
Buckle, to prove a theory ; not as Herodotus, to
preserve the memory of the great and wondrous
deeds of an ancient people ; not as Macaulay, to
trace the rise and progress of certain political
principles as embodied in a great political party ;
not as John Richard Green, to show the develop
ment of a great nation from small beginnings to
a position of imperial influence and power ; they
wrote the history of the Hebrew people to exhibit
the dealings of the Living God with his people
and with the peoples who were related to them. It
is this which gives to Biblical history its peculiar
character. That history is less dramatic than
Froude, less philosophic than Buckle, less scien
tific than Freeman, less democratic than Green,
less romantic than Herodotus ; but it is of all his
tories the most religious, because, above all other
histories, ancient or modern, it endeavors to inter
pret the part the Living God took in the history
of a peculiar people. 1 Jer. viii. 7, 9.

HEBREW HISTORY 47
It is for this reason that the Hebrew historian
makes no attempt to exalt the virtues or conceal
the vices of either the people or its leaders. With
a frankness which has often been misinterpreted,
he narrates the domestic infelicities of Abraham,
the treachery of Jacob, the shortsighted statesman
ship of Joseph, unconsciously preparing by a com
mercial monopoly for the future enslavement of
his race, the passion and the penitence of Moses,
the self-will of the athletic but inefficient Samson,
the superstition of Jephtha, the insane jealousy of
Saul, the adultery of David, the corrupt commer
cialism of Solomon. He is equally frank in dealing
with the nation : in describing its idolatries at
the foot of Sinai, its childish waywardness in the
wilderness, its alternate cowardice and cruelty of
conscience in the Canaanite campaigns, its abject
submission to a bondage which it needed only cour
age to repel, its repeated degeneracies and apostar
sies, and its final captivity and disgrace. From
the opening chapter of this composite history to
the end, the subject is not Israel, nor Israel's great
men, but Israel's God in his dealings with Israel.
It is Jehovah who calls reluctant Moses to assume
the task of emancipating Israel ; Jehovah who
inspires the nation with courage at the Red Sea ;
Jehovah who provides it with both food and guid
ance in the wilderness ; Jehovah who gives to it
the bases of its civil laws and civil liberty ; Jeho
vah who frees it from the superstitions in which it
has been reared, and into which it afterwards falls

48 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
with irritating repetitions; Jehovah who appears
to Joshua and equips him with courage for his
great campaigns; Jehovah who is the sole bond
of union to this unorganized people during the
colonial period ; Jehovah who sustains Saul when
Saul is loyal, and abandons him to defeat and
death when he is disloyal ; Jehovah who summons
David from the sheepfold to the throne ; Jehovah
who sends prophets, from Elijah the reformer to
Isaiah the statesman, to recover the people from
their apostasies, and to counsel and encourage them
in their national crises ; Jehovah who gives them
prosperity when they walk in his way, and who
sends them adversity when they depart from it.
The historian does, indeed, narrate the deeds of
great men ; but he so narrates them that our atten
tion is fixed, not on the man nor on the deed, but
on Jehovah who inspires the man to do the deed.
Moses was a great statesman, the father of civil
liberty for all humanity ; yet it is not of the
statesman but of the prophet who walked with
Jehovah that we think as we read the story of his
life. David was a great organizer ; the essential
principles of his organization of the state into great
departments and of the army into companies, regi
ments, and army corps we still maintain to-day,
nearly thirty centuries after his death ; 1 but it is
not of the great organizer, but of the poet and of
his experience of God in nature and men, that we
think as we read the story of his life and his
1 2 Sam. xviii. 1, 2 ; 1 Chron. xxvii. 25-34.

HEBREW HISTORY 49
achievements. Ahab brought Israel to a great
degree of prosperity by his skill and courage as an
astute statesman and a brave captain ; 1 and yet it
is of the sins of Ahab against God and humanity
that we think as we read the story of his reign ;
not of his statecraft and his military achievements,
but of his robbery of Naboth. In all this Biblical
history the moral element predominates over the
merely political, and the religious over the merely
ethical. And yet the historian rarely if ever
formulates a dogma or draws a moral. He writes
not to prove that " righteousness exalteth a na
tion, and sin is a reproach to any people ; " but
believing that this is true, and believing that this
truth is writ large in the history of his people, he
so writes the history that his readers see it recorded
there, not by his pen, but by the events themselves.
The question, then, for the student of Biblical
history to ask, is not whether all the deeds of the
heroes of Hebrew history were virtuous, whether
Abraham did right to lie, or Jephtha to sacri
fice his daughter, whether Samson was really a
hero, or David's adultery a pardonable offense.
The historian recites the virtues of men without
applause, and their vices without condemnation.
He draws no morals ; this he leaves to be done
by the conscience of the reader. The question is
1 1 Kings xx. See History of Israel, by C. A. Cornill, 102 ff. ;
The Religion of Israel, by Karl Budde, 116 ff. ; Hastings's Bible
Dictionary, tit. Ahab ; History of the Jewish Church, by A. P.
Stanley, lect. xxx.

50 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
not whether God commanded all that the ancient
Hebrews thought he commanded, or approved all
that they thought he approved. The historian
recites their errors as well as their sins. It is not
whether all the occurrences took place as they are
recorded ; whether Samson tied foxes or jackals
together ; 1 whether Elijah was fed by ravens or
Arabians ; 2 whether Elisha made the axe-head swim
in the water.3 The value of the history does not
depend upon its scientific accuracy in detailed in
cidents in this remote past. The question to con
sider is whether the historian is right or wrong in
his interpretation of human history, whether God
is in his world of men, whether Jehovah is to be
reckoned with in national policies, whether moral
forces are to be taken account of by wise men in
the world's adminstration ; or whether might
makes right and God is only on the side of the
strong battalions. This question I do not discuss ;
for it is no part of the object of this volume to
show that the view of life taken by the Biblical
writers is correct. I only seek to show what that
view is ; to interpret the Old Testament, not to
discuss its accuracy. To interpret it we must
understand first of all the purpose of the writers ;
and the purpose of the historical writers of the
Old Testament was not to secure infallible accuracy
1 Judg. xv. 4.
2 1 Kings xvii. 4, 6. See Robert Tuck's Handbook of Biblical
Difficulties, p. 439 ; Kitto's Bible Illus., vol. ii. part 2, pp. 216-
220. 8 2 Kings vi. 1-7.

HEBREW HISTORY 51
in dates, numbers, statistics, and historical inci
dents, but to interpret their national history as
Jehovah's dealing with his people. Did they in
terpret it aright ? and does this interpretation give
us a clue by which we can interpret also the history
of our own times ? If so, the Bible history is true,
and its truth is not impugned, and not even a sus
picion is cast upon its truth, by the conclusion that
certain of the incidents recorded in it are unhis-
torical, and many of the moral judgments which it
records are to be corrected in the light of a later
moral development, and by the standards of a later
revelation.

CHAPTER III
PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN
The principles respecting Hebrew history which
were set forth and illustrated in the preceding
chapter are two. The first principle is that this
history is a compilation from previously existing
materials, and that by careful study it is possible
to distinguish in some measure these different ma
terials, to separate the strand and show the threads
of which it is composed, and that this task is made
easier for us because in the latter portion of the
history two of these strands are separated for us
into two books — the Book of Chronicles, which is
priestly or ecclesiastical, and the Book of Kings,
which is prophetic. The second principle is that
this history is not factual nor philosophical, but
epic ; that it is not compiled by a scientific stu
dent whose aim it is to give accurate information
as to details, nor by a philosophical thinker whose
aim it is to enforce a theory of human life, but by
a prophetic or poetic or dramatic writer, who uses
the material which he finds ready to his hand for
the purpose of illustrating a certain phase or aspect
of human life, namely, that aspect which presents
itself to one who believes that God is in his world

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 53
of men, and who in his observation of the course of
human events looks for the indications of a divine
presence guiding and directing them. The histor
ical book of the Bible which affords, if not the
most striking illustration of these two principles,
at least the illustration most apparent to the Eng
lish reader, is the Book of Genesis ; and this for
three reasons : first, because the narratives which
that book contains appear on their face to be epic
or dramatic rather than factual ; second, because
we are able easily to separate the narratives of
which the book is composed, and to show that
there are two or more not always consistent ac
counts of the same events ; and, third, because the
researches of archaeologists have discovered in
other and admittedly older literature the materials
of which the narratives might easily have been
composed.1 1 The student who wishes to pursue more fully the study of
the question whether the historical books were written by one
author, or were compiled from a variety of documentary and tra
ditional sources by an editor or editors, will find material for the
purpose in the following volumes : An Introduction to the Litera
ture of the Old Testament, by S. R. Driver, D. D. ; the best book
in the English language, so far as I know, to give the student the
results of modern scholarship in its analysis of the Old Testament.
The Genesis of Genesis and The Triple Tradition of Exodus, by
Professor B. W. Bacon, D. D., of the Yale Theological Seminary,
which give analyses of these two books into their supposed con
stituent parts. The Beginnings of History according to the Bible
and the Traditions of Oriental Peoples, by Francis Lenormant, Pro
fessor of Archajology at the National Library of France ; to this
and the following volume I am indebted for the parallel traced in
this chapter between the Genesis tradition and one of the Assyrian

54 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
An early tradition, still regarded as trustworthy
by the traditional school of Biblical critics, attrib
utes the Book of Genesis to Moses.1 If we were
tablets. The Chaldozan Account of Genesis, by George Smith of
the Department of Oriental Antiquities in the British Museum.
Encyclopaedia Britannica, article Pentateuch, by J. Wellhausen,
Professor of Oriental Languages, University of Halle. For the
view of those who maintain the single and Mosaic authorship of
the Pentateuch the reader is referred to The Unity of the Book of
Genesis and the Higher Criticism of the Pentateuch, by William
Henry Green, D. D., LL. D., Professor of Oriental and Old Testa
ment Literature in Princeton Theological Seminary, who, at the
time of his death, was the ablest representative in this country of
the traditional school. See, also, The Veracity of the Hexateuch, by
Samuel C. Bartlett, D. D., LL. D., late President of Dartmouth
College ; The New Testament under Fire, by A. J. F. Behrends,
D. D. ; and Anti-Higher Criticism, edited by L. W. Munhall, M. A.
The two latter are general in their character, and are not con
fined, as are the others, to the problems of the Pentateuch.
1 " Is the Pentateuch the work of Moses ? It is univer
sally conceded that this was the traditional opinion among the
Jews. To this the New Testament bears the most abundant and
explicit testimony." In support of this Dr. Green refers to the
following New Testament passages : ' ' The Pentateuch is by our
Lord called ' the book of Moses ' (Mark xii. 26) ; when it is read
and preached the Apostles say that Moses is read (2 Cor. iii. 15)
and preached (Acts xv. 21). The Pentateuch and the books of
the prophets, which were read in the worship of the synagogue,
are called, both by our Lord (Luke xvi. 29, 31) and the Evange
lists (Luke xxiv. 27), ' Moses and the prophets ' or ' the law of
Moses and the prophets ' (Luke xxiv. 44 ; Acts xxviii. 23). Of
the injunctions of the Pentateuch not only do the Jews say, when
addressing our Lord, ' Moses commanded ' (John viii. 5), but our
Lord repeatedly uses the same form of speech (Matt. viii. 4 ; xix.
7, 8 ; Mark i. 44 ; *. 3 ; Luke v. 14), as testified by three of the
Evangelists. Of the law in general he says, ' Moses gave the
law ' (John vii. 19), and the Evangelist echoes, ' the law was given
by Moses ' (John i. 17). And that Moses was not only the author
of the law, but committed its precepts to writing, is affirmed by

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 55
to suppose that this tradition is correct, and that
the traditional Biblical chronology were substan
tially accurate, then the Book of Genesis was
written about 1450 b. c But, still supposing the
traditional chronology to be correct, this book deals
with a period of from two to twenty-five centuries
the Jews (Mark xii. 19), and also by our Lord (Mark x. 5), who
further speaks of him as writing predictions respecting himself
(John v. 46, 47), and also traces a narrative in the Pentateuchal
history to him (Mark xii. 26)." The Higher Criticism of the Penta
teuch, by William Henry Green, D. D., LL. D., pp. 32, 33. On the
other hand, so orthodox a critic as Dr. Franz Delitsch declares
that these references by Christ to the books of Moses are not con
clusive on the question of authorship. He says (A New Commen
tary on Genesis, vol. i. p. 21), " In the N. T. also the Pentateuch
is called ' the book of Moses ' (Mark xii. 26), or just ' Moses ' (Acts
xv. 21 ; 2 Cor. iii. 15) ; and when injunctions or sayings are quoted
from it (e. g. from Exodus, Luke xx. 37 ; Leviticus, Mark i. 44,
Rom. x. 5 ; Deuteronomy, Mark xii. 19, Rom. x. 19) Moses is
named as the speaker and writer. For our Lord and his apostles
conceive of the Thorah as might be expected of them as members
of their nation : it is to them the work of Moses. They regard it
as proceeding from the revelation of God. But it is not yet God's
full and final revelation, hence they intentionally emphasize the
human side of its origin, without regard to the directness or
indirectness of the authorship of Moses, which lay outside their
exalted and practical object, and was, moreover, alien to the
character of their age. It is important to us that they too were
penetrated by the conviction that Moses was the mediator of the
law through which Israel became the people of God ; but historico-
critical investigation as to his share as author iu the composition
of the Pentateuch is left free, as far as N. T. statements are con
cerned." For at least three centuries the Mosaic authorship of
parts of the Pentateuch has been in dispute. Spinoza, writing
early in the seventeenth century (Spinoza's Works; Tractatus
Theologico-Politieus, chap, viii.), pointed out features in the
Pentateuch that seem irreconcilable with the theory of Mosaic
authorship.

56 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
prior to Moses.1 Thus, even if we accept the tra
dition which attributes the authorship of the Book
of Genesis to Moses, he has recorded in it events
which occurred from two to twenty-five centuries
before his time. The question, therefore, that
necessarily presents itself to the thoughtful reader
is, How did he learn the facts the history of which
he narrates ? Of course we may suppose that they
were supernaturally revealed to him.2 But there
is nothing in the narrative to suggest this sup
position, unless it be the fact that we can conceive
no other way in which he could have received in
fallible information concerning such events as the
creation of the world and the deluge. The writer
does not claim that his narrative is a revelation ;
nor is this claim made for him by any subsequent
Biblical writer. He does not say, as do the later
prophets, " Thus saith the Lord " ; nor does any
subsequent sacred writer affirm concerning these
Genesis narratives that "the Lord spake unto
Moses, saying." The only other opinion open to
us is that the writer or compiler of Genesis availed
himself of such material as existed in his time, and
1 The creation is put in the popular chronology at 4004 B. c,
the deluge at 2948, the call of Abraham at 1922, the death of
Joseph at 1688. Of course to the modern scholar these dates are
almost wholly hypothetical, but that centuries elapsed between
the event, whatever it was, which gave rise to the narrative of the
deluge, and the writing of the narrative, is questioned by none.
2 For an admirable pictorial representation of the way in which
the story of the Creation might have been revealed to Moses, see
Hugh Miller's Testimony of the Rocks, lecture iv. ; The Mosaic
Vision of Creation.

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 57
that he used it with greater or less scientific and
critical discrimination in preparing his history of
this prehistoric period.
It is true that it has been suggested that the
actors in the events recorded in Genesis wrote
accounts of those events, and that these narratives
written by contemporaries and eyewitnesses were
handed down from generation to generation until
they came into the hands of Moses. When this
hypothetical process of autobiography began, it is
impossible even to surmise. It must suffice here
to say that, even if we were to suppose that writing
was an art known to Adam, and that this hypo
thetical collection of manuscript biographies began
with him, we should get as a result only one form
of a documentary hypothesis, since upon this theory
the Book of Genesis would be compiled from pre
existing documents, which, on the possible but
certainly unsubstantiated theory, had been with an
almost miraculous care prepared and preserved for
the use of the final editor. It is thus, even on the
hypothesis of the traditionalist, almost certain that
the Book of Genesis is composed of preexisting
materials. It is scarcely necessary to add that he
who disregards ancient tradition as of little scien
tific authority does not think that the Book of
Genesis was written by Moses. He puts it at a
much later date than 1450 B. C. I am inclined to
think that it was the last written of the historical
books of the Old Testament ; that, after the history
of the ancient Hebrews, which begins with the

58 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Exodus and ends with the Restoration, had been
substantially completed, the Book of Genesis, or
— the Book of Origins, — for such is the meaning of
the word, — was compiled by some unknown editor
as an introduction to the history which he or some
one before him had compiled ; and that in so doing
he rewrote the current traditions of this prehistoric
period, much as Alfred Tennyson rewrote the Ar
thurian legends in the " Idylls of the King "; and
that he did this for the purpose of emphasizing
the truth that God is in his world. Not in any
scientific accuracy in the narratives, are we to look
for the evidence of prophetic inspiration, but in
their witness to the faith of this prophetic people
in the presence and rule of God in his world. And
that inspiration is equally to be discerned in the
narrative, whether we suppose it is composed of
autobiographies by eye-witnesses or of current
myths and legends, whether it was compiled by
Moses about somewhere between 1250 b. c. and
1450 B. C. or by an unknown prophet six, eight,
or ten centuries later.1
1 ' ' The first chapters of Genesis constitute a ' Book of the Begin
nings,' in accordance with the stories handed down in Israel from
generation to generation, ever since the times of the Patriarchs,
which, in all its essential affirmations, is parallel with the state
ments of the sacred books from the banks of the Euphrates and
Tigris. But, if this is so, I shall perhaps be asked, where then do
you find the divine inspiration of the writers who made this archae
ology — that supernatural help by which, as a Christian, you must
believe them to have been guided ? Where ? In the absolutely
new spirit which animates their narration, even though the form
of it may have remained in almost every respect the same as

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 59
It seems, then, certain that, by whomsoever the
Book of Genesis was compiled, it is composed of
material which this compiler found ready to his
hand. What is the character of this material?
Was it composed by contemporaneous historians ?
and is its value in its scientific accuracy ? Or did
it grow up out of the observation, the imagination,
and the thought of the race? and is its value in
the moral lessons of which it is the vehicle? In
endeavoring to find the answer to these questions,
let us turn, in the first place, to the narratives
themselves. The first chapter of Genesis gives an account of
the creation of the world. It is " a sublime epic
of creation," a "hymn of praise to the Creator."
among the neighboring nations. It is the same narrative, and in
it the same episodes succeed one another in like manner ; and yet
one would be blind not to perceive that the signification has
become altogether different. The exuberant polytheism which
encumbers these stories among the Chaldseans has been carefully
eliminated, to give place to the severest monotheism. What
formerly expressed naturalistic conceptions of a singular grossness
here becomes the garb of moral truths of the most exalted and
most purely spiritual order. The essential features of the form
of the tradition have been preserved, and yet between the Bible
and the sacred books of Chaldsea there is all the distance of one
of the most tremendous revolutions which have ever been effected
in human beliefs. Herein consists the miracle, and it is none the
less amazing for being transposed. Others may seek to explain
this by the simple natural progress of the conscience of humanity ;
for myself, I do not hesitate to find in it the effect of a super
natural intervention of Divine Providence, and I bow before the
God who inspired the Law and the Prophets." The Beginnings of
History, by Francois Lenormant, preface, pp. xvi., xvii.

60 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
A comparison of this chapter with such passages
as Psalm xxxiii. 6-8 ; civ. ; or Prov. viii. 24-30,
will make clear to the English reader its poetical
character. Its language is not scientific, accurate,
"technical ; it is figurative, poetic, the language of
imagination. God broods upon the face of the
water like a wind playing upon its surface ; he
calls, and light comes forth out of the darkness ;
he gives proper names to both light and darkness,
calls one Day, the other Night ; he erects a firma
ment J to divide the waters above from the waters
beneath ; he again divides the waters below from the
land, and gives proper names to both earth and seas ;
he speaks, and in the heavens above lights appear
to illumine the earth. All this is language of
poetry and of picture ; this is no scientific treatise
or cosmogony ; it is a poet's sublime epic ; a paean
to the Creator of the world.2 Whether it agrees
i * See Ruskin's Modern Painters, part v. chapter vi.
2 " Sometimes the prose of the Bible is equal to the best poetry,
and blends truth and beauty in perfect harmony. It approaches
also, in touching the highest themes, the rythmical form of Hebrew
poetry, and may be arranged according to the parallelism of
members. Moses was a poet as well as a historian. ... In this
wider sense the Bible begins and ends with poetry. The retro
spective vision of the first creation, and the prospective vision of
the new heavens and new earth, are presented in language which
rises to the summit of poetic beauty and power." Commentary on
the Holy Scriptures, by J. P. Lange, vol. vii. of Old Testament,
on Job ; from Gen. Int. to the Poetical Books, by Philip Schaff,
p. ix.
"This sublime Epic of Creation, with its boldly figurative
imagery and poetic grandeur of conception and expression, has
been subjected to a style of interpretation, suited only to a plain

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 61
with the latest conclusions of scientists concerning
the order of the processes of evolution by which
the world was developed from star-dust is a ques
tion as little pertinent to the chapter as would be
the. question whether geographical exploration indi
cates any locality for the Purgatory and the Para
dise of Dante.1
The second and third chapters, containing ac
counts of the creation and fall of man, are equally
characterized, not by the spirit of a scientific inves
tigator into the problems of anthropology, but by
a naive, childlike, and yet divine imagination. Man
is fashioned, sculptor-like, out of clay, and a breath
of life is breathed into him. The animals are
brought to him to be named ; among them all there
is no one fit to be a companion to him. So, while
he sleeps, a rib is taken from him,2 and from the
and literal record of the ordinary occurrences of life. Hence not
only its true spirit, but its profound teachings, have been mis
conceived and misinterpreted ; and its exhibition of the mysteries
of creative power, which science traces in its own observation of
Nature, have been confounded with popular misapprehensions,
irreconcilable with the well-known facts of science." The Book of
Genesis, with Explanatory Notes, by Thomas J. Conant, p. xvi.
1 The correspondence is undoubtedly extraordinary — " Every
great feature in the structure of the planet corresponds with the
order of events narrated in the sacred history." Professor Silli-
man, Outline of Geological Lectures appended to Bakewell's Geology,
p. 67, note. But as an exact scientific account of the creation it
is not, in all minor details, strictly accurate. See Science and
Hebrew Tradition, essays iv. and v., T. H. Huxley.
2 The poetic character of this conception is artistically illus
trated by Ghiberti in the bronze doors at Florence, in which he
represents the angels bringing Eve to the Creator, from Adam's

62 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
rib a woman is formed. Husband and wife, they
are put into a garden ; the great world lies outside.
In the garden are two trees of which they may not
eat. The fruit of one will give them a knowledge
of good and evil ; the fruit of the other will endow
them with immortality. A serpent comes into the
garden, not crawling on his belly, but erect —
though how erect it is difficult to conceive. He
persuades the too confiding woman ; she persuades
the too pliant man ; they both eat the fruit of the
first tree, discover that they are naked, lose their
childhood innocence, are ashamed, make for them
selves aprons, are afraid of their God whose voice
they hear in the cool of the evening as he walks in
the garden, and try to hide themselves from him
among the trees. Like children discovered in a
fault, they come when summoned, excuse themselves
in vain by casting the fault, the man on the woman,
the woman on the serpent, and are cast out from
the garden because they have become as a god by
knowing good and evil, and lest they become still
more as a god by being immortal. How this gar
den is so fenced in from the outer world that nei
ther they nor their descendants can ever return to
it, nor even discover where it is, is left to conjec
ture, as surely no scientific writer would have left
it. The garden disappears absolutely from the
face of the earth, and never again is mentioned in
side. See Mrs. Jameson's History of our Lord in Art, i. 96, 97.
As poetry the idea is beautiful ; as history, both incredible and
repulsive.

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 63
the sacred history, or in any other. The man and
his wife go out into the wilderness to fight life's
battle with thistle-bearing nature ; children are
born to them ; cities are discovered in the wilder
ness : whence come they ? Cain is married : where
did he get his wife ? The question is an oft-repeated
one — foolish if this story is imagination, not fool
ish if it is or purports to be a scientific history of
the origin of the human race.
It is absolutely certain that if one were to come
upon this story in Greek, Latin, or Scandinavian
literature, one would not hesitate a moment how to
classify it. This, he would say, is a myth of won
derful beauty : What is its significance ? What
does it mean ? The scientific or literary student of
the Old Testament sees no reason for refusing to
apply the same standards to this story in Hebrew
literature which he would apply if he found it in
any other. He reaches without hesitation the same
conclusion, and addresses himself to the same ques
tion : Why did the writer tell this story ? What
life-lesson is it intended to convey ? To him it is
like Tennyson's story of the Holy Grail. As in
the one case he wastes no time in answering the
question whether the cup out of which Christ drank
was still in existence in Arthur's time, or whether,
if it were, a search for it would be profitable, but
in the poem sees a beautiful vehicle of a yet more
beautiful spiritual lesson, so in this prose-poem of
the first sin and its consequences he sees no history
of the origin of evil, no philosophy of sin and its

64 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
historic cause, nor does he care to inquire where
was this fabled garden of innocence, or how, scien
tifically, one fruit could possibly endow with im
mortality a human body or another fruit could
endow with godlike knowledge of moral distinc
tions a human soul ; he sees in the story a casket,
opens it, and finds within a portraiture of the life-
drama of sin, fall, and redemption in miniature.
The same epic character is scarcely less appar
ent in the rest of Genesis, which is composed of a
series of narratives the value of which depends,
not upon their scientific answer to historical pro
blems, but upon their naive dramatic quality and
their vital human interest. Such are its stories of
the marriage of the sons of God to the daughters
of men ; of the deluge, in the mind of the narrator
clearly overspreading the whole habitable globe ; of
an ark large enough and seaworthy enough to con
tain specimens of the whole animal race, who for
seven months live in accord, a happy family ; of
Abraham receiving Jehovah's angelic messengers
and feeding them at his tent ; of Jacob with his
treachery to his father and its penalty, with his ro
mantic courtship and its reward; of Joseph, the
dreamer, in the pit, in the prison, in the palace.
These stories we study, not for the purpose of secur
ing historical data on which we can rely with un
failing certainty, but for the interest which they
awaken and for the life-lessons which they convey.
They are neither factual nor philosophical ; neither
written to give scientific information concerning

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 65
the past nor to bear witness to some philosophical
theory which the writer desires to maintain ; they
are written by one interested in life and for the
purpose of conveying to others the interest which
he himself possesses.
Thus the literary or scientific student of the Bible
finds in the Book of Genesis a clear illustration and
a cogent confirmation of the principles which I
have stated in the preceding chapter. He finds
this book composed of narratives which are epic or
dramatic in their character, and it is quite clear
that these narratives existed in some form long
prior to the earliest date at which the Book of Gene
sis could have been composed or compiled.
But, further than this, his analysis makes clear
to him the constituent elements of which the book
is compiled. It shows him unmistakably in many
instances that the narrative which he reads in the
book is composed of two or more narratives, which
previously existed, and which have been harmo
nized and woven together in one narrative by the
editor or author of Genesis. That there are two
such accounts of the creation will appear evident
to most readers of the English Bible. The first
account, contained in the first chapter and the first
three verses of the second chapter, lays stress on
the creation of the physical globe, represents God
as creating man, male and female, in one act of
creation, as making subject to them the powers of
nature and the various animal races, and as conse
crating the seventh or Sabbath day at the close of

66 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
the whole creative period. The second account,
beginning with the fourth verse of the second
chapter of Genesis, passes by the creation of the
heavens and the earth with a mere allusion, gives
in detail the creation of man, represents the crea
tion of woman as a companion for man as a sub
sequent event, if not an afterthought, and makes
this whole story introductory to the drama of a
first sin and the consequent expulsion from the
garden. It is not equally apparent to the casual student
that there are two accounts of the deluge, because
those two accounts have been by the editor woven
into one ; but modern scholars have shown that
it is possible to separate this narrative into its con
stituent parts. If they have not proved that the
narrative is composed of two preexisting narra
tives, they have at least demonstrated that it may
have been so composed. I can best exhibit this
demonstration by repeating here the two stories of
the deluge, as the modern scholar discovers them
in the one story which we now possess : 1
ELOHIST NARRATIVE OF THE DELUGE
These are the generations of Noah. Noah was a
righteous man, (and) perfect in his generations : Noah
walked with God. And Noah begat three sons, Shem,
Ham, and Japheth. And the earth was corrupt before
God, and the earth was filled with violence. And God
1 These two accounts are taken from the Analysis of Genesis
iii Genesis of Genesis, Professor B. W. Bacon, p. 109.

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 67
saw the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt ; for all flesh
had corrupted his way upon the earth.
And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is
come before me ; for the earth is filled with violence
through them ; and, behold, I will destroy them with
the earth. Make thee an ark of gopher wood : rooms
shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within
and without with pitch. And this is how thou shalt
make it : The length of the ark three hundred cubits,
the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it
thirty cubits. A light shalt thou make to the ark,
and to a cubit shalt thou finish it upward ; and the
door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof;
with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou make it.
And I, behold, I do bring the flood of waters upon the
earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life,
from under the heaven ; everything that is in the earth
shall die. But I will establish my covenant with thee ;
and thou shalt come into the ark, thou, and thy sons,
and thy wife, and thy sons' wives with thee. And of
every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt
thou bring into the ark, to keep them alive with thee ;
they shall be male and female. Of the fowl after their
kind, and of the cattle after their kind, of every creep
ing thing of the ground after its kind, two of every sort
shall come unto thee to keep them alive. And take
thou unto thee of all food that is eaten, and gather it to
thee ; and it shall be for food for thee, and for them.
Thus did Noah ; according to all that God commanded
him, so did he.
And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood
of waters was upon the earth.
In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second

68 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on the same
day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up,
and the windows of heaven were opened.
In the self-same day entered Noah, and Shem, and
Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife,
and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark ;
they, and every beast after its kind, and all the cattle
after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth
upon the earth after its kind, and every fowl after its
kind, every bird of every sort. And they went in unto
Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh wherein is
the breath of life. And they that went in, went in male
and female of all flesh, as God commanded him : And
the flood was forty days upon the earth. And the waters
prevailed, and increased greatly upon the earth ; and the
ark went upon the face of the waters. And the waters
prevailed exceedingly upon the earth ; and all the high
mountains that were under the whole heaven were cov
ered. Fifteen cubits upward did the water prevail ;
and the mountains were covered. And all flesh died
that moved upon the earth, both fowl, and cattle, and
beast, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the
earth, and every man. And the waters prevailed upon
the earth an hundred and fifty days.
JAHVIST NARRATIVE OF THE DELUGE
And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on
the face of the ground, and daughters were born unto
them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men
that they were fair ; and they took them wives of all
that they chose. And Jahweh said, My spirit shall not
strive with man forever, for that he also is flesh : yet
shall his days be an hundred and twenty years. The

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 69
Nephilim were in the earth in those days, and also after
that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters
of men, and they bare children to them : the same were
the mighty men which were of old, the men of renown.
And Jahweh saw that the wickedness of man was great
in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts
of his heart was only evil continually. And it repented
Jahweh that he had made man on the earth, and it
grieved him at his heart. And Jahweh said, I will
destroy man whom I have created from the face of
the ground ; both man, and beast, and creeping thing,
and fowl of the air ; for it repenteth me that I have
made them. But Noah found grace in the eyes of
Jahweh. And Jahweh said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy
house into the ark ; for thee have I seen righteous before
me in this generation. Of every clean beast thou shalt
take to thee seven and seven, the male and his female ;
and of the beasts that are not clean two, the male and
his female ; of the fowl also of the air, seven and seven,
male and female : to keep seed alive upon the face of
all the earth. For yet seven days, and I will cause it
to rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights ; and
every living thing that I have made will I destroy from
off the face of the ground. And Noah did according
unto all that Jahweh commanded him.
And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and
his sons' wives with him, into the ark, because of the
waters of the flood. Of clean beasts, and of beasts that
are not clean, and of fowls, and of everything that
creepeth upon the ground, there went in two and two
unto Noah into the ark, male and female, as God com
manded Noah. And Jahweh shut him in. And it came

70 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
to pass, after the seven days, that the waters of the flood
were upon the earth. And the rain was upon the earth
forty days and forty nights. And the waters increased,
and bare up the ark, and it was lift up above the earth.
All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that
was in the dry land, died. And every living thing was
destroyed which was upon the face of the ground, both
men, and cattle, and creeping thing, and fowl of the
heaven ; and they were destroyed from the earth ; and
Noah only was left, and they that were with him in
the ark.
So complete are these two accounts that it is
probable that if on a Sunday morning any clergy
man were to read either one from the Bible, a
considerable proportion of his congregation would
not know that he had not read the entire Biblical
account. And yet in these parallel narratives, as
here printed, nothing in either account is borrowed
from the other ; both are to be found entire in the
one Biblical narrative. It is true, as I have said,
that this fact does not demonstrate that the Biblical
narrative was in fact composed of two independent
and preexistent narratives ; it only demonstrates
that it may have been so composed.1 But when
we reflect that there are clearly two accounts of
the creation ; that the subsequent history in the
Bible can be separated into two narratives, much
1 Professor William Henry Green of Princeton has ingeniously
analysed the parable of the Prodigal Son into two continuous
narratives, in order to show that the possibility of such a division
of a continuous narrative is not of itself a demonstration of its
composite character. See Anti-Higher Criticism, p. 66.

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 71
as the story of the deluge is here separated, though
not generally as clearly; that the separation is
made for us by the historians themselves in the
later history of Israel, in the Books of Kings and
of Chronicles ; that throughout the entire Biblical
history the distinctions notable in these narratives
can be discerned ; that one is characterized by the
priestly and the other by the prophetic spirit ;
that it is by such compilations that most Oriental
histories are composed ; and that, finally, there is
only the traditional belief as to the origin and
authorship of the Biblical books to counteract
these cumulative considerations — if we adopt the
literary or scientific method of Bible study, we
shall almost certainly accept the conclusion of the
modern or scientific student that the Bible narra
tives, as we now possess them, have been composed
in the manner here illustrated from preexisting
material, though the preexisting material cannot
always be as easily discriminated as in these early
Genesis narratives.
This opinion is further confirmed by the fact that
the archaeologists have discovered, in a literature
which dates prior to the time of Moses, accounts
of the creation, the temptation and fall of man,
the tower of Babel and consequent dispersion, and
the Deluge, which differ very radically in their
spirit, but not very radically in their historical or
scientific details, from the Genesis- accounts. Erom
data not necessary to go into here, the scholars fix
the date of the Assyrian tablets containing these

72 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
legends as from 1500 B. c. to 2000 B. c1 Similar
accounts, dating so far back in history that their
age is wholly problematical, are to be found in the
tradition of other nations. One legend copied here
from an Assyrian tablet, as deciphered by George
Smith, may suffice as an illustration of this prehis
toric material of other nations, much of which was
certainly in existence before the time when Genesis
could have been written.
THE ASSYRIAN STORY OP THE DELUGE
1. The surface of the earth is swept.
2. It destroyed all life from the face of the earth.
3. The strong deluge over the people reached to
heaven. 4. Brother saw not his brother, they did not know
the people. In heaven
5. the gods feared the tempest and
6. sought refuge ; they ascended to the heaven of Anu.
7. The gods like dogs in droves prostrate.
19. Six days and nights
20. passed, the wind, deluge, and storm overwhelmed.
21. On the seventh day in its course was calmed the
storm and all the deluge
22. which had destroyed like an earthquake,
23. quieted. The sea he caused to dry, and the wind
and deluge ended.
24. I perceived the sea making a tossing ;
25. and the whole of mankind turned to corruption,
26. like reeds the corpses floated.
1 See The Chaldcean Account of Genesis, by George Smith,
chaps, i. and ii.

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 73
27. I opened the window, and the light broke over
my face.
28. it passed. I sat down and wept.
38. I sent forth a dove and it left. The dove went
and turned, and
39. a resting-place it did not find, and it returned.
40. I sent forth a swallow and it left. The swallow
went and turned, and
41. a resting-place it did not find, and it returned.
42. I sent forth a raven and it left.
43. The raven went, and the decrease of the water it
saw, and
44. It did eat, it swam and wandered away, and did
not return.
45. I sent the animals forth to the four winds, I
poured out a libation.
46. I built an altar on the peak of the mountain.
The careful reader will discern in this narrative
the historical resemblance and the spiritual contrast
to the narrative in Genesis. In both are the flood,
the earthquake, the wholesale destruction of life,
the dove, the raven, the mountain peak, the altar,
and the sacrifice ; and it may be assumed that in
the hiatus between line 7 and line 19 in the As
syrian account there has been some reference to a
boat or ark in which the narrator has been pre
served and from which he subsequently sends forth
the birds. But, on the other hand, in the Hebrew
account God sends the flood upon the earth as a
punishment for sin ; in the Assyrian account the
moral element appears to be wholly lacking, and

74 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
the gods themselves flee terrified to the heavens for
refuge from the storm which they cannot control.
It is in this spiritual significance of the narrative,
not in its scientific or historical accuracy, that its
value inheres. The hypothesis that the unknown
writer of Genesis took these early legends and re
wrote them, writing God into them, or that the
people retold them with the national consciousness
of God wrought into them, is far more probable
and quite as spiritual as the hypothesis that these
narratives were supernaturally revealed to the his
torian, or that they were miraculously preserved
and handed down from generation to generation
until they reached him as an infallible record of
events long anterior.
Why should we think that the Hebrew prehis
toric history is not composed like the prehistoric
history of all other peoples of legends and myths ?
It appears to be. Is there anything in the use of
legend and myth to cast discredit on the spiritual
value of this Book of Origins ? What is legend ?
What is myth?
A legend is a non-historical narrative handed
down through the early ages by word of mouth. It
invariably has some historical basis ; but imagina
tion has so modified, ornamented, and perhaps
exaggerated it that it is generally impossible to
determine accurately how much of fact and how
much of unconscious fiction enters into it. It is
not, indeed, without historical value. " Tradition,"
says Professor Karl Budde, " in numberless cases

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 75
clothes genuine history in forms which at first sight
appear to deserve no confidence at all. The task
of the historian is first of all to understand the tra
dition. When it is correctly understood, he will
not throw it away, but will make use of it in the
proper sense and in the proper place. In this way
tradition is transformed into history." 1 Neverthe
less, the value of the legends of an ancient people
is not in the accuracy of the narrative. Is it true
that Alfred the Great had his ears boxed because
he did not turn the scone when it was sufficiently
baked ? We do not know. But the story could
not have arisen concerning Alfred the Great except
in a community which had within itself the elements
of that democratic character which has character
ized the Anglo-Saxon people in all ages of the
world. Did William Tell shoot the apple from his
son's head? Probably not. But the story could
not have arisen except among a people loving
independence and daring everything to win and
maintain it. Did Pocahontas save the life of John
Smith by throwing herself prostrate upon him?
We cannot now tell. But there is in the story a
precursor of that cosmopolitan character overrun
ning all lines of race and religion which has
characterized the American people in its history
from that time to this. These legends of an early
date indicate the character of the people, and in
this lies their value. It is in this that the value of
1 Religion of Israel to the Exile, by Professor Karl Budde, Lec
ture i. p. 2.

76 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
the Hebrew legends lies. They are not scientific
records of an age so remote that no scientific
investigation can give us trustworthy historical
information concerning it ; but they are indica
tions that the spiritual temper of this people
characterized their earliest consciousness as it is
manifested in these stories of their prehistoric life.
The myth, on the other hand, is the attempt of
a primitive people to state an abstract truth in a
concrete form. For primitive people, like children,
cannot conceive an abstract truth ; they can con
ceive only in concrete illustration. Sometimes to
express such truth they take a legend, pour the
truth into it, and it becomes a mythical legend;
sometimes they invent the story to interpret the
truth — it is then a mythical poem or fiction. The
Greeks wished to express the truth that love is rich
in itself, but poor in its possessions. Love, they
said, has Resource for his father and Poverty for
his mother.
" Love then, as being the child of Poverty and Re
source, has a strange fate. He is always poor ; and so
far from being delicate and fair, as most people suppose,
is rough and squalid, unsandaled and homeless, sleeping
upon the bare earth beneath the open sky, and, accord
ing to his mother's nature, is always mated to want.
But, on the other hand, as he takes after his father, he
aims at the beautiful and the good, and is brave, vigor
ous, and energetic, clever in the pursuit of his object,
skillful in invention, passionately fond of knowledge,
and fertile in resource, unceasingly devoted to the search

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 77
after wisdom, and withal an inveterate trickster, charla
tan, and sophist." 1
This is a myth. The philosophic moralist of to
day would say, Love has no promise of the outer
world, but has resources within itself ; the Greek
said, Poverty and Resource married ; Love was
born to them, and inherited poverty from the one
and resource from the other.
Three great problems have confronted men from
the earliest ages : the origin of the cosmos ; the
cause of the differences in human character and
condition, including the problem of sin and its con
sequences ; and the future destiny of man. The
modern philosopher gives his answers to these ques
tions in abstract form ; the primitive peoples, in
concrete narratives. Our answers are philosophy ;
theirs were myths. Such myths are generally un
conscious growths ; Plato furnishes an illustration
of the method of their growth by his naive and
probably not serious plan for manufacturing one.
He says : —
" All ye who are in the State, we will say to them fol
lowing out our fiction, are brethren ; but God when he
moulded you, at the time of your birth, mixed gold in
the substance of all you who were fit to rule, and there
fore they are the most honored. He infused silver in
the military caste, iron and bronze in the husbandmen
and craftsmen generally. The offspring of these sev
eral classes will, as a general rule, preserve the character
1 From The Symposium of Plato as rendered by Bishop West-
cott in The History of Religious Thought in the West, pp. 7,8.

78 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
of their parents. But if the signs of silver or gold
appear in the children of the bronze or iron castes, they
must then be raised to their due places. And if bronze
or iron appear where we look for gold, that too must be
reduced to its proper rank."
He adds : —
" We shall not persuade the first generation that it is
so, but it may be in time that their descendants will be
lieve our tale. And the belief would contribute greatly
to the good of the State and to the good of one another." 1
The early history of all peoples is in legends ;
the early philosophy of all peoples is in myths.
There is no reason to believe that the Hebrew
people are any exception to this otherwise universal
rule. When the literary critic says that the Book
of Genesis is a collection of legends and myths, he
does not stigmatize it as valueless.2 He affirms
1 Ibid., pp. 9, 10.
2 Bishop Westcott points out the providential use of the myth,
and indirectly indicates that it might well be used as a vehicle for
the conveyance of divine truth in a divinely inspired writing.
From his suggestive essay on The Myths of Plato, above referred
to, which is well worthy of the student's careful reading, I quote
a few sentences. " Thus there are two problems with which the
Platonic myths deal, the origin and destiny of cosmos, and the
origin and destiny of man. Both problems obviously transcend
all experience and all logical processes of reason. But no less both
are ever present to the student of life, though he may neglect them
in the investigation of details or deliberately set them aside as
hopelessly insoluble " (p. 11). " Whatever may be the prevail
ing fashion of an age, the Myths of Plato remain an unfailing
testimony to the religious wants of man. They show not only that
reason by its logical processes is unable to satisfy them, but also in
what directions its weakness is most apparent and least support-

PREHISTORIC TRADITIONS REWRITTEN 79
that its value lies, not in the historical or scientific
accuracy of its stories, but in the indications which
they afford of the pre-natal character of this He
brew people, and in the spiritual truths of which
these stories are the vehicle. What these indica
tions are, what that truth is, I have already indi
cated. The story of creation is not a scientific
treatise on cosmogony. When neighboring peoples""'
deified nature, worshiping the sun and moon and
stars, the birds and beasts, the sacred river Nile,
the cattle that browsed upon its shore, the croco
diles that swam in its waters, and the very beetles
which crawled along its banks, the Hebrew myth
of creation embodied the truth that God is Spirit,
and Spirit is creative ; that God has made man
in his own image ; that of created beings man
alone is divine ; and that nature, which by pagan
religions men were taught abjectly to worship, is
man's serf whom he is to tame, harness, and make
do his bidding. The Hebrew myth of Eden em
bodied the truth that sin is willful disobedience of
law ; that conscience makes cowards of us all ;
that between sin and the human soul is to be eter
nal and undying hate ; that sin will corrupt the
able. They form, as it were, a natural scheme of the questions
with which a revelation might be expected to deal, — Creation,
Providence, Immortality, — which as they lie farthest from the
reason, lie nearest to the heart. And in doing this, they are so far
an unconscious prophecy of which the teaching of Christianity is
the fulfillment. . . . But more than this : the Myths mark also the
shape which a revelation for men might be expected to take.
The doctrine is conveyed in an historic form : the ideas are of
fered as facts; the myth itself is the message " (ibid., pp. 48, 49).

80 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
whole human race, but that the human race will
destroy sin, or, to relate it in the language of the
myth, the serpent shall poison the heel of man, and
man shall crush the serpent's head. The Hebrew
myth of the expulsion from the garden embodied
the truth that sorrow is disciplinary, and the road
from the garden of innocence to the victory of vir
tue is through the struggle of the wilderness. The
Hebrew myth of the deluge embodied the truth
that destruction of sinners can never cure the world
of sin. The Hebrew myth of Abraham taught the
truth that he who seeks God shall find him, and
that to find him no sacrifice of home or friends or
child is or can be too great ; the Hebrew myth of
Jacob, that God is the God of sinner as well as
of saint, and remembers his mercies unto children's
children of such as love him and keep his com
mandments ; the myth of Joseph, that he is the
Providence of all who put their trust in him —
God in Egypt as in the Holy Land, in Pharaoh's
prison and Pharaoh's palace, God of gods and
Lord of lords.
This ancient compilation of prehistoric myths
and legends is valuable, not because of any scien
tific addition which it makes to our knowledge of
early history, but because it shows us the conscious
ness of God in the early experiences of that re
markable people to whom more than to all other
peoples combined the world owes its knowledge of
God, its standards of righteousness, and its im
pulse to the divine life.

CHAPTER IV
THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT
It is a common belief among primitive peoples
that their code of laws was dictated to the law
givers by a god or the gods. This seems to have
been the opinion of the ancient Hebrews concern
ing their system of laws contained in the Books of
Exodus, Numbers, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy.
That opinion has passed over into the Christian
Church, where it has been widely held that this
entire code, with all its complex regulations respect
ing both civil life and ecclesiastical offices, was
given by Jehovah to Moses and reduced by him to
writing. According to this view, the entire code,
civil and ecclesiastical, dates from about 1450 B. c.1
References in these codes to conditions that did not
exist until long after the death of Moses are sup
posed to have been prophetic and preparatory for
conditions yet to come. Some of the scholars of the
olden time even maintained that the account of
the death of Moses, contained in the last chapter of
Deuteronomy, was written by Moses prophetically
before the death occurred, though no one, I think,
1 Or according to modern chronology 1250 B. C. See chrono
logical table on page xi.

82 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
any longer entertains that opinion. It is generally
conceded by the most conservative critics that this
postlude to the book, and perhaps some other
special provisions scattered through the Pentateuch
which are wholly inapplicable to the nomadic life
of the wilderness, were added by an unknown
writer subsequent to the death of Moses.1
The modern critic believes that no part of these
law books was written by. Moses in their present
form ; that they contain laws and prescribe customs
which grew up gradually among the Hebrew people
during a checkered history of nearly ten centuries ;
that while the oldest portion of the codes of which
these books are composed probably embodies sub
stantially his teaching, the latest civil code, as we
have it in Deuteronomy, was not formulated until
1 This is the substantially unanimous opinion of scholars who
insist upon the Mosaic authorship of the rest of the book, e. g. :
' ' This chapter could not be written by Moses himself, but was
added by Joshua or Eleazar, or, as Patrick conjectures, by Samuel,
who was a prophet, and wrote by divine authority what he found
in the records of Joshua, and his successors, the judges." Matthew
Henry, Commentary on Deut. xxxiv. 1-14. " It seems most proba
ble, and is commonly believed, that this chapter was not written
by Moses, but by Eleazar or Joshua, or Ezra, or some other man of
God, directed herein by the Holy Ghost ; this being no more im
peachment to the Divine authority of this chapter, that the pen
man is unknown, which also is the lot of some other books of
Scripture, than it is to the authority of the acts of the king or
parliament, that they are written or printed by some unknown
person." Pool's Annotations, vol. i. p. 407. The thoughtful reader
will probably observe that this argument applies with as much
force to the whole Book of Deuteronomy as to a single supple
mentary chapter of the book.

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 83
about the year 620 b. c, and the final ecclesiastical
code, as contained in the Levitical or Canon law,
and especially in the Book of Leviticus, was not
formulated as we now possess it until about the
year 525 b. C. These dates, of course, are only
approximate ; for it is not supposed that the exact
year of the completion of any of the codes can now
be ascertained. It will thus be seen that the ques
tion between the old and the new view of the Bible
is more than one of mere dates or authorship. It
is not the question, as it has been humorously de
fined, whether the Pentateuch was written by
Moses or by another man named Moses ; it is the
question whether the books constituting the Penta
teuch were given at one time and through one
prophet, as the Mohammedans believe was the case
with the Koran, or whether they record the growth
of a great people under the guidance and inspira
tion of God. This is not a mere literary question.
It is distinctively a theological, and in some sense
a religious, question. I hold the second of these
two opinions ; and in this and the next article I
propose to elucidate this opinion more fully.
The parallel between a nation and an individual
is a very familiar one, at least as old as Plato.
The nation grows as the individual grows. Man
has been described as a " bundle of habits." That
is not quite an accurate description. He inherits
something from his forefathers. Then on that in
heritance he begins to build character. Action
frequently repeated becomes a habit; habit long

84 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
continued becomes a second nature ; and this second
nature, the product of habit long continued incor
porated in and mixed with what he has inherited,
makes the man what he is. He may in this pro
cess of growth write down resolutions, as Jonathan
Edwards did, and endeavor to live up to them;
but the man is not made by the resolutions he
writes ; he is made by the life he lives ; and the
resolutions which he writes are both a product of
the preceding life and an impulse and a guidance
to the life that lies before him. In a similar
manner grows the nation. It starts with certain
racial peculiarities. It is an Anglo-Saxon race, or
a Latin race, or a Semitic race. This is its in
heritance, and on this inheritance it builds its
character. In the building of this character, first
comes custom ; for what habit is to the individual,
custom is to the nation ; after this custom has been
long repeated, so that it has entered into and
formed a part of the national character, it is not
infrequently reduced to writing. Sometimes this
is done early in its history ; sometimes some pro
phet arises who sees in advance of his fellows and
reduces to writing that which he thinks the nation
ought to aim to be. But the nation is not made
by its written constitution or its written laws, it is
made by its custom ; it is not made by what it
resolves it will do, nor by what some one says it has
done or ought to do ; it is made by what in point
of fact it does. For the nation, like the individual,
is built up by the processes of life itself.

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 85
In this process there may be, and often are,
critical periods ; there may be, and often are, im
portant writings. The Magna Charta was one
such in England ; the Constitutions of Clarendon
were another. But the nation is not made by
these ; these help to form its constitution only so
far as they are actually embodied in its real life.
If it has a written constitution, as we profess to
have, still its real character is determined not by
the writing, but by the life, and it changes its
constitution by its life, whether it incorporates
those changes in the written document or not. We
as an American people are to-day, not what Hamil
ton and Madison said we ought to be ; we are what
we have been, what our national life has made us.
Even our written Constitution itself is changed by
other processes than those of formal amendment.
It has been often said by jurists that Chief Justice
Marshall has done as much to make the real Con
stitution of the United States what it is, though he
never wrote a line of it, as did any of its framers.1
We have recently passed through an epoch in
which we have incorporated a very important ele
ment in our National Constitution. The question
1 " The task which Marshall had to perform was the arduous
one of construction ; fortunately he had to a very striking degree
the constructive faculty, a rare gift, and certainly the highest
form of intellectual ability which lawyers can ever use and dis
play." John Marshall, Allan B. Magruder, p. 165. The very
words here used, " constructive " and " construction," indicate the
recognized function of a. chief justice, which is to construct the
constitution by the very process of interpreting it.

86 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
arose whether a representative might be excluded
by Congress from his seat in Congress because he
was a polygamist. He had been unquestionably
elected by a majority of the district which he
claimed to represent. One party in Congress said :
No ! the district has an absolute and final right to
select whom it will, and if the man thus selected
has the three qualifications, age, residence, and
citizenship, without which no man can enter Con
gress, he must be admitted, no matter what his
character. The other party replied : Every man
in the House of Representatives represents not
only his State, but the Nation, and although the
initiative comes from the State, the Nation possesses
a veto power, and can refuse to allow a man who
is living in open violation of the laws of his State
and the moral sentiment of the Nation to represent
the Nation in its legislative body ; and the House
of Representatives, by a vote of 286 to 50, decided
that Congress, that is, the Nation through Con
gress, had such a veto power over the action of any
particular State. In the future this is the Con
stitution of the United States. It has been made
so by the decision of a body in whom the consti
tutional power of rendering that decision has been
vested. Thus the government, whether it has a
written constitution or not, grows by means of
decisions more or less formally registered and
more or less fully carried out in the national life.
The protection of our property and our person
depends, not primarily upon the statutes that have

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 87
been enacted by the legislatures of the various
States, not primarily upon the statutes that have
been enacted by the Congress of the United States,
but upon what is known as the common law ; and
the common law is nothing more or less than the
customs which have grown up among the Anglo-
Saxon people. It is thus evident that the Con
stitution and laws of the United States, and still
more evident that those of Great Britain, are the
product of a gradual growth, beginning, let us say,
with Alfred the Great and continuing to the
present time.
The character of a nation, then, may be described
as the result of three cooperating forces : first, a
racial characteristic ; second, the acceptance by a
nation in its birth-period, or one of its successive
birth-periods, of a dominant principle — as auto
cracy by Russia, the supremacy of the State over the
Church by England, the authority of the common
people by the United States ; and, third, the na
tional habit, applying these fundamental principles
to changed conditions, perhaps adding new and cog
nate principles, perhaps modifying those already
accepted for better or worse, or departing from
them more or less widely. Finally, this national
habit is incorporated in writings — in the form
either of text-books recognized as authoritative
because they reflect the national organic will, or
of judicial decisions authoritatively declaring that
will, or of codes issued by legislative authority or
approved by popular acquiescence and acceptance.

88 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
It is, therefore, a great mistake to suppose that the
authority of the law dates from the promulgation
of the code. The code is generally the last step in
the growth of the national law. It is not authori
tative because it is promulgated ; it promulgates
what is already authoritative. In general, the
codification of a system of laws marks the end, not
the beginning, of its growth.1 When, therefore, the
modern critic says that the Book of Deuteronomy
was written b. c 640, and the Book of Leviticus
b. c. 525, he does not mean that the civil laws in
corporated in the one and the sacrificial system
1 The reader will find these principles elucidated and illustrated
by Sir Henry Maine in his Ancient Law, especially in chaps, i.
and ii., from which I quote a few significant and suggestive
sentences : " The Homeric word for a custom in the embryo is
sometimes ' Themis ' (0e,uis) in the singular — more often ' Dike '
(Mien), the meaning of which visibly fluctuates between a ' judg
ment ' and a ' custom ' or k usage.' ' Nomos ' (v6/xos), a Law, so
great and famous a term in the political vocabulary of the later
Greek society, does not occur in Homer." ... " It is certain
that, in the infancy of mankind, no sort of legislature, not even a
distinct author of law, is contemplated or conceived of. Law has
scarcely reached the footing of custom ; it is rather a habit. It
is, to use a French phrase, ' in the air.' " . . . " The Hindoo Code,
called the Laws of Menu, which is certainly a Brahmin compila
tion, undoubtedly enshrines many genuine observances of the
Hindoo race, but the opinion of the best contemporary orientalists
is, that it does not, as a whole, represent a set of rules ever actu
ally administered in Hindostan. It is, in great part, an ideal
picture of that which, in the view of the Brahmins, ought to be
the law." ..." When primitive law has once been embodied in
a, code, there is an end to what may be called its spontaneous
development. Henceforward the changes effected in it, if effected
at all, are effected deliberately and from without." Pp. 5, 7, 16,
17, 20.

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 89
incorporated in the other were then first instituted.
He means rather that they were then first com
pleted, and so capable of being reduced to a
codified form.
As the modern State is the product of a gradual
growth, so is the modern Church. Each denomi
nation is inclined, naturally, to carry back its
dogmatic beliefs and its ecclesiastical usages to a
remote time, and claim for them a divine origin ;
to think itself born full grown. But each denomi
nation recognizes that the beliefs and usages of its
neighbor have been gradually developed, by a pro
cess more or less lengthy and complex, from simple
beginnings. Thus, whatever claim the Roman
Catholic ecclesiastic may make for the divine
origin of his church, the Protestant scholar un
hesitatingly traces in ecclesiastical history the
successive steps by which that church has grown
to its present complex faith, organization, and
ritual. He tells us that the celibacy of the clergy,
the adoration of the Virgin, and the use of images
all date from the fourth century ; that Indulgence
as a release from the pains and penalties of pur
gatory was not formally announced until the four
teenth century ; that the title " pope " was applied
to all bishops in the primitive church, and that the
supremacy of the bishop of Rome was not claimed
until the fourth century, his infallibility was not
asserted until about the eleventh, and was not
authoritatively affirmed until the nineteenth. The
canons of that church are equally the product of

90 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
growth. The Decretum of Gratianus in the twelfth
century was a codification partly of previous codes,
partly of incongruous customs and inconsistent
decrees, and has become in turn the basis of sub
sequent additions and modifications.1 Nor is i.t
less certain that both the creeds and the ecclesias
tical usages of Protestant churches have in a similar
manner grown up gradually. The creed has gen
erally been forged as a weapon supposed to be
necessary for the defense of the preexisting faith;2
the canon has been tempered and fashioned into
obligatory law out of what was at first only a
convenient custom — and this whether it involves
the authority of the bishop in Episcopacy or the
1 For a good brief history of the canon law of the Roman
Catholic Church, which may serve as an illustration of the prob
able process which preceded the final codification of the canon
law of the Hebrew church in the Levitical code, see article Canon
Law, in the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
2 Calvin's Institutes are a striking illustration of this truth, as
may be seen from the following quotations : " We conclude, then,
that it is not now left to faithful ministers to frame any new doc
trine, but that it behoves them simply to adhere to the doctrine
to which God has made all subject, without any exception."
Institutes of the Christian Religion, John Calvin, trans, by John
Allen, 6th Am. ed., vol. ii., bk. 4, chap. viii. § ix. " Upon this
principle, those ancient councils, such as the Council of Nice,
of Constantinople, the first of Ephesus, that of Chalcedon, and
others like them, which were held for the condemnation of errors,
we cheerfully receive and reverence as sacred, as far as respects
the articles of faith which they have defended ; for they contain
nothing but the pure and natural interpretation of the Scripture,
which the holy fathers, with spiritual prudence, applied to the
discomfiture of the enemies of religion who arose in those days."
Hid., bk. 4, chap. ix. § viii.

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 91
independence of the local church in Congrega
tionalism. The modern or evolutionary student of the Bible
believes that both the civil and the ecclesiastical
laws of the Hebrew people were developed in a simi
lar manner. As we now possess them in the Books
of Exodus, Numbers, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy,
they are the product of ten centuries of national
growth. Into their composition have entered four
elements : (1) the character of the Hebrews as a
peculiarly religious people, that is, one preeminent
for their possession of a moral consciousness of
God; (2) the prophetic genius of the great founder
of their nation, the prophet statesman Moses ; (3)
the successive additions to the principles enunciated
by him made by subsequent prophets possessed of
a similar spirit, and successive applications of those
principles, and in some cases departures from them,
by the people into whose life they had entered;
(4) and, finally, their codification in a substantially
final form in the two great codes, — one the civil
or Deuteronomic code, the other the ecclesiastical or
Levitical code. To trace the origin and growth
of these codes or systems of laws, and to interpret
their fundamental principles, will be the object of
this and the next article in this series.
The founder of the Hebrew nation, and in some
sense of its distinctive theology and its type of
religion, was Moses. Who, then, was Moses ? A
shadowy figure, so far in the remote past that in
studying the details of his life it is impossible

92 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
scientifically to separate the legendary from the
historical. Yet it must not be forgotten in such a
case that legends themselves indicate not less truly
than do assured historical facts the essential ele
ments in the character of him around whom they
have grown up.1 The story of his life, as we gather
it from Biblical and extra-Biblical sources, is briefly
as follows.2 Israel was an unorganized body of
1 See, ante, chap. iii. pp. 74 ff. Substantially all critics recognize
in Moses one of the greatest and most creative spirits of ancient
history. Thus Renan, who speaks of him as " completely buried
by the legends which have grown up over him," still recognizes
him as " a colossus among the great mythical figures of humanity."
History of the People of Israel, vol. i. p. 135. Dr. H. Oort re
gards him as the founder of the Hebrew Nation, and so of that
spiritual movement which culminated in Christianity. " It is due
to Moses in the first instance that the uncivilized hordes that wan
dered through the Arabian deserts in the thirteenth century before
Christ, and afterwards conquered Canaan, finally produced such
noble results." ... "In many respects his character was moulded
by that of his age, but the direction which he gave to the powers
of Israel opens a new era. Moses, the founder of the moral
Yahweh-worship, stands at the head of the spiritual movement
which culminated in him who said : Blessed are the pure in
heart, for they shall see God ! " Bible for Learners, vol. i. pp.
313, 325. Ewald recognizes the historical trustworthiness of the
narrative in Exodus in its main incidents. " That Moses was
brought up in Egyptian learning and knowledge, but yet, when
driven to an act of patriotic indignation, obliged to flee to the
peninsula of Sinai, and to take refuge with Midian (or, according
to Hellenistic pronunciation, Madian), the ruling nation there,
and that he formed a friendship with a prince of that people,
Hobab (or Jethro), and married his daughter, is also in its present
form reported only by the Third Narrator. But the narrative is
without doubt based on genuine history." The History of Israel,
by Heinrich Ewald, vol. ii. pp. 42, 43.
2 The original authorities for a study of the life of Moses are

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 93
slaves under a remorseless despotism. The inhu
man ill usage which still characterizes the despotism
of Egypt remains a mournful illustration of the
simple statement of the Hebrew historian, " There
fore they did set over them taskmasters to afflict
them with their burdens." The echo of their cry
by reason of their taskmasters is still to be heard
in the melancholy antiphonal wail sung in a weird
chorus by the bands of workmen and workwomen
on the banks of the Nile : " They starve us, they
starve us ; they beat us, they beat us : but there 's
some one above, there 's some one above, who will
punish them well, who will punish them well."1
Nevertheless, despite ill usage, the Israelites multi
plied rapidly. It seems to be the tendency of
slavery to increase the number of the enslaved
and to reduce the number of masters. To pre
vent the possibility of an insurrection, an edict
was issued to slay all the male children. One
Hebrew mother, with an audacious ingenuity which
could find lodgment only in a mother's heart, re
solved to save her baby boy from the tiger by
putting him into the tiger's den. She put the
the Pentateuch, chiefly the Book of Exodus, and Josephus's An
tiquities of the Jews, books ii., iii., and iv. S. Baring-Gould,
Legends of the Patriarchs and Prophets, chap, xxxii., has brought
together various legends from other sources concerning Moses.
The Koran should also be consulted for Mohammedan legends
(see Selections from the Kur-dn, by Edward W. Lane, pp. 97-131,
Moses and his People). Also compare Stephen's speech (Acts
chap, vii.) with the Exodus narrative.
1 Lectures on the History of the Jewish Church, Arthur Penrhyn
Stanley, D. D., Part I., p. 93.

94 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
child in a basket made of the -papyrus which grows
in great quantities by the banks of the Nile. Per
haps she shared the Egyptian fancy that this
papyrus was a protection against the river demon
embodied in the crocodile. She then left him at
the water's edge, where the princess came to bathe,
and set her daughter to watch what should become
of the little waif. She could neither bear to wit
ness his death nor endure the suspense of absolute
ignorance of his fate. Her scheme succeeded ; the
cry of the babe appealed to the woman's heart of
the princess ; she called to a Hebrew maid who
seemed to be accidentally standing not far away ;
and the sister took the babe back to his own mother
to be nursed until he should be old enough to be
weaned. Then he was transferred to the palace to
be educated by Egyptian priests as the adopted
son of his foster-mother. The Child of the Waters
became an Egyptian prince. Jewish legends report
him as so extraordinarily beautiful that laborers
stopped from their toil to refresh themselves with
a glance at his bright face ; and as possessed of a
mind as remarkable as his body. Egypt was the
land of civilization, of art, of science, and of philo
sophy ; and the young prince, who, by virtue of his
adoption into the royal family, was also a priest,
became versed in the arts, the sciences, and the
theology of the Egyptian cultivated class. The
ancient legends respecting him declare that he not
only acquainted himself with the civilization of his
age, but added to it. He is said to have learned

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 95
arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, medicine, and
music ; to have invented boats and engines for
building; instruments of war and of hydraulics,
hieroglyphics, and division of lands — that is, sur
veying. His military achievements outshone in
popular estimation his intellectual attainments.
He conducted with great success a campaign
against the Ethiopians, and returned in triumph,
probably the most popular man in the kingdom
despite his plebeian origin ; but also probably the
most envied. But he never forgot that he was a
Hebrew ; perhaps with the Hebrew blood he re
tained something of that contempt for other races
which has been at once the strength and the weak
ness of the Hebrew race. Nor did he forget the
Hebrew religion. It is said that he worshiped
outside the temple walls an unknown God ; perhaps
he identified the God of his Hebrew mother with
the incommunicable deity whom the esoteric theo
logy of the Egyptian priesthood taught him to
believe was back of and manifested through the
cloud of mediatorial deities whom the common
people ignorantly worshiped. Says Rawlinson in
his " History of Egypt : " —
" The primary doctrine of the esoteric religion un
doubtedly was the real essential Unity of the Divine
Nature. The sacred texts taught that there was a single
Being, the ' sole producer of all things, both in heaven
and earth, Himself not produced of any,' . . . ' the only
true living God, self-originated,' . . . ' who exists from
the beginning,' . . . ' who has made all things, but has

96 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
not Himself been made.' This Being seems never to
have been represented by any material, even symbolical,
form. It is thought that He had no name, or, if He
had, that it must have been unlawful either to pro
nounce or write it. He was a pure spirit, perfect in
every respect — all-wise, almighty, supremely good. The
gods of the popular mythology were understood, in the
esoteric religion, to be either personified attributes of
the Deity, or parts of the nature which He had created,
considered as improved and inspired by Him." 1
It is not improbable that this doctrine, which the
Egyptian priests held as an abstraction, Moses
infused with a life of real devotion, borrowed from
his mother, and so made it concrete and vital.
Strabo cannot be said to be a historical authority
respecting Moses, except as he indicates correctly
the popular impression of a later epoch ; but these
impressions are not incredible ; their reality would
go far to account for subsequent events in the
career and influence of this extraordinary man ;
and according to Strabo, " He [Moses] taught that
the Egyptian was not right in likening the nature
of God to beasts and cattle, nor yet the Africans,
nor even the Greeks in fashioning their gods in
the form of man. He taught that this only was
God — that which encompasses all of us, earth
and sea ; that which we call Heaven, and the
1 History of Ancient Egypt, by George Rawlinson, M. A., vol. i.
p. 324. The whole chapter (No. 10), on the Religion of Ancient
Egypt, is worth consultation by the student of the life and work
of Moses.

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 97
Order of the world, and the Nature of things."
This was quite in accord with the esoteric doctrine
of the Egyptian priesthood. But no one so angers
a priesthood as he who reveals the mysteries of
their faith to the common herd ; no one seems to
them more dangerous than he who at once spiritu
alizes and popularizes truth which they have re
garded purely as a philosophy and therefore as
their peculiar possession. Such a one uses their
own professed beliefs with which to destroy their
professional power. He is condemned as a rene
gade from their order, a betrayer of their secrets,
and an enemy of their religion. More than once
Moses narrowly escaped assassination. Nothing but
the intervention of Thermutis, his foster-mother,
prevented him from falling a prey to the anger of
the king, who, if modern scholars are right in
identifying him with Rameses II., was not a mon
arch to brook independence in another or to con
trol the passion of envy in himself.
Such is the story of Moses's life as we gather it
from the uncertain traditions of the past. Such, in
shadowy and uncertain outline, was the training
of the man whose passionate burst of indignation
against an incident of Egyptian oppression com
pelled him to flee the court and the kingdom ; whose
years of exile in the wilderness trained in him the
needed spirit of patience, gave him opportunity for
reflection on the truths which he had learned as a
philosophy and by devout meditation was to con
vert into religion, and familiarized him with the

98 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
wilderness into which he was to lead the people
whom he was to convert into a nation by giving to
them the fundamental principles of their civil and
their religious life. How he led them out of their
bondage into that wilderness it is not necessary
here to relate. The story is familiar to every
reader of the Bible : it is enough to intimate very
briefly the cumulative reasons which led me to
accept that story of the Exodus as in its essential
character trustworthy history.
In the first place, this story of the Exodus is
written into the songs and stories of the Hebrew
people; it is interwoven throughout their litera
ture.1 In this respect it is in striking contrast
with the story of the Fall, which, after it is once
recorded in the third chapter of Genesis, is never
again referred to by any of the Old Testament
writers, and among the writers of the New Testa
ment only by Paul, and by him only incidentally.
But it is not only in their literature that this
exodus of Israel from Egypt was celebrated ; it
was celebrated by their greatest national festival,
the Passpjer. And this Passover was of such a
character as to indicate a true memory of certain
details of that great event ; and it was so widely
and continuously observed as to make incredible
the opinion that it celebrated nothing.2 As the
1 For references to Moses see 1 Chron. xxi. 29 ; xxii. 13 ; xxiii.
14, 15 ; 2 Chron. xxiv. 6, 9 ; xxxiv. 14 ; Ps. ciii. 7 ; cv. 26 ; cvi. ;
Is. lxiii. 11, 12. For reference to the Exodus and the wanderings
in the wilderness, see Pss. cv., cvi., cxxxv., cxxxvi. ; Neh. ix. 9-23.
2 Comp. Exod. ch. xii. ; Num. ix. 5 ; Josh. v. 10, 11 ; 2 Kings

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 99
existence of the American Fourth of July is itself
an indication of a definite day when the independ
ence of the nation was declared, so the Passover is
an indication not to be ignored that the birth of
the nation was characterized by some such event
as its history narrates and its poets celebrate.
There are also silent witnesses outside either the
national literature or the national life to the sub
stantial truth of the story of the Exodus. The
Egyptian monuments contain many pictorial repre
sentations which serve to illustrate the Old Testa
ment account of the Exodus. They are not demon
strations of its accuracy, but they are at least
indications that it is not inaccurate. It is not
within the province of this article to attempt to
reproduce in any detail the arguments from the
monuments ; it must suffice to say that I believe
there never has been found in Egypt any figure,
symbol, picture, or monument which tends to
throw doubt upon the narrative in the Book of
Exodus, or to indicate that the story, even in its
minutest details, is inaccurate, while there are
many indications of the accuracy of the incidental
allusions to Egyptian sites or Egyptian customs
which the narrative contains.1
xxiii. 21-23 ; 2 Chron. xxx. 1 ; xxxv. 1-19 ; Ezra vi. 19, 20 ; Matt.
xxvi. 17, 19. A comparison of these references will show that the
feast of the Passover was kept apparently continuously from its
first appointment down to Christ. That there should be such a
continuous celebration, if there was no event to celebrate, is
hardly credible.
1 Any illustrative work on Egypt, such as The History of

100 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
The confirmation lent to that narrative by geo
graphical exploration is not less noteworthy. Geo
graphical explorers have followed the line of the
great pilgrimage ; they have been able to see
where the nation could have crossed an arm of the
Red Sea in the manner described in the Biblical
narrative ; where a passage might easily have been
made for the people by an ebb tide and a strong
Ancient Egypt, by Dr. Rawlinson, or The Ancient Egyptians, by Sir
J. Gardner Wilkinson, D. C. L., F. R. S., etc., contains illustra
tions of Egyptian civilization which serve to throw light on inci
dental references in the Biblical history. For a general study of
such elucidations, and the confirmation given to Bible history by
the ancient monuments, see Recent Research in Bible Lands, Her
man V. Hilprecht, Ph. D., D. D. ; The Bible and Modern Discoveries,
by Henry A. Harper of the Palestine Exploration Fund ; and
History, Prophecy, and the Monuments, by J. F. McCurdy, Ph. D.,
LL. D., Professor of Oriental Languages in the University Col
lege, Toronto. A single paragraph from Mr. Harper's book may
serve to indicate the nature, though not the extent, of the con
firmation lent to the Hebrew history of the Exodus by modern
investigations in Egypt. " Before we leave these springs let us
sum up what the recent Biblical gains have been. The true
starting-point of the Exodus, with the city of Pithom, has been
found. Then, also, that the Hebrew words translated in the Au
thorized Version do not mean 'Red Sea' but 'Sea of Reeds.'
Also we have found that ' the tongue of the Egyptian Sea ' at the
time of the Exodus extended to the present Lake Timsah ; that
owing to the elevation of the ground that ' sea ' ' dried up,' and
left lakes of brackish water, through which the present Suez Canal
runs ; that the Israelites crossed ' the Sea of Reeds ' somewhere
near Lake Timsah, and then went ' three days ' journey in the
wilderness of Etham, and pitched in Marah ' (Num. xxxiii. 8).
They had come to Marah, and find the ' waters of Marah ' bitter.
We have seen that these ' Mflsa ' springs are ' bitter,' that they
have a deposit of bog iron ore in some, and others are ' brackish.' "
P. 89.

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 10L
wind ; and where quicksands exist which inter
pret the disaster which overwhelmed the pursuing
Egyptians. In a similar manner, almost every
step of the journey from Egypt to Mount Sinai
has been identified ; and a great plain which
would well serve for the encampment of Israel
at the foot of Mount Sinai is there to indicate
at least the probability of such an encampment.1
It is true that a historical novelist can describe
with geographical accuracy any scene through
which his hero is supposed to pass ; but, in fact,
the novelist is rarely accurate, and imaginative his
tory, lacking the deliberate purpose of the profes
sional romancer, generally lacks even the vrai-
semblance which the romancer is able to impart to
his narratives. Similar considerations to those
which Professor Schliemann's explorations have
furnished in support of a historical basis for the
Iliad constitute a much stronger argument for
the substantial historicity of the story of the Exodus
and the encampment in the wilderness.
It may, then, be assumed that Moses was one
of the people of Israel ; that in his education he
1 For illustration of this geographical confirmation of the He
brew history of the Exodus and the march to Sinai and thence
to the Promised Land, see The Desert of the Exodus, by E. H.
Palmer, M. A., especially chap. xxv. He thus (at p. 434) sums up
his conclusions : " We cannot, perhaps, ever hope to identify all
the stations and localities mentioned in the Bible account of the
Exodus, but enough has been recovered to enable us to trace the
more important lines of march, and to follow the Israelites in
their several journeys from Egypt to Sinai, from Sinai to Kadesh,
and from thence to the Promised Land."

102 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
received all that the most civilized state of his time
could give him ; that, by birth, by education, and
by nature, he had the qualities of a prophet and a
statesman ; and that, being so equipped, he led the
people of Israel out of Egypt to the great plain at
the foot of Mount Sinai, where he gave them their
constitution. That constitution is contained in
what is admitted by all critics — the conservative
and progressive, traditional and modern — to be
the oldest complete book in the Bible.1 It con
sists of the twentieth, twenty-first, twenty-second,
twenty-third chapters of Exodus, and, I think, of
the first eight verses also of the twenty-fourth. It
is probable also that, if the nineteenth chapter is
not a part of the Book of the Covenant, it embodies
essential principles which belong to the same age.2
1 Not the oldest writing, — the Song of Deborah, for example,
is probably older, — but the oldest book in the Bible. It is
known as the Book of the Covenant.
2 It is true that some critics attribute the book, not only in its
present form but in its essential contents, to an age much later
than that of Moses. Wellhausen argues against the Mosaic au
thorship of the Decalogue. History of Israel, Julius Wellhausen,
p. 439. Dr. Budde thus states the argument from the evolution
ist's point of view.: " Many scholars, while relinquishing every
thing else, have tried to save the Ten Commandments, the
' Mosaic ' moral law, for these oldest times. Now the Ten Com
mandments base all their demands on the nature of the God of
Israel. If, then, they really did come from this period, it appears
that there existed, even in the earliest times, a conception of God
so sublime that hardly anything could have remained for the
prophets to do. This of itself should suffice to show the impossi
bility of the Mosaic origin of the Ten Commandments." Religion
of Israel to the Exile, Karl Budde, D. D., p. 32. This argument
ignores the existence of geniuses in human history who anticipate

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 103
At this point let the reader lay down this volume
and read through this Book of the Covenant ; it
their fellows and proclaim truths to which the race only gradu
ally arrives. Prof. William James has well said that " the evo
lutionary view of history, when it denies the vital importance of
individual initiative, is, then, an utterly vague and unscientific
conception, a, lapse from modern scientific determinism into the
most ancient oriental fatalism." The Will to Believe, p. 245.
That Moses was a spiritual genius, with such power of individual
initiative, all Hebrew history combines to testify, and most schol
ars concur in believing its testimony. So even Wellhausen : " The
time of Moses is invariably regarded as the properly creative
period in Israel's history. . . . The prophets who came after
gave, it is true, greater distinctness to the peculiar character of
the Nation ; but they did not make it, on the contrary, it made
them." History of Israel, Julius Wellhausen, p. 432. This does
not seem to me to consist with his apparent theory that the Ten
Commandments have a late prophetic origin ; because the Ten
Commandments are unmistakably the real moral making of the
Nation, if not as a formal code certainly as a system of moral
principles. A correspondent writing to me objects to the state
ment that the Book of the Covenant is the oldest book in the
Bible. How can it be, he asks, " as old even as Deuteronomy,
when the latter (chapter v.) knows no more powerful sanction for
the observance of the Sabbath than the memory of the unresting
slavery in Egypt ? Surely, if, with the writer of the Book of the
Covenant, the Deuteronomist had known any story of creation-
rest, he could not have failed to adduce that far more tremen
dous sanction." This argument assumes that the Ten Command
ments existed originally in the form in which they are contained
in the Book of the Covenant. As stated in the text, I believe that
the explanatory matter was added in both editions of the Ten
Commandments (Exod. xx. 1-17 ; Deut. v. 6-21) at a later date;
it is only the essential principles in the form given below which
were probably Mosaic. The Mosaic authorship of the Book of
the Covenant, not in its literary form but in its essential prin
ciples, and especially of the Ten Commandments, is maintained
and emphasized by Ewald : " There is no well-founded doubt
that the Ten Commandments are derived from Moses, in their

104 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
will not take him long. Let him then endeavor
to imagine the mental and moral condition of the
people to whom its instructions were imparted.
They had just emerged from a slavery which had
stifled any independent moral or intellectual devel
opment ; in which they had been subject to a peo
ple whom Herodotus describes as " religious to ex
cess, far beyond any other race of men " ; 1 a people
who made an elaborate sacrificial system a means
general import, their present order, and even in their peculiar
language. They are genuinely Mosaic in essence, and comprise
the highest truths which the new religion brought into the world,
in so far as they may be summed up in a few short sentences for
everybody, and are expressed with so much precision and order
as of itself to indicate a superior mind. Their arrangement pos
sesses the most antique simplicity imaginable, and has itself be
come the model of many similar series of laws, in groups of five
and ten. They are moreover twice (Exod. xx. and Deut. v.)
placed at the head of all expositions of the Mosaic religion ; and
in both cases distinctly marked as most sacred and peculiar
words. And whereas there are several peculiar expressions, even
in the ten very brief sentences of which they undoubtedly origi
nally consisted, both the copies now extant insert several addi
tions and explanations — an infallible criterion of a very ancient
text variously interpreted in after-times — a text in this respect
without a parallel in the Old Testament." History of Israel, Hein-
rich Ewald, vol. ii. p. 19. This view of the date of the Ten Com
mandments is entertained by the majority of the modern scholars
of the evangelical liberal school : by W. Robertson Smith, The
Old Testament in the Jewish Church, pp. 335-338 ; by Charles A.
Briggs, The Study of Holy Scripture, p. 118 ; by A. B. Bruce,
Apologetics, chap. iv. pp. 208-215 ; by Arthur Penrhyn Stanley,
Lectures on the History of the Jewish Church, lect. vii. pp. 194-198 ;
and apparently by S. R. Driver, Introduction to the Literature of
the Old Testament, pp. 31-35.
1 Herodotus, quoted in Rawlinson's History of Egypt, i. 320.

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 105
at once of glorifying the gods and of supporting
and enriching the priests ; a people who knew no
thing of the esoteric doctrine of monotheism, the
knowledge of which was sedulously guarded from
the uninitiated ; who worshiped innumerable in
carnations and manifestations of the deity, from
the sun to the sacred beetle ; whose fear of future
hell and hopes of future heaven gave to the priest
hood a power which they were not slow to use ;
whose moral life indicates that the ethical precepts
of their sacred books were not much better known
than the spiritual monotheism of their specially illu
minated philosophers ; and who were dominated
by a priesthood which controlled literature, educa
tion, science, and politics in the interest of their
own ecclesiastical order, and were the master spir
its in every event of life, public and private.1
The simplicity of the religious and ethical ideas
contained in the Book of the Covenant is the
more striking when contrasted with the ideals and
practices of the country in which Israel had so long
dwelt. The book is as remarkable for what it
omits as for what it contains. It is practically
silent respecting any future life, any sacrificial sys
tem, any ecclesiastical ritual, any organized priest
hood, any form of what was then universally and
is even now generally termed religious duty. It is
purely spiritual in its conception of God and of
his worship, and wholly non-ritualistic and almost
1 See Rawlinson's History of Egypt, i. chap. x. ; compare chap.

106 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
exclusively ethical in its interpretation of the divine
will. Its fundamental principles are incorporated
in ten commandments, which in their original form
probably read substantially as follows : 1 —
I am Jehovah thy God which brought thee out of the
land of Egypt, the house of servants.
Thou shalt have no other gods.
Thou shalt not make any graven image.
Thou shalt not take the name of Jehovah thy God in
vain. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.2
¦ Honor thy father and thy mother.
Thou shalt not kill.
Thou shalt not steal.
Thou shalt not commit adultery.
Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neigh
bor. Thou shalt not covet.
The rest of the Book of the Covenant is little
more than an illustration and an application of
these principles to specific conditions in society, or
a modification or amelioration of some of those
conditions, such as slavery, in accordance with the
spirit of these principles. Some of these applica
tions clearly belong to a later date, since they would
1 This is the view of most modern scholars, such as Ewald,
Driver, Briggs, Stanley, Bruce, and others. For the grounds on
which this opinion is based the reader is referred to these authors
as cited in the preceding notes.
2 That is, set apart. The subsequent additions undoubtedly
truly interpret its purpose — to secure rest to a people who as
slaves had lived in perpetual servile drudgery.

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 107
be wholly inapplicable to the migratory condition
of Israel while dwelling in tents in the wilderness.1
But the fundamental principles of this Hebraic
constitution are as radical as they are simple, and
are equally applicable to all epochs and all peoples.
Leaving their theological and ecclesiastical aspects
to be considered in the following article, I propose
in this article to state the political aspects of these
principles, and to show how the political life of the
nation was grounded in and developed out of them.
The fundamental principle of this constitution
is that religion is the basis of the state and the
ground of authority for law ; that, in other words,
all just law is divine in its origin, nature, and sanc
tions. There are two contrasted conceptions respecting
the basis of the state and the ground of authority
for law which have claimed the suffrages of man
kind. The first is the doctrine that authority rests
upon power. Law, according to this opinion, is a
command or series of commands, given by one man
or body of men, to another man or body of men.
It is law because the person or persons issuing it
have power to punish the person or persons to
whom it is issued, for disobedience. Of this con
ception of law John Austin may be regarded as
the chief historical exponent. " A command," he
says, " is an order issued by a superior to an infe
rior. It is a signification of desire distinguished
1 E. g., chap, xxii., 5, 6, 7. There were no vineyards, no
standing corn, and no houses in the wilderness.

108 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
by this peculiarity, — that the party to whom it is
directed is liable to evil from the other, in case he
comply not with the desire. . . . The evil is called
a sanction, and the command, or duty, is said to
be sanctioned by the chance of incurring the evil.
. . . All commands, however, are not laws. That
term is reserved for those commands which oblige
generally to the performance of acts of a class."
These principles lead to and are incorporated in
the following definitions : " (1) Laws, being com
mands, emanate from a determinate source ; (2)
Every sanction is an evil annexed to a command ;
(3) Every duty implies a command, and chiefly
means obnoxiousness to the evils annexed to com
mands." x This is in effect a philosophical state
ment of the doctrine popularly embodied in the
maxim, " Might makes right." The right of the
superior to command depends upon his power to
enforce his commands. Notwithstanding the high
authority for it, it is none other than the philoso
phy which underlies all despotism.
In striking contrast to this is the philosophy
implied in the parenthetic statement in the Decla
ration of Independence that " government rests
upon the consent of the governed." Of the philo
sophy embodied in this maxim Rousseau is the ablest
modern exponent. He taught that man was origi
nally in a state of nature, which was a state of
absolute freedom ; that in this freedom men were
1 Encyclopaedia Britannica, article Law. See also Maine on
Ancient Law, pp. 6, 7.

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 109
brought into continual conflict of interests and
consequent disadvantages; that they, therefore,
consented to surrender some of this freedom for
the advantages which an orderly government would
bring with it, and that this imaginary agreement,
or " social contract," was the basis of all just gov
ernment.1 If the first theory is that which underlies despot
ism, the second is that which underlies anarchy.2
Upon the theory of the " social contract " there is
really no such thing as authority. Law is simply
a form of consent, or at least derives all its author-

1 For a good critical account of Rousseau's doctrine of the So
cial Contract, see Rousseau, by John Morley, vol. ii. chap. iii. See
also, for a briefer description of it by more hostile critics, A Cen
tury of Revolution, by William S. Lilly, chap, i., and Popular
Government, by Sir Henry S. Maine, pp. 154-162.
2 And anarchy is only another form of despotism ; the despot
ism of the many in lieu of that of the one or of the few. See this
abundantly illustrated in Taine's French Revolution, book i. To
this effect De Tocqueville bears eloquent testimony : ' ' If the abso
lute power of a majority were to be substituted, by democratic
nations, for all the different powers which checked or retarded
overmuch the energy of individual minds, the evil would only have
changed character. Men would not have found the means of in
dependent life ; they would simply have discovered (no easy task)
a new physiognomy of servitude. There is, — and I cannot repeat
it too often, — there is here matter for profound reflection to those
who look on freedom of thought as a. holy thing, and who hate
not only the despot, but despotism. For myself, when I feel the
hand of power lie heavy on my brow, I care but little to know
who oppresses me ; and I am not the more disposed to pass
beneath the yoke because it is held out to me by the arms of a
million of men." Democracy in America, Alexis De Tocqueville,
pp. 12, 13.

110 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
ity from a consent, real or implied. The maxim
that " government rests on the consent of the gov
erned " still continues popular ; but the philosophy
of which it is an expression has long since been
abandoned by all historical and philosophical stu
dents. There never was such a state of nature as
Rousseau imagines ; there never was such a social
contract as he has conceived. The earlier stages
of life are not those of liberty, but those of abso
lutism. As Rousseau's theory has no basis in his
tory, so it has none in analogy. The government
of the father does not depend on the consent of
the children, nor that of the teacher on the con
sent of the pupil, nor that of God on the consent of
men. No more does the government of the state
depend on the consent of the citizens. For America
the notion that government rests on the consent of
the governed was forever demolished by the Civil
War. The basic principle of the Hebrew government
was neither the authority of one man over other
men because be has power to enforce his com
mands, nor the consent of other men to accept the
will of one man — that is, the consent of the
governed ; it was the authority of Almighty God.
There are certain great natural laws — of heat, of
light, of electricity, of gravitation. Men neither
make them nor unmake them, mend them nor
modify them. They must obey them, and then they
can use them ; but they violate them at their peril.
So there are laws of health which men neither

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 111
make nor unmake, mend nor modify. If we obey
them, we have health ; if we disobey them, we
sicken and die. The fundamental principle of the
Hebraic commonwealth was that there are great
moral laws by which human society is bound
together. These laws men neither make nor un
make, mend nor modify. They are not dependent
upon the will of monarch, oligarchy, aristocracy,
or public assembly. They are eternal, absolute,
immutable. We must find out what they are and
obey them, or suffer the penalty of our ignorance
or our willfulness. " The seat of law," says
Hooker, " is in the bosom of Almighty God."
This is the doctrine of the Hebraic common
wealth. Neither Czar nor Council of Ten nor Brit
ish Parliament nor American Congress can make
law. All that man can do, whatever governmental
mechanism he adopts, is to ascertain what are the
laws of social order, and apply them to the pro
blems of his own time and his own community.
This is the first and fundamental principle of the
Hebraic commonwealth ; the authority for law is
neither the power of one man to enforce his will
over other men nor the consent of the governed ;
it is the authority of the one and only Lawgiver.
If by our governmental organization we ascertain
what the law of the social order is, we shall do
well ; if we fail to ascertain, or, ascertaining, fail
to obey, we shall do ill.
The second principle or congeries of principles
in the Hebraic constitution is found in its state-

112 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
ment of the essential laws of the social order.
These are very simple and very vital. They were
stated in the Ten Commandments in concrete
forms, but they are concrete forms of great prin
ciples which may be restated somewhat thus :
Spiritual reverence for God ; preservation of some
time free from the drudgery of toil for the develop
ment of the higher nature ; respect for parents ;
regard for the rights of person, of the family, of
property, of reputation ; and, last, this respect real
and spontaneous, not formal and enforced.
When a community bases government on either
the power of the governor, leading to despotism, or
on the consent of the governed, leading to anarchy,
it violates the first of these laws. When it sub
stitutes symbols for realities, promotes and en
courages the spirit of irreverence, devotes all its
energies to material advancement, forgetting all
need of and all ministry to the higher life, and
makes every day a workday, and wealth the mea
sure of prosperity, it violates the second, third,
and fourth laws. When, through the disregard of
parents, it suffers the disintegration of the family,
which is itself the unit of organized society, and so
prepares the way for widespread social disorder, it
violates the fifth law. When it fails to afford
protection of the innocent from the oppressions of
the strong or the violence of mobs, or suffers such
industrial conditions as destroy men and women
and children before their time in mining and man
ufacturing industries, it violates the sixth law.

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 113
When it permits the practice of polygamy, or en
courages licentiousness in legalized forms by free
dom of divorce, it violates the seventh law. When
it taxes a helpless and prostrate people under
forms of law, giving them by law none of the
benefits for which governments are organized, it
violates the eighth law. When it allows honored
citizens whose life has been devoted to the public
service of the community to be slandered by a
sensational and unprincipled press, and continues
to give the press its support, it violates the ninth
law. When it depends wholly or chiefly on force
to maintain these laws, failing to furnish such
education as will make obedience to them voluntary
and spontaneous, it violates the tenth law. These
are the fundamental laws of human life. Their
maintenance is essential to social order. No so-
called laws are just which do not work in harmony
with them.
These ethical and spiritual laws, as simple as
they are fundamental, are easily apprehended by
mankind. Their sanction is in the universal con
science. This is the third principle of the Mosaic
constitution. The force of these laws does not lie
primarily in the power of the human governor to
enforce it ; nor does it lie in the consent of the
governed ; it lies in the inherent authority of
divine law and in the sanction given to that law by
human conscience. This principle is recognized
in the history of the giving of the Ten Command
ments. Moses, it is said, came down from Mount

114 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Sinai, submitted to the people the question whether
they would accept Jehovah as their king and his
will as their law, and "all the people answered
together and said, All that Jehovah hath spoken
we will do." This acceptance by the people of
the divine constitution gives to the Book of the
Covenant, which contains the Ten Commandments,
its name ; gives, indeed, to the collection of books
in which that Book of the Covenant is found the
ancient title, the "Old Testament," or "Old
Covenant." Throughout their history the relation
between God and Israel was treated as a covenant
relation. The prophetic indictments of Israel
were not merely because they had violated the
divine law, but because they had broken their
covenant with their God. The law was not im
posed upon them ; it was accepted by them ; its
authority was divine, and they had recognized
' their obligations to obey it. This fact is written
large in Hebrew history. There are no threats of
punishment in a future life ; there are no promises
of rewards in a future life ; no priesthood is vested
with power to enforce the law by appeals to super
stitious fears, as the law was enforced in the Middle
Ages. Nor was there permitted to Israel in its
governmental ideals a standing army to enforce
against a recalcitrant people the laws which they
had made their own by their acceptance of them.
" Out of Zion shall come forth the law," said one
of Israel's great prophets. That is, the obliga
tion of law was a religious obligation recognized

THE BOOK OF THE COVENANT 115
by the conscience of the people to whom it was
given. These three principles, then, were at the foun
dation of the Hebraic commonwealth : first, that
reverence for God and acceptance of his authority
is the basis of a free state ; second, that the gen
eral laws of the social order are very simple,
though their applications may be diverse and com
plicated; third, that for a peaceful and a free
people acceptance of these laws is necessary, and
in a free commonwealth they must depend pri
marily for their support on the conscience of the
people themselves. On these principles as a foun
dation was built the Hebraic commonwealth ; his
tory has proved them to be the foundation of all
truly free governments. How they were applied
in the Hebrew commonwealth will be the subject
for consideration in the next chapter.

CHAPTER V
THE DEUTERONOMIC CODE
It is clear from the subsequent history of the
Hebrews that only the foundations of the national
structure were laid during the lifetime of Moses.
The superstructure was not instantly reared thereon,
but was the product of centuries of national growth.
It does not come within the province of this volume
to trace in detail the national history of Israel.
The general outlines of that history are familiar to
every reader of the English Bible. For three cen
turies the tribes existed in scattered and separate
communities, without a constitution, an organized
government, or effective law. Leaders arose from
time to time called "judges," though their func
tion was executive rather than judicial, and military
rather than executive. These leaders were not
elected by the people, nor did they inherit their
office. They assumed authority by reason of some
force or vigor of character which made them effi
cient in protecting the people against foreign foes,
or made them the subjects of popular admiration
by reason of special feats of valor.1 Much of the
1 " Their authority was divine, or, as we should say, moral, in its
character ; it rested upon that spontaneous recognition of the idea

THE DEUTERONOMIC CODE 117
time the tribes were subject to predatory raids by
surrounding nations ; part of the time they were
in absolute subjection to cruel and unscrupulous
foes. Within the tribes themselves there was prac
tically no law. " Every man did what was right
in his own eyes." At length, under one of these
leaders — Saul — the tribes were united in a vigor
ous and successful campaign ; under his successor,
David, they were organized into a united kingdom ;
and this kingdom, under his son Solomon, grew in
size, in wealth, and in apparent prosperity. But
the spirit of liberty in a people whose blood and
whose essential principles united to make them
jealous of their freedom, the spirit of restlessness
which was inherited from their colonial days, and
the grievous exactions levied upon them by a king
who lived in almost Oriental splendor, induced re
bellion after his death. In the reign of his suc
cessor ten of the twelve tribes seceded ; the nation
was rent in twain ; a new capital was established ;
an idolatrous worship imitating that of Egypt was
set up in Samaria for the seceding tribes ; and the
history of the Jews flows thereafter in a divided
stream as that of Israel and Judah. After two
hundred years of increasing profligacy, Israel, or
more accurately a large proportion of its popula
tion, was carried away captive by the Assyrians,
and their country was repopulated by a colony from
the land of their captors. A mongrel population
of right which, though unexpressed, was alive and working among
the tribes." The History of Israel, by Julius Wellhausen, p. 436.

118 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
supplanted the tribes of Hebrew origin, a hybrid
religion the worship of Jehovah.1 The two re
maining tribes, retaining the capital and the temple,
preserved their nationality under the name of
Judah, but, changing their religion with the chan
ging opinions of their rulers, outrivaled their sister
Israel in corruption.2 This corruption reached its
climax under Manasseh, the fourteenth king of the
southern kingdom. His reign of over half a cen
tury was characterized not only by the establish
ment of paganism as the religion of the state, but
by a consequent reign of licentiousness and immo
rality impossible to describe and almost impossible
to imagine. The worship of the heavenly bodies
was restored ; the name of Moloch became a com
mon oath ; human sacrifice was reinstated ; there
was a succession of small furnaces in the streets for
which the children gathered wood and in which
their parents baked cakes as offerings to Astarte ;
the roofs of the houses were converted into places
of worship and of incense-burning to the heathen
gods ; the temple vessels were consecrated to Baal ;
the altar in front of the temple was desecrated ;
and the ark itself was removed from the Holy of
Holies. An attempt made by faithful prophets
to stem this current of heathenism was met by a
wholesale religious persecution of all the followers
of Jehovah, and by a reign of terror against all
who dared remain faithful to the religion of their
1 2 Kings xvii.
2 Jer. iii. 11.

THE DEUTERONOMIC CODE 119
fathers.1 During this half-century the religious
writings as well as the religious principles of the
Jewish nation were forgotten. Such ecclesiastical
literature as had grown up during the preceding
centuries was kept within the priestly circles. The
people knew even less about ecclesiasticism then
than they do to-day.
Then it was that an unknown prophet arose,
resolved to do what he could to bring Israel back
to the simple religion of Moses. Inspired by the
teaching of preceding prophets of his own nation,
such as Isaiah and Micah, and perhaps also by
echoes of the prophecies from the northern king
dom of such men as Elijah, Amos, and Hosea, the
unknown gathered together whatever there was of
ancient law in manuscript and of ancient counsel
in current traditions, and rewrote the laws of
Moses, codifying both manuscript and tradition,
modifying both and adding to them new regula
tions in the spirit of the old, and new applications
of the old to the conditions and problems of his
own time. The discovery of his writing would
have insured the death of the author and the de
struction of the manuscript. The temple was still
a literary centre, and somewhere in its archives
the prophet hid the book. Here, after Manasseh's
death, the manuscript was discovered, brought
to the new and reforming king, Josiah, accepted
by him as a divinely inspired interpretation of
1 2 Kings xxi. 1-16 ; xxiii. 4 ; xxiv. 4 ; 2 Chron. xxxiii. 1-10 ;
Isa. lxv. 3 ; Jer. vii. 17, 18, 31 ; viii. 2 ; xiv. 13 ; Zeph. i. 5.

120 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Mosaism, and made the inspiration and guide of
what was both a great religious revival and a great
political reformation. To this codification, by an
unknown prophet of the seventh century, of Mosaic
precepts and principles, additions were made sub
sequently by other writers. The whole constitutes
the Book of Deuteronomy. How much of it is
truly Mosaic, how much of it was contributed by
the unknown author in the reign of Manasseh, how
much is of even subsequent date, it is not possible
now to determine with absolute accuracy, nor is it
necessary. The value of the Book of Deuteron
omy does not depend upon its Mosaic authorship.
Its value depends upon the fact that it is the ex
pression of the faithful few in a degenerate age to
the fundamental principles of the founder of their
church and their nation.
I must refer the reader to other books for the
reasons which have led scholars to the conclusion
respecting the nature of the Book of Deuteronomy
here so briefly stated.1 Those reasons lie partly in
the structure of the book itself. It consists in form
of at least three distinct speeches, together with
two poems, all of them put into the mouth of
'Moses. We must either suppose that Moses wrote
these orations, or that they were taken down ver-
1 The reader who desires a more thorough discussion of the
character, contents, date, and authorship of the Book of Deuter
onomy will find it in Professor George F. Moore's article on
Deuteronomy in the Cyclopcedia Biblica, and in Dr. Driver's
Introduction to the Book of Deuteronomy in the International
Critical Commentary.

THE DEUTERONOMIC CODE 121
batim by some contemporaneous reporter and then
miraculously preserved through the intervening
ages ; or else, as the modern scholar does, that this
form was employed by a later prophet in accord
ance with the custom of his times, to give dramatic
effect to teaching which he intended should embody
the spirit of Mosaic prophecy in its application to
a later age. It depends partly on the way in which
the laws in the Book of Deuteronomy fit the re
forms initiated by Josiah, which are declared by
the historian to have been based upon a law-book
found in the temple. It depends partly on the
title of the book">itself, which signifies the " second
law," or " second giving of the law," a title which,
derived apparently from the earliest ages, at least
indicates that from the earliest ages the book was
regarded as a second or supplementary edition of
the Mosaic legislation.
It will be seen from this brief sketch that those
are mistaken who suppose that the new criticism
regards the Book of Deuteronomy as a pious fraud.
This would, indeed, seem to me to be an impossible
hypothesis. Pious frauds have been perpetrated
by pious men, it is true, but always either in some
selfish or in some ecclesiastical interest — that is,
either for the benefit of the writer or for the
advantage of some churchly organization. An
ethical book founded upon fraud would be an
anomaly in literature. The Book of Deuteronomy
is not an ecclesiastical book ; it is not written in
the interest of the priesthood ; it is essentially an

122 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
ethical book. Its ethical standards are noble, its
tone throughout pure and practical. It is morally
inconceivable that such a book should be inspired
by dishonest motives ; equally inconceivable that a
great moral revolution, like that wrought in the
reign of Josiah, should be inspired by a pious
fraud ; and the modern critic does not regard the
Book of Deuteronomy as a fraud. Books written
by one man in the name and phraseology of another
are not uncommon in literature. Defoe's history
of the plague of London is not a fraud because it
purports to be written by one who had passed
through the scenes of the plague, though it was not
written for fifty years afterward ; Plato's report of
the dialogues of Socrates is not a fraud because no
man can tell how much of the thought in the dia
logues belongs to Socrates and how much to Plato.
Seven centuries after Moses a prophet writes a
book, in .which he incorporates the current tradi
tions respecting Mosaic laws ; elaborates, modifies,
interprets, and applies them to existing social
conditions; couches them in the language of the
great statesman ; after a fashion of historians in
all ages puts them dramatically in the statesman's
mouth ; and then, as if to prevent any reader from
imagining that he intends these manuscripts to be
taken as actual rescripts of the original law, de
scribes them as a second law.1 To call this a fraud
is to confound moral distinctions by treating a
common literary method, pursued by writers in all
1 Deut. xvii. 18, Septuagint version.

THE DEUTERONOMIC CODE 123
ages of the world without obloquy, as though it
were a literary forgery.1
It is in the Book of the Covenant and in the
Book of Deuteronomy that we are chiefly to find
the political institutions of the Hebrew people,
though light is thrown upon those institutions by
incidental references in their sacred history. Nor
is it difficult to trace the institutions which grew
up in the eight centuries that intervened between
these two publications, back to the essential prin
ciples involved in the Book of the Covenant : the
religious basis of the state, the ethical nature of
law, and its sanction in the conscience of the
people. All Oriental nations were absolute despotisms.
In the Hebraic commonwealth the three depart
ments of government, the executive, the legislative,
and the judicial, were clearly discriminated. There
were two representative assemblies : one the Jewish
house of representatives, known as the Great Con
gregation, which reflected the popular will; the
other a smaller body, the elders of the tribe or the
nation, who acted as counselors of the executive,
cooperated in making treaties, and exercised certain
judicial functions. It was the Great Congregation
that on the report of the twelve spies voted not to
1 " The truth that ' the law came by Moses,' that the foundation
of this sacred jurisprudence was laid by this founder, that the
germs of the late growth proceeded from him, is not subverted by
finding that from one period to another there was a gradual ex
pansion." George P. Fisher, D. D., Address before International
Congregational Council, Boston, Sept., 1899.

124 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
undertake the subjugation of Canaan, inducted into
office Josiah, ratified the selection of Saul as king,
carried into effect the proposal of Solomon to
establish the ark of the Lord at Jerusalem.1 It
was the elders who made treaties, tried capital
offenses, and enforced the execution of the laws.
It was both judicial and executive.2 There was
a judiciary who were apparently elected by the
people themselves;3 who were forbidden to take
fees from their suitors or to pay any regard to the
social standing of those who had causes before
them ; and whose authority, it is clear from many
instances in Jewish history, was far from being
merely nominal.* Executive authority was, after
the time of Saul, vested in a king, but his powers
were limited. The Jewish monarch was a consti
tutional monarch ; no foreigner could receive the
imperial crown, no cavalry could be organized by
the king to harry the kingdom, no heavy taxation
could be levied for the benefit of the king and his
court ; he could establish no harem, he was himself
subject to the laws of the realm.5 That these re
strictions on the authority of the king, though
sometimes disregarded, were real, not merely for
mal, is evident from the fact that so unscrupulous
a despot as Ahab was not able to accomplish so
1 Num. xiv. 1-5, 10 ; xxvii. 18-23 ; 1 Chron. xiii. 1-8 ; 1 Kings
viii. 1-5 ; Num. xi. 16, 17 ; Josh. ix. 18-21 ; Jer. xxvi. 10-16.
2 Josh. ix. 18-21 ; Jer. xxvi. 10-16.
8 Exod. xviii. 19-26 ; Deut. i. 9-14.
4 Lev. xix. 15 ; xxiv. 22 ; Deut. i. 17 ; xvi. 19 ; Exod. xxii. 2L
6 Deut. xvii. 14-20.

THE DEUTERONOMIC CODE 125
simple an act of despotism as the unjust absorption
of a peasant's estate except by bribing the regularly
constituted judges of the land.1 With these pro
visions for the protection of the people from the
despotic power of their rulers, unparalleled in that
period of history, were other provisions equally
remarkable for their justice and humanity. Mr.
Robert Ingersoll has spoken of the cruel code of
Moses, under which hundreds of crimes were pun
ished with death. In point of fact, only twelve
crimes were punished with death under this code,2
whereas, as late as A. D. 1600, two hundred and
sixty-three were punished with death in England.
Attainder was forbidden,3 human life, liberty, and
property were guarded by special provisions in
accordance with the spirit of the Ten Command
ments — that is, the Hebrew constitution ; 4 special
provisions were made for the detection of secret
crime;5 public instruction was provided for both
by laws imposing this duty on the parents and by
provision for instruction through itinerant Levites.6
The only limitation on free speech permitted was a
provision making the preaching of false gods a
capital offense ; and even a false prophet could not
ordinarily be punished by the state until the events
1 1 Kings xxi. 1-16.
2 See a list of them in Smith's Bible Dictionary, article Laws
of Moses.
8 Deut. xxiv. 16.
4 Deut. xxii. 8 ; Exod. xxii. 1-14 ; Deut. xxiv. 7.
6 Deut. xxi. 1-9.
9 Deut. vi. 7 ; Exod. xiii. 14, 15 ; Deut. xxxi. 9-13 ; xxxiii. 10;
Neh. viii. 5-8 ; 2 Chron. xvii. 8, 9 ; xxx. 22 ; xxxv. 2, 3.

126 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
which he had assumed to foretell belied his predic
tions, proving him to be an impostor. The boldness
of the ancient prophets, illustrated alike by the
utterances which have been preserved to us and by
dramatic incidents in their careers, could have
been possible only in a country where freedom of
speech was a fact as well as a theory.1 With these
provisions of justice were others, scarcely less re
markable, of a philanthropic character. Strangers
were protected from oppression ; the widow and
the fatherless were especially guarded ; wages were
to be paid to the hired servant from day to day ;
gleanings in the vineyard were to be left for the
poor ; caste and class distinctions were prohibited.2
This spirit of humanity is especially characteristic
of the Book of Deuteronomy.3
1 Deut. xviii. 21, 22; Jer. xxxviii.; 2 Sam. xii. 1-7; 1 Kings
xxi. 17-24.
2 Exod. xxii. 21, 22; Deut. i. 17; xvi. 19; xxiv. 14, 15; Lev.
xix. 10, 15 ; xxiv. 22.
8 " Humanity is the author's ruling motive, wherever consider
ations of religion or morality do not force him to repress it.
Accordingly, great emphasis is laid upon the exercise of philan
thropy, promptitude, and liberality towards those in difficulty or
want, as the indigent in need of a loan (xv. 7—11 ; xxiii. 19, 20) ;
a slave at the time of his manumission (xv. 13-15), a neighbor
who has lost any of his property (xxii. 1-4), a poor man obliged
to borrow on pledge (xxiv. 6, 12 f.), a fugitive slave (xxiv.
7), a hired servant (xxiv. 14 f.); and in the law for the dis
position of the triennial tithe (xiv. 28 f.), the landless Levite (xii.
12, 18 f. ; xiv. 27, 29 ; xvi. 11, 14 ; xxvi. 11, 12 f.), and the stranger
— i. e., the unprotected foreigner settled in Israel. The fatherless
and the widow are repeatedly commended to the Israelite's charity
or regard (xiv. 29 ; xvi. 11, 14 ; xxiv. 17, 19, 20, 21 ; xxvi. 12 f . ;
xxvii. 19 ; and the stranger, x. 19 ; xxvi. 11), especially at the

THE DEUTERONOMIC CODE 127
The laws of a nation are partly a record of its
life, partly an interpretation of its ideals. That
this is true of the laws of the Hebraic common
wealth is made clear both by their historical and
their political books. The former contain many
instances of violations of law by kings ; the latter
indict the people, and especially the nobility, for
transgressing its humane provisions. Nevertheless,
it would be impossible to mention any people of
even a much later age than that of the Book of
Deuteronomy, or even that of the restoration after
the exile, whose law and constitution embodied an
ideal so noble as that embodied in the Hebrew civil
laws, or any people whose history shows the exist
ence of political institutions so essentially just,
free, and humane. Did this ideal exist only in
the mind of Moses ? Are the laws and institutions
of the Hebraic commonwealth to be compared
with the ideals of Plato's " Republic " or More's
" Utopia " ? or do those laws and constitutions
represent a real, vital, national growth? Do we
here see the fundamental principles of justice, lib
erty, and humanity suggested by a single prophetic
genius? or do we see them on actual trial in a
unique nation ? Traditionalism holds the first
opinion, modern scholarship holds the second. The
second does not detract from but rather adds to
time of the great annual pilgrimages (xii. 12, 18 ; xiv. 27 ; xvi.
11, 14; xxvi. 11), when he and his household partook together
before God of the bounty of the soil, and might the more readily
respond to an appeal for benevolence." The International Critical
Commentary, Deuteronomy, page xxiv.

128 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
the significance and the value of the revelation
which that political code contains. Regarded as
an attempt by a long line of prophets to embody
in the institutions of the primitive people the
essential motives of justice, liberty, and humanity,
this code is more eloquent than when regarded as
an ideal given only by one prophet, comprehended
only by him, the serious execution of which was
never really attempted.
The growth of the ecclesiastical code or canon
law of Hebraism will be the subject of considera
tion in the next chapter.

CHAPTER VI
THE CANON LAW
The doctrine that the Hebrew code is a produc
tion of the gradual growth of the Hebrew people
is applied by the modern scholar to their religious
as well as to their civil codes. He does not believe
that the Levitical system of worship, as it is con
tained in the books of Exodus and Numbers and
especially that of Leviticus, was given by God to
Moses in the form in which it is there found ; he
supposes that only the germ of it existed in the
time of Moses, and that from that germ the elabo
rate system grew by a gradual process reaching its
final form in the time of Ezra, about the year 450
B. c1 To a certain school of theologians this hypo-
1 All modern, that is, literary or non-traditional, students of the
Bible accept this general view ; that is, they agree that the germi-
nant principles of the Levitical code are Mosaic, but its devel
opment was gradual, and its final codification, in the form in
which we now possess it, was post-exilic and probably due to
Ezra. Thus : " The principles by which the priesthood was to be
guided were laid down, it may be supposed, in outline by Moses.
In. process of time, however, as national life grew more complex,
and fresh cases requiring to be dealt with arose, these principles
would be found no longer to suffice, and their extension would be
come a necessity. Especially in matters of ceremonial observance,
hick would remain naturally within the control of the priests,

130 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
thesis seems destructive not only of certain forms of
worship, but of certain essential aspects of divine
regulations such as those enjoined in Exod. xx. 24-26 ; xxu. 29,
30 ; xxiii. 14-19 would not long continue in the same rudimen
tary state ; fresh definitions and distinctions would be introduced,
more precise rules would be prescribed for the method of sacrifice,
the ritual to be observed by the priests, the dues which they were
authorized to receive from the people, and other similar matters.
After the priesthood had acquired, through the foundation of
Solomon's Temple, a permanent centre, it is probable that the
process of development and systematization advanced more rapidly
than before. . . . Although, therefore, there are reasons for sup
posing that the Priests' Code assumed finally the shape in which
we have it in the age subsequent to Ezra it rests ultimately upon
an ancient traditional basis ; and many of the institutions pro
minent in it are recognized, in various stages of their growth, by
the earlier pre-exilic literature, by Deuteronomy and by Ezekiel."
Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament, S. B. Driver,
D. D., pp. 153, 154. " The code of Holiness comes into the his
toric field first in connection with Ezekiel. It is a codification of
the immemorial practice of the priests of Jerusalem going back to
Aaron and Moses. The priestcode and the document which con
tains it cannot be proven till Ezra's time. It was a larger codifi
cation of the priestly ritual and customs coming down by tradition
from Moses and Aaron in the priestly circles of Jerusalem, which
had been carefully conserved as holy relics in the priestly families
among the exiles, as bearing in them sacred memories and holy
promises." The Higher Criticism of the Hexateuch, by Charles
A. Briggs, D. D., p. 157. Professor Wellhausen traces the de
velopment of the Jewish hierarchy and thus states his conclusion :
" To any one who knows anything about history, it is not neces
sary to prove that the so-called Mosaic theocracy, which nowhere
suits the circumstances of the earlier periods, and of which the
prophets, even in their most ideal delineations of the Israelite
state as it ought to be, have not the faintest shadow of an idea, is,
so to speak, a perfect fit for post-exilian Judaism, and had its actu
ality only there. Foreign rulers had then relieved the Jews of all
concern about secular affairs ; they had it in their power, and were
indeed compelled to give themselves wholly up to sacred things,

THE CANON LAW 131
truth. The churchman, that is, he who attaches
great value to the institutional forms of thought
in which they were left completely unhampered. Thus the tem
ple became the sole centre of life, and the prince of the temple the
head of the spiritual commonwealth, to which also the control of
political affairs, so far as these were still left to the nation, natu
rally fell, there being no other head." History of Israel, Julius
Wellhausen, pp. 150, 151. Dr. Bruce sees in the organization of
a hierarchy and a sacrificial system the sign of the degeneracy
of the Jewish people. He says, " Judaism, apart altogether from
critical questions, was distinct from Mosaism. The distinguishing
feature of Mosaism, as we have seen, was that it asserted the
supremacy of the moral as compared with ritual. This funda
mental principle the prophets reasserted with new emphasis and
widened range of application, so showing themselves to be the true
sons of Moses. On the other hand, the distinctive character of
Judaism was that it put ritual on a level with morality, treated
Levitical rules as of equal importance with the Decalogue, mak
ing no distinction between one part of the law and another, but
demanding compliance with the prescribed ceremonial of worship
as not less necessary to good relations with God than a righteous
life. This was a new thing in Israel ; and it was a great down-
come ; a descent from liberty to bondage, from evangelic to legal
relations with God, from the spirit to the letter." He neverthe
less thinks the Code was a providential provision to meet that de
generacy and keep alive the spirit of Mosaism, and further says,
' ' It needs but a hasty and general survey of the priestly Code to
be satisfied that there was much in it that tended towards the
realization of the Mosaic ideal of a holy people faithful to Jeho
vah. One outstanding feature in it is the prominence given to the
idea of sin. ... It was well, it was a real advance in moral cul
ture, that the religious system should be so altered as to develop
a deeper consciousness of sin. It tended to a more exalted view
of the holiness of God, and to greater needfulness in conduct. . . .
The centralization of worship in a single sanctuary, and the com
mitment of the whole sacrificial service into the hands of a priestly
class, if an innovation as regards Mosaism, had certainly a ten
dency to prepare men for the religion of the spirit which came in
with Jesus. In old times, it would appear, killing for food and

132 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
and worship as they are found in the church,
generally also attaches great value to the sacri
ficial system as it is embodied in the church creed
and expressed in the church ordinances. He re
gards the sacrificial system of the Old Testament
as divinely organized and ordained ; he reveres it
as an ancient type foreshadowing the sacrifice of
Christ and fulfilled in the Gospel ; he looks upon
it, therefore, as the most central feature of the Old
Testament revelation ; and it is not strange that he
resists with the utmost vigor any view which treats
the Levitical system as a human development, and
the sacrificial system therein contained as tempo
rary in its nature and now forever passed away,
because it has fulfilled its purpose.1 But to this
sacrifice were the same thing, and every man was his own priest.
Sacrifice was a thing of daily occurrence, and an essential element
of religion. The centralization of worship changed all that. Sac
rifice became an affair of stated seasons, public sacrifice for all
Israel threw into the shade private sacrifice, and the offering of
victims became the business of a professional class. But religion
is not an affair for two or three seasons in the year, but for daily
life. Therefore men had to find out for themselves means for the
culture of piety independent of Levitical ritual. . . . The syna
gogue, with its prayers and its reading of the scriptures, met the
want, and educated men for a time when temple and sacrifice
would finally disappear." Apologetics, by Alexander B. Bruce,
D. D., pp. 262, 268, 269, 270.
1 For a good statement of this view and a good presentation of
the argument from the traditional point of view in favor of the
Mosaic authorship of the Levitical Code, see The Book of Leviticus,
by S. H. Kellogg, D. D., Expositor's Bible Series. The following
paragraph (page 25) illustrates the spiritual interpretation of the
Book of Leviticus by this school. After saying that one of the
present uses of the " book is that it is a revelation of the charac-

THE CANON LAW 133
view of the Levitical system the modern literary
study of the Bible necessarily conducts us, and it
would be a mistake for one who is attempting to
interpret the methods and results of that study to
conceal from himself or from his readers the con
clusions to which it will necessarily lead. How the
modern or literary or scientific student of the Bible
thinks the Levitical code was gradually formed,
and what providential purpose he thinks it was in
tended to serve in the history of the race, it is the
object of this article to show. Theology is what
men think about religion ; ritual is the way in
which they express their religious feeling when
they unite to give it combined expression. It is
this ritual, this religious expression of the life of
Israel, we are to consider in this paper.
In the earlier and primitive states of society the
family is the only organization. This is what is
known as the patriarchal age. The father is the
ter of God, " he says, " More particularly, Leviticus is of use to us
now, as holding forth, in a singularly vivid manner, the funda
mental conditions of true religion. The Levitical priesthood and
sacrifices are no more, but the spiritual truth they represented
abides and must abide forever ; namely, that there is for sinful
man no citizenship in the kingdom of God apart from a High
Priest and Mediator with a propitiatory sacrifice for sin. These
are days when many, who would yet be called Christians, belittle
atonement, and deny the necessity of the shedding of substitu
tionary blood for our salvation. Such would reduce, if it were
possible, the whole sacrificial ritual of Leviticus to a symbolic
seiy-offering of the worshiper to God. But against this stands
the constant testimony of our Lord and His apostles, that it is
only through the shedding of blood, not his own, that man can
have remission of sin."

134 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
king and lawgiver ; he enacts the laws and directs
the industries of the family. If the family is to
fight in defense of itself or in attack on others the
father is the commander-in-chief ; he organizes his
older sons and his servants, arms them and directs
the battle. When the battle is over and thanks
giving is to be offered to the gods for the victory,
the father doffs his military garments, puts on the
garments of a priest, and conducts the worship.
He is lawgiver, he is soldier, he is priest. But as
society grows more complex and families are asso
ciated together in tribes, and later the tribes into
a nation, a differentiation necessarily takes place.
There become different classes for different voca
tions. There grows up an agricultural class, a
mercantile class, a military class, — one to cultivate
the soil, one to trade with other nations, one to
fight the nation's battles ; and by the same pro
cess of human development there grows up a wor
ship-leading class. It is ordinarily called a priestly
class. There is some protest in the modern com
munity against a priestly class. But if we are to
have government we must have men to govern ; if
industry, we must have men to work ; if war, we
must have men to fight; and if we are to have
public worship, we must have men to conduct such
worship. Thus society is developed out of the
simple patriarchal form into the more complex
form. The priestly order arises in this process as
naturally and as necessarily as the industrial, the
military, or the ruling order.

THE CANON LAW 135
But this is not all. During the patriarchal age,
this family is an itinerant family. It leads a
nomadic life ; has no permanent dwelling-place ;
lives in tents. Its religion moves with it, and its
place of worship is as simple as its forms of wor
ship. Whenever the tent is raised, the altar is
put up ; whenever the tent is taken down, the altar
is left as a memorial, or is demolished. There are
no temples, as there are no houses. But as society
grows more complex and men begin to live in
houses, and then in towns and cities, out of the
altar grows the temple, as out of the father grew
the priesthood ; and there grow permanent places
for worship, as there grow classes to lead the wor
ship. And as society grows more wealthy, the
place of worship grows more ornate and more
elaborate. And with this growth of a priestly
class and this accompanying growth of a temple or
a church there grows a more elaborate ritual. The
simple method of the primitive age no longer satis
fies the highly developed society ; worship grows
more complex. While men are children, they
bring their gifts to God, in the spirit with which
little children bring their gifts to their parents.
The boy is thankful — he brings an apple to his
father as a token of his love ; he has done wrong
and he cannot quite get his stammering lips to say
" I am sorry," so he offers some unusual service to
his father as a token of his penitence. An offer
ing is the child's natural expression of his childish
emotion. So sacrifices grew up among men ; they

136 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
offered their gifts to God as a token of their grati
tude, or their penitence, or their desire for God's
companionship. In the primitive society these
gifts are primitive ; but when the society has grown
complex and the temple has been built and the
priestly class organized, the sacrificial system is
formulated also, and the sacrifices which were so
simple and childlike become elaborate.
But the offering becomes deeper in its signifi
cance as well as more complex in its form. In the
story of the Eall the fundamental facts of sin and
its consequences are pictorially illustrated in a
childhood story. One of the first effects of that
sin, as there illustrated, and as seen in all human
history, is a realization of the great difference
between good and evil, and a consciousness of sin,
growing out of this experience ; a sense of separa
tion from God, who is good, and a fear of him and
a desire to flee from him. In the primitive state
of society, man is comparatively innocent, because
ignorant ; he is not consciously guilty, because he
does not know enough to discriminate between the
good and the evil. But as society grows larger,
more complex, more ebullient, man grows more
subject to temptation and more liable to sin. And
with this liability to sin there grows the conscious
ness of guilt ; and with this consciousness of guilt,
a sense of the separation from God which it in
volves. For if God is good and man is evil and
man becomes conscious of this and conscious also
of the separation between good and evil, he becomes

THE CANON LAW 137
conscious of the separation between God and him
self. Thus the religious service is transformed,
not only by the growth in complexity of society,
but by the growth in moral consciousness of the
individuals who compose society. Formerly, the
father was only the leader of worship ; now the
priest becomes the necessary mediator ; men think
that they cannot go to God direct ; because of the
separation which sin has produced, they must have
some holy priest to go to him on their behalf and
in their stead. Once the altar was simply the
place where men had met God ; now the temple
comes to be regarded as the only place where they
can meet God ; they think he is nowhere else save
in this temple, under this roof, surrounded by this
incense, sung to by this choir. Once they thought
any gift would serve that was brought to God as
an expression of their good will ; now there is a
prescribed ritual and the belief that sinful man can
come to God only in the method which has been
so prescribed.
The religion of the Book of the Covenant, the
oldest book in the Bible, embodies the primitive or
childhood conception of religion ; the religion of
an age when people have not yet become deeply
conscious either of their own sin or of the holiness
of God, and therefore not deeply conscious of any
separation between themselves and God ; the reli
gion of an age when as yet the father is the natural
priest, when any place will serve as a place of
worship, when any form will serve as a means of

138 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
approach to the Father. Accordingly, in this Book
of the Covenant there is only one reference to
priests, and that in the introduction to it, unless
the declaration that the entire people shall be a
kingdom of priests belongs to the Book of the
Covenant, as probably it does belong to the epoch
which that book represents ; there is only one
reference to sacrifices, and that in connection with
the Passover, — and it is to be remembered that
the Passover sacrifice was offered by the fathers
for their families, not by the priests ; and there is
no reference to any sacred place or temple where
worship is to be conducted, and only one to an
altar ; that reference is as follows : —
" Gods of silver and gods of gold ye shall not make
unto you. An altar of earth thou shalt make unto me,
and shalt sacrifice thereon thy burnt-offerings, and thy
peace-offerings, thy sheep, and thine oxen : in every
place where I record my name I will come unto thee,
and I will bless thee. And if thou make me an altar of
stone, thou shalt not build it of hewn stone : for if thou
lift up thy tool upon it, thou hast polluted it." x
The meaning is clear : Jehovah desires no elab
oration of decoration : Let the altar be of earth
such as any man can easily cast up with a spade ;
or if the people are not satisfied with an altar of
earth, and want to make one of stone, it must be
of the simplest kind ; it must not be hewn stone ;
and they must not imagine that there is but one
1 Exod. xx. 23-25.

THE CANON LAW 139
place where acceptable worship can be offered;
wherever they are, there they may put their altar ;
wherever they are, there Jehovah will come and
bless them.1
Such are the liturgical characteristics of this
Book of the Covenant. God is a righteous God,
who demands righteousness of his children, and
demands nothing else. There is no one sacred
place — he may be worshiped anywhere ; no great
temple — an altar of earth will serve ; no priest
hood — the people is a kingdom of priests, and
any man may offer sacrifice.
But at the time when this simple religion was
set forth by Moses, the religions of the surround
ing nations were complicated and elaborate. In
Phoenicia, in Egypt, in Babylon, there were a sacred
priesthood, a holy temple, and an elaborate sacrifi
cial system. In the expressive language of Pro
fessor Rawlinson, " The Temple dominated over the
Palace and is itself dominated by the Tomb, both
the Temple and the Tomb being the expression
of religious ideas." He thus graphically de
scribes the ecclesiastical character of the com
munity in which emancipated Israel had been sub
ject. "Everywhere in Egypt gigantic structures
upreared themselves into the air, enriched with all
that Egyptian art could supply of painted and
sculptured decoration, dedicated to the honor, and
bearing the sacred name, of some divinity. The
great temple of each city was the centre of its life.
1 See Gen. xxviii. 16.

140 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
A perpetual ceremonial of the richest kind went on
within its walls, along its shady corridors, or
through its sunlit courts — long processions made
their way up or down its avenues of sphinxes —
incense floated in the air — strains of music re
sounded without pause — all that was brightest
and most costly met the eye on every side — and
the love of spectacle, if not deep religious feeling,
naturally drew to the sanctuary a continual crowd
of worshipers or spectators, consisting partly of
strangers, but mainly of the native inhabitants, to
whom the ceremonies of their own dear temple,
their pride and their joy, furnished a perpetual
delightful entertainment. At times the temple
limits were overpassed, and the sacred processions
were carried through the streets of the town,
attracting the gaze of all; or, embarking on the
waters of the Nile or of some canal derived from
it, glided with stately motion between the houses
on either side, a fairer and brighter sight than
ever. The calendar was crowded with festivals,
and a week rarely passed without the performance
of some special ceremony, possessing its own
peculiar attractions. Foreigners saw with amaze
the constant round of religious or semi-religious
ceremonies, which seemed to know no end, and to
occupy almost incessantly the main attention of
the people. Nor was the large share which re
ligion had in the outer life of the nation the sole
or the most important indication of the place which
it held in their thoughts and regards. Religion

THE CANON LAW 141
permeated the whole being of the people." x The
Hebrew slaves breathed an air of formalism.
But this religion was not ethical. It did not
concern itself with the moral life of the people.
It was purely theological and ceremonial. With
this elaborate system of religious ceremonialism
the simple religion of Mosaism, that God is a
righteous God and demands righteousness of his
children and demands nothing else, came into
uncompromising conflict. The Levitical Code, as
the literary critic interprets the Old Testament, is
the product of this conflict between the simple
principles of Mosaism and the elaborate ritualism
of paganism, much as the mediaeval religion was
the product of the conflict between the simple
teachings of Jesus Christ and the elaborate ritual
ism of pagan Rome which those teachings were
destined to supplant. If a stream of pure water is
to wash out a sewer, it can do so only by entering
the sewer. If a new life is to purify a community,
it can do so only by entering into that community,
and it must, in the very process of purifying, take
on to some extent the impurities from which it is
to cleanse the community.
In the Old Testament we can trace this process.
We see this simple religion of Mosaism — God is a
righteous God, who demands righteousness of his
children and who demands nothing else ; they may
bring their offerings where they will, as they will,
1 History of Ancient Egypt, George Rawlinson, M. A., vol. i.
pp. 321, 322.

142 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
through whose hands they will — we find this
religion entering into the life of the nation. At
first there is no temple, no one place of religious
service where alone sacrifice may be offered, no
priestly order which alone may offer sacrifice.
Gideon offers sacrifice at Ophrah ; Saul at Gilgal ;
Samuel and David at Bethlehem ; Elijah at Car
mel.1 Nor are these violations of the divine law ;
they are clearly approved — sometimes approved
by a signal revelation of the divine favor. When
Elijah, who is no priest, offers the sacrifice on
Mount Carmel, the fire falls from heaven in wit
ness that God has approved his offering. It is
clear that during all this period of their history
the children of Israel knew no law requiring all
men to go up to Jerusalem and offer their sacri
fices at the temple there, or requiring all sacrifices
to be offered by priests. As during this early
history of Israel there is no exclusive priesthood,
no temple, no definite place of worship, so there is
no elaborate ritual. The sacrifices during that
early history are, for the most part, simple thank-
offerings. Outside the Levitical code there are no
indications of offerings to atone for sin.
But the nation is growing, not only in complex
ity of life, but also in moral consciousness. Its
prophetic teachers, its providential schooling, are
not in vain. The people grow in the knowledge of
good and evil. Their appreciation of the holiness
1 Judges vi. 24 ; 1 Sam. xv. 21 ; xvi. 5 ; xx. 6 ; 1 Kings xviii.
29-38.

THE CANON LAW 143
of God is developed ; their consciousness of their
sins against him is deepened. They feel increas
ingly the moral separation between good and evil,
and therefore between a good God and an evil na
tion. At the same time they are growing, in some
other directions, not so wisely nor so well. They
mingle with other peoples and borrow from them.
They abandon the simplicity of their primitive
republicanism and adopt the monarchical system.
The nation becomes a highly organized nation,
with a standing army and a permanent civil ad
ministration. It is not strange that it borrows
from other nations religious as well as political
ideas and methods. Sometimes the people wor
ship Jehovah, but betrayed in images borrowed
from Egypt ; sometimes they substitute the wor
ship of Baal and Astarte for that of Jehovah ;
sometimes they suffer the double worship to be
carried on contemporaneously and even in the
same sacred edifice.1 Imitating their neighbors in
ecclesiastical as in civil matters, the people build a
temple, ordain a priesthood, organize a sacrificial
system, and unconsciously tend to centralize all
worship in the temple, to confine all religious func
tions to the priesthood, to eschew all forms of wor
ship not conducted according to the ritual. At
length they are carried into captivity. For seventy
years they live exiles in Babylon, separated from
their holy city, their temple, their priesthood, their
1 1 Kings xii. 28, 29 ; Judges ii. 11 ; vi. 25 ; 1 Kings xvi. 31,
32 ; xi. 5 ; 2 Kings xxiii. 13.

144 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
sacrificial system. Their religious life begins to
take on new forms. They gather together their
sacred books : the Bible grows into a recognized
collection of sacred literature. They organize
places for religious instruction and religious wor
ship without sacrifice : the synagogue is born, and
public and family prayer appear. They learn that
God is not a Palestinian God, that he is to be met
with elsewhere than in the temple of Solomon or
the city of David. Ezekiel sees a vision of Jeho
vah in the desert ; the Great Unknown beholds the
manifestation of him in the starry firmament.1
Because the people scorn their captives they scorn
their captives' gods. Jehovah is no longer merely
a God above all other gods, he is the only God ;
the gods of the pagans are for the first time called
not-gods.2 The people are learning that their God
is the God of all nations ; that all places are sacred
places ; that he may be approached by prayer with
out a sacrifice and by the layman without a priest.
The New Judaism is born, and it is, as so many
new births are, a restoration of the oldest Judaism,
a return to the truths of the Book of the Covenant,
never really accepted by the people, yet never
wholly forgotten by their greatest spiritual leaders.
At the same time, because the people are shut
off from those methods of worship to which they
have been accustomed, they long to reestablish
them. Their patriotism and their religious insti
tutions become inseparably connected. Judaism
1 Ezek. i. ; Isaiah xl. 25, 26. 2 Jer. ii. 11 ; xvi. 20.

THE CANON LAW 145
means to them a return to the Holy City, and that
means also a return to all that the Holy City con
notes — their own temple, their own priesthood,
their own liturgical system. And when the time
of the restoration comes, and they return to their
native land, many of the most deeply religious
among them are eager to rebuild the temple, re
establish the priesthood, reorganize the ancient
service. But all this tends to an excessive sacer
dotalism, and that in turn, by a natural reaction,
to vigorous protests against sacerdotalism. An
ecclesiasticism and a Puritanism grow up together.
The representatives of the ecclesiastical party urge
the rebuilding of the temple, the reconstruction of
the priesthood, and the rehabilitation of the liturgy.1
Now for the first time appears the doctrine that
sacrifice can be acceptably offered only in Jerusa
lem ; that it is profanation for any other than a
priest to offer it ; that only by sacred sacrifice so
offered in that temple can sin be atoned and the
sinful soul purified.2 But the representatives of
the Puritan party will hear nothing of all this.
They protest against it in utterances quite as vigor
ous as any of Luther's against Romanism, or any
of the Puritans of the seventeenth century against
sacerdotalism. Even before the restoration, Isaiah,
1 Hag. chap. i. See Ezra passim.
2 Deut. xii. 6, 11, 14, 26 ; 2 Chron. vii. 12 ; Lev. xvii. 4, 8, 9 ;
xvii. 11, with Heb. ix. 22; 2 Chron. xxvi. 18-21. Uzziah 's (or Aza-
riah's) punishment for offering sacrifice is not mentioned in Kings :
2 Kings xiv. 21, 22.

146 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
one of the greatest of the prophets, sees the growth
of this ecclesiasticism contemporaneously with the
moral deterioration of the nation, and protests
against it. He says : —
" Hear the word of the Lord, ye rulers of Sodom ; give
ear unto the law of our God, ye people of Gomorrah.
To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto
me ? saith the Lord : I am full of the burnt offerings of
rams, and the fat of fed beasts ; and I delight not in
the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he-goats. When
ye come to appear before me, who hath required this at
your hand, to trample my courts ? Bring no more vain
oblations ; incense is an abomination unto me ; new
moon and sabbath, the calling of assemblies, — I cannot
away with iniquity and the solemn meeting. Your new
moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth : they
are a trouble unto me ; I am weary to bear them. And
when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes
from you : yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not
hear : your hands are full of blood. Wash you, make
you clean ; put away the evil of your doings from be
fore mine eyes ; cease to do evil : learn to do well ; seek
judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless,
plead for the widow." x
Amos, the first of the great prophets whose writ
ten utterances have been preserved to us, is equally
explicit, and in one respect even more so, as in the
following passage : —
" I hate, I despise your feasts, and I will take no de
light in your solemn assemblies. Yea, though ye offer
1 Isa. i. 10-17.

THE CANON LAW 147
me your burnt offerings and meal offerings, I will not
accept them : neither will I regard the peace offerings
of your fat beasts. Take thou away from me the noise
of thy songs ; for I will not hear the melody of thy
viols. But let judgment roll down as waters, and
righteousness as a mighty stream." *
He does not believe that this liturgical system
dates from the days of Moses. He says : —
" Did ye bring unto me sacrifices and offerings in the
wilderness forty years, O house of Israel ? " 2
Jeremiah is still more explicit in his affirmation
that this sacrificial system is not a revival of Mosa
ism but a corruption of it : —
" Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel : Add
your burnt offerings unto your sacrifices, and eat ye
flesh. For I spake not unto your fathers, nor com
manded them in the day that I brought them out of the
land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices :
but this thing I commanded them, saying, Hearken
unto my voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be
my people : and walk ye in all the way that I command
you, that it may be well with you." 8
l Amos v. 21-24. 2 Ibid. v. 25.
8 Jer. vii. 21-23. The conservative or traditional critics quote
Jer. xxxiii. 18 as evidence that Jeremiah means by his language
here, not to deny that God commanded sacrifices through Moses,
but only, as Dr. C. von Orelli puts it, to deny " that sacrifice was
the motive or occasion, and so the substantive content of God's
legislation." The Prophecies of Jeremiah, by Dr. C. von Orelli,
p. 78. The same interpretation is more fully given in the Bible
Commentary on Jer. vii. 21-23. The interpretation which I ac
cept is the one adopted by the modern school, as by George Adam
Smith, for example, who says that Jeremiah " distinctly declares
that in the wilderness God prescribed no ritual to Israel." The
Book of the Twelve Prophets, vol. i. p. 171, note. See also p. 104.

148 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
That Amos and Jeremiah were correct, that the
Levitical system does not date from the days of
Moses, that it is no part of that simple, primitive
religion which finds its exposition in the Book of
the Covenant, appears absolutely certain to the
literary or scientific student of the Bible. This
appears to him clear from the inconsistency of the
Levitical code in its form and to some extent in its
spirit with the Book of the Covenant, admittedly
the oldest and most authentic interpretation of the
spirit of Moses and his teaching ; from its palpable
ill-adaptedness to the nomadic life in the wilder
ness ; from the fact that it was not only disre
garded during all the earlier history of Israel, but
disregarded with never a sign of divine disapproval,
and sometimes with explicit signs of divine ap
proval ; from the nature of the ritual itself, and
its kinship in form with that of pagan peoples ;
from the testimony of the great prophets already
cited ; and from the further consideration to be
pointed out that it has unmistakably served its pur
pose, and is now no longer recognized as an integral
part of Judaism by any considerable number of
Jewish teachers.
The literary or scientific student does not, then,
believe that the Levitical code embodies a divinely
ordained system revealed to Moses, super naturally
preserved, and intended, either in itself or as a fore
shadowing of the divine sacrifice, to be of eternal
value to the human race. But neither does he
believe it to be of pagan origin, an impediment to

THE CANON LAW 149
the growth of the human race, because a mere cor
ruption of spiritual religion. We are not left to
reject as wholly false every religious movement
which is not wholly true. The Puritans were mis
taken in thinking that there is no place in God's
kingdom for a Quaker no-ritual; the Cavaliers
were mistaken in thinking that there is no place
for a Puritan no-ritual ; the Roman Catholics were
mistaken in the Middle Ages in thinking that there
is no place for a Protestant no-ritual. And the
Quakers, the Puritans, and the Protestants were
equally mistaken in thinking that there is no place
in God's world for the ritual which they sometimes
hated and sometimes scorned. For God opens
more doors to himself than we imagine, and lets us
come to him by what pathway we will : with in
cense or without incense ; with candles and an altar
or with communion-table and no altar ; through the
expression of the silent prayer, or through the ex
pression of the Book of Common Prayer, or through
the expression of the Roman ritual in the eleva
tion of the host.
The Levitical code, then, in the form in which
we now find it in the Bible is not, — to this conclu
sion 1 have been endeavoring to conduct the reader,
— a divine and eternal order of worship, nor yet
the revelation of a divine and eternal principle of
worship ; it is the codification of ecclesiastical cus
toms which had grown up through eight or nine
centuries of Jewish life ; it borrowed most of its
form and some portion of its underlying theological

150 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
conception from pagan religions. Yet it was not
wholly Jewish, neither was it wholly pagan ; it was
a combination of paganism and Mosaism, a graft
of the former upon the latter, or the transformation
of the former by the spirit of the latter. But the
customs embodied in this code furnished a protec
tion to the religion of Israel at a time when a more
purely spiritual and less formal religion would not
have sufficed for that purpose. It had within it
self, as we shall see, elements which insured its
destruction when it had served its purpose ; that
purpose was to furnish a bridge across which a
people not fully emancipated might pass from pa
ganism, which is founded on the fear of the gods,
to Mosaism, which is founded on reverence for the
one and only God, and so to Christianity, which is
founded on God's love for man and the possibility
of man's spiritual union with him.
There are two methods by which a great reform
may be accomplished, — the iconoclastic and the
constructive. Politically France illustrates the one
method, England the other. In both countries had
grown up a feudal system ; France destroyed it in
a single revolution, gathered the people in a general
assembly, and undertook to build from the founda
tion a republic consecrated to liberty, equality, and
fraternity. England in successive epochs poured
a new and popular spirit into her old forms : she
retained the crown as a symbol of the nation, but
without political power ; the prime minister, but
made him the people's servant; the Parliament,

THE CANON LAW 151
but centralized its authority in the House of Com
mons, that is, of the common people. The French
seemed at the time the more expeditious ; the
English has proved the more efficacious. The con
trast between Puritanism and Episcopacy illustrates
the same principle in the religious realm. Puri
tanism repudiated the bishops, dissolved the old
ecclesiastical organization, set aside the altar, the
liturgy, and the priesthood, made of the temple a
meeting-house, treated the minister as only a lay
man intrusted with a temporary function, resolved,
in a word, to dispense with everything which
the mediaeval church held dear, because every
thing which it held dear had been corrupted to
base uses. Episcopalianism retained the bishop,
but bereft him of his autocratic powers; called
her clergy priests, but refused to regard them as
necessary mediators between the laity and God;
retained the altar, but not the sacrifice of the mass ;
preserved the ritual, but set it to new uses. The
Reformation was not less in the Episcopal than in
the Puritan churches ; the one was not less than
the other the vehicle of a new spirit. Both methods
of reform are legitimate ; each has its perils. The
dangers of the radical method are those of revolu
tion and reaction ; the dangers of the conservative
method are those of unconscious return through
the old forms to the old evils which they embodied.
The history of Israel illustrates both of these
methods. The paganism which surrounded Israel
was thoroughly false: false in its conception of

152 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
God as an unmoral force ; false in its notion
that he is a God of wrath and must be appeased
by blood ; false in its notion that his favor can
be secured by sacrifice ; false in its notion that he
calls on his children for any other offering than to
do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with
him. There were two ways in which this falsity
might be overthrown. One was the way of the
prophets, the Hebrew Puritans, the radicals of
that age. It was directly to attack the ceremonial
system ; to affirm, as one Hebrew Psalmist did, that
God desires not sacrifices ; as Isaiah did, that he did
not require them ; as Amos did, that he despised
feast days and incense and would not accept their
offerings ; as Micah did, that he required nothing
but justice, mercy, and humility.1 The other way
was that of the priests, the ecclesiastics, the church
men of that age. It was to accept the spiritual
truth of Mosaism and pour it into the formal
ism which had been borrowed, but modified, from
the pagan nations, and make paganism itself the
vehicle of divine truth. This method gave birth to
the Levitical code ; which was like the pagan cere
monialism in that it prescribed a temple, an altar,
a priesthood, a sacrificial system, but which was
unlike the pagan code in five very important
particulars. I. In pagan countries the ecclesiastical system,
with its priests, its temple, and its worship, was
independent of the people. The Church was a
1 Psalm li. 16 ; Isa i. 11-15 ; Amos v. 21, 22 ; Micah vi. 6-8.

THE CANON LAW 153
department of the State and supported out of the
revenues of the State. The priests were State
officials ranking next to the king himself, if not
outranking him. In Egypt a considerable portion
of the land, perhaps as much as one third, was
made over to the priestly class ; sacred slaves be
longing to the priests cultivated the lands for
them ; their estates were exempt from taxation ;
their wealth was continually augmented by the
voluntary gifts of the devout or the more reluctant
contributions of the superstitious ; they were, in
short, the wealthiest, as they were the most privi
leged, class in the country.1 A similar independ
ence of the church was manifested far down into
European history. In mediaeval Europe the church
was supported by payments for ecclesiastical ser
vices, which, at first voluntary, became compulsory ;
by tithes collected by force of law like other taxes ;
and by rentals of land, from one tenth to one fifth
of which, in the time of Henry VIII., even in
England, had passed into the possession of the
ecclesiastics.2 In the Levitical church the priests
could own no land ; the church was not supported
by the State ; the offerings which sustained it were
voluntary. It is true that the Levitical code fixed
on one tenth of the agricultural produce as a proper
proportion to be given to the support of the church,3
but there was no means of collecting this tenth
1 Rawlinson' s History of Ancient Egypt, i. 449, 450.
2 Hallam's Constitutional History of England, chap. ii.
8 Lev. xxvii. 30-32 ; Deut. xiv. 22-28.

154 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
from those who did not choose to give it. The
Levitical church was dependent on the free-will
offerings of the people, enforced only by public
sentiment. II. As the support of the church was not com
pulsory, so neither were its services. The pagan
code made sacrifice obligatory. To refuse to sacri
fice to the gods was to hazard one's fortune, one's
family, one's life. But the Levitical code declares
that all offerings must be the free-will gift of the
worshiper. " He shall offer it of his own voluntary
will at the door of the tabernacle," is the provision
of the code in its introductory paragraph.1 It is
true that our revised version gives a radically
different translation: "He shall offer it at the
door of the tent of meeting that he may be accepted
before the Lord." It is doubtful which of these
translations is correct : whether the meaning is
that the worshiper shall offer a sacrifice which is
acceptable to the Lord, — that is, in accordance with
God's will ; or whether he shall offer one that is
acceptable to himself, — that is, of his own free
will. But whichever of these translations we accept
as correct, there is no doubt that the former epi
tomizes the spirit of the Levitical code. Its
provisions, as my brother, the late Dean of the
New York University Law School, once said to
me, are regulative, not mandatory, and no lawyer
would think of interpreting them otherwise. They
regulate customs already existing ; they do not
1 Lev. i. 3.

THE CANON LAW 155
require a service now first prescribed. " If," says
the code, " his offering be a burnt sacrifice of the
herd, let him offer a male without blemish. ... If
his offering be of the flocks, ... he shall bring it
a male without blemish. ... If the burnt sacrifice
for his offering to the Lord be of fowls, then he
shall bring his offering of turtle-doves, or of young
pigeons. ... If thou bring an oblation of a meat
offering baken in the oven, it shall be unleavened
cakes mingled with oil, or unleavened wafers
anointed with oil." All is voluntary ; all is con
ditioned on the free will of the worshiper. The
offerer may bring or not ; though, if he brings, the
code defines certain qualities of the gift and what
shall be done with it. The reader will search in
vain in the Levitical code for any penalty pro
nounced against the non-worshiper, and the history
of Israel in vain for any penalty inflicted on one
for refusing to worship.
III. This voluntary character of the sacrificial
system of the Levitical code is emphasized and the
principle involved in it is carried out in another
principle of that code which is even more important,
and is in quite as striking a contrast with the sacri
ficial systems of the pagan religions : the offerings
were inexpensive. In paganism the value of the
sacrifice was estimated by its cost. Thousands of
cattle, costly incense, prisoners taken captive in
war, sometimes the child of the worshiper, were
offered as sacrifices. The aim was to appease the
wrath of the gods, or to satisfy their supposed

156 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
insatiable desire, and nothing was esteemed too
precious for this purpose. The prevented sacrifice
of Isaac by Abraham, the accomplished sacrifice of
his daughter by Jephtha, the legendary self-sacri
fice of Curtius to save Rome from the widening
chasm which threatened to engulf it, are illustra
tions familiar to every reader of this character
of sacrifice prior to or outside the influence of
Mosaism. The oft-quoted text of Micah, "Will
Jehovah be pleased with thousands of rams, or
with ten thousands of rivers of oil ? Shall I give
my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my
body for the sin of my soul?" refers doubtless to
this pagan conception of sacrifice, with which hia
hearers were only too familiar.
The spirit of the Levitical code was wholly
opposed to this conception. Human sacrifice was
unknown ; hecatombs were unknown ; the value
of sacrifice was never measured by its costliness.
It was true that the worshiper must not bring to
God the lame, the halt, the blind ; that is, he must
not offer to God what he would offer to no one
else, because that would be no true offering, but
mere false pretense. But so that it was without
blemish he might bring what offering he would, —
a bullock, a lamb, a goat, a pair of doves, a sheaf
of wheat. The value of the offering depended, not
on its cost, but on the experience which it repre
sented. The three divine experiences of a soul
toward its God were all recognized in the Levitical
code, and each was represented by its appointed

THE CANON LAW 157
expression. The worshiper might come to the
temple conscious of sin and desiring to express his
penitence ; then he brought a sin-offering or a
trespass-offering. He might come with a desire
to renew his consecration to God and reaffirm his
purpose to devote his life to God's service ; then
he brought a burnt offering, the consumption of
which by fire represented his purpose to offer to
Jehovah all that he had. He might come with a
heart full of gladness and a desire to express his
gratitude to and his joy in the Lord ; then he
brought a peace-offering or a thank-offering. The
offerings were classified, not according to their
costliness, but according to the expression which
they represented ; and if they did not represent
the real and vital experience, no cost in the offering
could make it acceptable to Jehovah. A single
quotation from this code will serve to illustrate this
general principle : —
" If a soul sin, and commit a trespass against the Lord,
and lie unto his neighbor in that which was delivered
him to keep, or in fellowship, or in a thing taken away
by violence, or hath deceived his neighbor ; or have
found that which was lost, and lieth concerning it, and
sweareth falsely ; in any of all these that a man doeth,
sinning therein : then it shall be, because he hath sinned
and is guilty, that he shall restore that which he took
violently away, or the thing which he hath deceitfully
gotten, or that which was delivered him to keep, or the
lost thing which he found, or all that about which he
hath sworn falsely ; he shall even restore it in the prin-

158 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
cipal, and shall add the fifth part more thereto, and
give it unto him to whom it appertaineth, in the day of
his trespass offering. And he shall bring his trespass
offering unto the Lord, a ram without blemish out of the
flock, with thy estimation, for a trespass offering, unto
the priest : and the priest shall make an atonement for
him before the Lord : and it shall be forgiven him for
anything of all that he hath done in trespassing there-

Sacrifice did not take the place of righteousness.
Before the sin-offering could be given to the Lord,
reparation must be made to the one who had been
wronged. Two centuries after this code had been
formulated, Christ said to his disciples, " If thou
bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest
that thy brother hath aught against thee ; leave
there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way ;
first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come
and offer thy gift." 2 He did but give expression
in a slightly different form to the essential princi
ple embodied in this ecclesiastical code — that resto
ration must precede sacrifice. So far as we know
the history of those times, no such abuse ever grew
up under the Levitical code as that form of indul
gence which aroused the indignation of Luther in
the sixteenth century.
IV. Still more important is another principle
contained in this code, so radical that I suspect its
statement here will arouse the suspicion, if it does
not evoke the stout denial, of the reader : the sac-
1 Lev. vi. 2-7. 2 Matt. v. 23, 24.

THE CANON LAW 159
rifices of the Levitical code were never offered to
satisfy the wrath of God, nor as a substitute for
penalty pronounced against sin, nor as a means of
securing divine pardon and a restoration of divine
favor. Sacrifice and penalty are never connected
in the Old Testament ; sacrifices are never offered
by the sinner as a means of securing remission of
penalty. The Levitical sacrifice was a means for
the purification of the sinner, not for the pacifica
tion of Jehovah.1 The curious ceremonial which,
according to this code, accompanied and distin
guished the so-called Day of Atonement illustrates
in a striking manner this principle. On that day,
from two goats brought out before the congregation,
one was selected by lot as a sacrifice to Jehovah,
the other as a scapegoat. The first was killed be
fore the Lord; on the head of the other — the
scapegoat — -the sins of the people were laid in
confession by the priest, and he was then led off
into the wilderness, that so he might " bear upon
him all their iniquities to a solitary land," — a land
from which he could never return to bring back to
the people the sins from which they were thus de
livered.2 The significance of this primitive object-
lesson should be as clear to us now as it was to the
people then. In it there was no suggestion of a
1 Lev. xvii. 11, " it is the blood that maketh an atonement for
the soul," will be regarded by some as an exception to this state
ment. If so it stands alone ; but I do not think it is an exception ;
there is nothing in the phraseology that implies the pacification of
an angry God.
2 Lev. xvi.

160 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
wrath to be appeased, or a penalty to be escaped ;
its suggestion was sin removed and a people set
free from its burden. The object of sin-offering
in paganism was always to appease the wrath of the
gods ; in the Levitical system, to purify the soul of
the worshiper. In paganism sacrifice was a means
of escape from penalty ; in Leviticalism, a means of
escape from sin.
V. Finally, the Levitical code provided for its
own destruction. In that code it was expressly
provided that sacrifice could be offered only in the
temple at Jerusalem by the priests. In the begin
ning, as we have seen, this was not the case : sac
rifice might be offered anywhere by any devout
soul.1 Whatever the intent of the framer of this
exclusive provision, its providential intent is clearly
indicated by the result which it produced. When
the city of Jerusalem was captured and the temple
destroyed, the entire sacrificial system and the en
tire hierarchy organized to administer it came to
an end. Both have now entirely disappeared from
Judaism. Not a trace is left behind of either altar,
sacrifice, or priest. The simple and fundamental
principles of the early Mosaism remain — the faith
that God is a righteous God, and demands right
eousness of his children and demands nothing else.
But no Jew offers sacrifice ; no Jewish priest con
ducts worship ; no Jewish altar or temple exists in
all the world. No longer anywhere is heard the
lowing of cattle, the bleating of sheep, the cooing
1 Compare Lev. xvii. 4, 8, 9, with Exod. xx. 24.

THE CANON LAW 161
of doves, no longer anywhere are seen the rivers of
blood in connection with any worship of the one
God such as characterized the temple at Jerusalem.
The sacrificial code has served its temporary pur
pose and has perished absolutely, leaving in Juda
ism no remnant in existing institutions even to
memorialize it.
It is true that some remnants of this sacrificial
system have passed over into the Christian church.
They are seen in the bloodless sacrifice of the
mass in the Roman Church and in some Anglican
churches, and in clauses stating in terms a sacrificial
theory of the atonement in some Protestant creeds.
Occasionally still is heard the doctrine, supposed to
have been foreshadowed by the Levitical code, that
a great sacrifice has been offered once for all as a
means of satisfying divine justice, if not of appeas
ing divine wrath and securing a purchased pardon
which God cannot consistently grant without an
innocent victim to bear the penalty which of right
should be inflicted upon the guilty. But this rem
nant of an ancient ritual gradually disappears be
fore the growing faith in the love of God, as the
snows even in the remoter crevices of the rock
are melted by the spring sun; gradually we are
learning that sacrifice is not a means by which
penitence secures pardon, but the method by which
mercy confers life. It is not the child's sacrifice
which wins forgiveness from the mother ; it is the
mother's sacrifice which wins repentance from the
child. It is not the sacrifice offered by man, or on

162 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
his behalf, which purchases remission of penalty
from a righteous judge ; it is the sacrifice offered
by God and on his behalf which achieves remission
of sin for the repentant sinner. Slowly, very
slowly, we are learning the meaning veiled in that
solemn and splendid story miscalled the sacrifice
of Isaac, — " God will provide himself the lamb for
a burnt offering, my son." x
In Homer, to ward off a pestilence which Phoe
bus, in her wrath, has sent upon the Greeks, " the
wise Ulysses " offers up a
" hallowed hecatomb
To Pluebus, for the Greeks ; that so the god
Whose wrath afflicts us sore may be appeased."
In the Fourth Gospel the Apostle John declares
that " God so loved the world that he gave his only be
gotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not
perish but have everlasting life."
In the pagan conception God is wrathful ; in the
Christian conception God is love. In the pagan
conception man is wiser and better than the gods
who are destroying him ; in the Christian concep
tion man is destroying himself by his own igno
rance and sin. In the pagan conception the sacrifice
is offered by man to the gods ; in the Christian
conception it is offered by God for man. In the
pagan conception the peril comes from God to
man, the sacrifice goes from man to God ; in the
' x Gen. xxii. 8.

THE CANON LAW 163
Christian conception the peril comes from man to
himself, the salvation comes from God for man,
through God's act of se£/*-sacrifice. The history of
sacrifice in the Old Testament is the history of the
process by which the pagan conception was trans
formed into the Christian conception ; the Levitical
Code is the bridge by which Israel passed over
from the pagan belief that sacrifice is a condition
of forgiveness which God exacts, to the Christian
doctrine that self-sacrifice is the method by which
God confers forgiveness.

CHAPTER VII
HEBREW FICTION
The suggestion that there are works of fiction
in the Bible certainly at one time would have
aroused protest, if not resentment, and it is possi
ble that there may still linger in the minds of
some a remnant of this feeling. It is largely due
to two reasons. The first is an impression that
the suggestion of fiction in the Bible has been
invented by those who desire to eliminate from it
the supernatural. Doubtless it is true that there
are some critics who desire to eliminate the super
natural from the Bible, and who therefore seek to
show that everything which seems to be super
natural is imaginative. This is not the scientific,
it is not the literary, spirit.1 The true scientific
spirit does not assume that there can be nothing
supernatural in life ; it studies life to ascertain
1 Dean Farrar's statement of his own position on this subject
may be accepted as an admirable definition of the general position
of all evangelical scholars of the modern or evolutionary school.
He says : " I withhold my credence from no occurrence — how
ever much it may be called ' miraculous ' — which is adequately
attested ; which was wrought for adequate ends ; and which is in
accordance with the revealed laws of God's immediate dealing
with man." The Bible, by F. W. Farrar, D. D, F. K. S., p. 241.

HEBREW FICTION 165
what is in it. The truly literary spirit does not
assume that there is nothing supernatural in litera
ture ; it studies literature to ascertain what is its
character and what are the motive and purpose
of each author. No literary critic would think of
classifying the story of the resurrection of Jesus
Christ among works of fiction or imagination. He
might think the narrative incorrect, but he would
not doubt that it belongs among historical works
— that is, that the authors believed that they were
narrating facts. The mere circumstance that an
incident narrated in the Old Testament is extraor
dinary does not afford the slightest indication that
it is fiction. The question whether any narrative
is history or fiction is not identical with the ques
tion whether it is true or false. The literary clas
sification of a narrative depends upon the motive
of the author, not upon the accuracy of the narra
tive. The author of fiction gives free play to his
imagination, and his work is not the less fictitious
because he interweaves some historical truth with
his imaginative narrative ; the historian assumes
to narrate facts, and his work is history despite
the fact that he may be misled into the most seri
ous errors in his narrative. Herodotus is a writer
of history ; although Macaulay assures us that
"he is from the first to the last chapter an in
ventor." Dumas is a writer of fiction ; although
his editor affirms that " contemporary authority
can be cited for every anecdote or incident not di
rectly connected with the distinctively romantic

166 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
portions of the narrative." The question whether
any particular narrative in the Old Testament —
the Book of Jonah, for example — is history or
fiction is not to be determined by considering
whether the book contains extraordinary events,
but by considering the question whether its gen
eral spirit and structure are such as to justify the
belief that the author thought himself narrating
facts as they actually occurred, or whether he con
sciously gave a free rein to his imagination as he
wrote. A second reason for the objection to the sugges
tion that there is fiction in the Bible is a remnant
of a Puritan prejudice which everywhere except in
its relation to the Bible has long since disappeared.
The Puritans opposed all manifestations of the im
agination. They destroyed the pictured windows
in the churches ; took down the pictures from the
walls of the houses ; broke in pieces the statues in
the niches; closed the doors of the theatres and
forbade the drama ; and banished the works of
fiction from their tables. No doubt some readers
of this article can remember, in their own child
hood days, how novels of every description were
looked upon askance, if not with absolute reproba
tion, in their own circles. We have emerged into
an epoch in which this banishing of the imagina
tion is no longer permitted because it is no longer
necessary. We admit the pictured windows to the
churches ; we hang pictures on the walls of our
houses ; we have replaced the statues even of

HEBREW FICTION 167
pagan deities in their niches, reopened the doors
of the theatres, and novels lie on all our tables.
In brief, we recognize the fact that imagination is
a divinely given faculty, not to be suppressed, but
to be freely used. Why, then, should we think it
strange that God should have used the same fac
ulty in the education of the Hebrew race? If
to-day it is one of his instruments for the develop
ment of humanity, why should we think it impos
sible that in the olden time he should have inspired
men to use their imagination for the moral and
spiritual culture of the race ?
In truth, the works of imagination have a very
high and a very varied service to perform. Fiction
is, in the first place, entertaining and gives rest.
The little child, left alone at night by the mother,
whispers softly to itself a story and so talks itself
to sleep ; when we have lost the imagination of
our childhood, we ask some genius who still retains
it to tell us his story, that he may sweep out of our
minds for a little while the cares and perplexities
of our busy day, that in his narrative we may find
rest and refreshment. Fiction is sometimes a valu
able vehicle for the conveyance of instruction. It
is true that there are critics who say that a work
of imagination never should be didactic ; but who
would banish from literature Bunyan's " Pilgrim's
Progress," or " Oliver Twist," or " Put Yourself in
His Place" because they are didactic? Some of
the greatest of our novelists have written for the
purpose of illustrating truth, moral, religious, or

168 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
sociological. Fiction is descriptive and interpre
tative. The imagination tells us much of life with
which otherwise we should be unfamiliar. If we
desire pictures of old-time life we shall find them
more vivid in " Henry Esmond," " Lorna Doone,"
or " Quentin Durward," than in Green's " History
of England ; " because the novelist has a free hand
with which to picture the life that he desires to set
before us. If we desire to know how the other half
of the world lives, we shall find it more vividly por
trayed in such a novel as Walter Besant's "All
Sorts and Conditions of Men " than in such a sta
tistical work as Charles Booth's " Labor and the
Poor in London." Fiction is interpretative of life
as well as descriptive of it. The great novelist
understands the principles of human nature and
portrays them — not philosophically, not psycho
logically, but dramatically ; so that by sharing his
imagination we share his understanding. If he be
really a great dramatist, he realizes not only the
outer life, but the moral forces which are at work
in the world, and he so portrays life that those
moral forces appear before us; he does not so
much give instruction as impart life through the
ministry of life. It would be a mistake to say that
Shakespeare wrote " Macbeth " to show the evils
of ambition, or " Othello " to show the evils of
jealousy, or " Hamlet " to show the evils of irreso
lution ; but, none the less, the great interpreter of
human life could not tell the story of jealousy, of
ambition, or of irresolution without making us feel,

HEBREW FICTION 169
rather than see, their evil. Thus fiction not only
entertains, instructs, describes, interprets, but in
spires ; by showing noble life, it quickens noble
life in us ; by showing ignoble life, it inspires us
with hate against what is ignoble.
Fiction in the Old Testament serves all these
purposes. Some of these Hebrew stories are vastly
entertaining. If one doubts it, let him read the
Old Testament story of Daniel or Samson or
Elijah to a group of children ; he will find them
not less interested than they would be in any story
to be found in Greek or Roman literature. Some
of these Hebrew stories are didactic, written for
the purpose of conveying moral instruction ; the
parables of Christ are preeminently so. Some
of them are simply descriptive. We get, for in
stance, from the account of Eliezer's courtship of
Rebecca for his master's son J a better picture of
the way in which courtships were conducted in
patriarchal times than we could possibly get from
accurate history. We find in these stories, also,
interpretations of life ; love and jealousy, joy and
sorrow, courage and cowardice, virtue struggling
with vice and vanquishing it, vice struggling with
virtue and vanquishing it, all this we find por
trayed with moral simplicity nowhere surpassed,
with dramatic power never degenerating into the
melodramatic. In them all, with the entertain
ment, the didactic teaching, the description of ex
ternal life, the portrayal of character, we find life
1 Gen. chap. xxiv.

170 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
imparted through life ; and therefore in them all
we can discover that inspiration which is more than
instruction. It is a mistake to think, as men of
the Puritan temperament have sometimes seemed
to think, that all life comes through the intellect,
and that we must understand before we can re
ceive. A great deal comes through the sympa
thies, the emotions, the imagination, and through
these the writer of fiction often addresses himself
to us more effectively than either the historian,
the philosopher, or the moralist.
A single illustration taken from the Book of
Judges will serve to demonstrate to the more con
servative reader that there is some fiction in the
Old Testament. It is the parable of the trees,
and reads as follows : —
" The trees went forth on a time to anoint a king
over them : and they said unto the ofive-tree, Reign
thou over us. But the olive-tree said unto them, Should
I leave my fatness, wherewith by me they honor God
and man, and go to be promoted over the trees ? And
the trees said to the fig-tree, Come thou, and reign over
us. But the fig-tree said unto them, Should I forsake
my sweetness, and my good fruit, and go to be pro
moted over the trees ? Then said the trees unto the
vine, Come thou, and reign over us. And the vine said
unto them, Should I leave my wine, which cheereth God
and man, and go to be promoted over the trees ? Then
said all the trees unto the bramble, Come thou, and
reign over us. And the bramble said unto the trees,
If in truth ye anoint me king over you, then come
and put your trust in my shadow : and if not, let fire

HEBREW FICTION 171
come out of the bramble, and devour the cedars of
Lebanon." '
No one will doubt that this is fiction. And yet
it would be quite as possible for God to make a
tree that could talk as an ass that could talk, or a
big fish that could swallow a man and a man that
could live three days and three nights in the belly
of the big fish. There is no question of possible or
impossible with God. Our question always must
be, not what God can do, but what it is reasonable
to believe that he has done. We believe that this
parable of the trees is fiction, because it has the
qualities of fiction, because it is more reasonable to
suppose that the author invented the story to serve
as the vehicle of a moral, than to suppose that God
created talking trees and brought them together in
a quasi-political convention for that purpose. This
parable, therefore, not only illustrates the truth
that there is fiction in the Old Testament, but it
indicates the method by which we are to determine
what is fiction and what is history.
All readers recognize that the parables in the
Bible are fiction ; many of them are less ready to
recognize its folk-lore.2 By folk-lore I mean the
1 Judges ix. 8-15.
2 Mrs. L. S. Houghton has recently published in the N. Y.
Evangelist an admirable series of Studies in the Old Testament
which, doubtless, will be republished in book form. Two of them
are devoted to " Folk Lore in the Old Testament." Folk lore
she defines as " the narrative of events passed along from lip to
lip down through the ages." As illustrations of such stories, of
which the inspired writers have made use, she specifies Joshua's

172 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
stories which mothers tell their children, and which
pass from generation to generation, sometimes in
later history printed, sometimes never reduced to
print ; all peoples have such folk-lore, and the
Hebrew people had theirs. Such were some of
the stories subsequently incorporated in the Book
of Genesis ; such some of the tales respecting
Elisha ; such, probably, the account of the boy
hood exploits of King David ; such, certainly, the
story of Samson.
Samson lived in the colonial days of Israel, when
there was no king, and every man did what was
right in his own eyes. His birth was heralded by
an angelic messenger ; he was consecrated to the
life of a Nazarite from his cradle by his mother ;
he drank no wine, ate no grapes, suffered the locks
of his hair to go uncut, and in his youth gave
token of that extraordinary strength which has
since rendered his name proverbial.
We first meet this Hebrew unheroic hero on
his way to Timnath. A Philistine maiden has
captured his fancy by her beauty, and, despite the
law, the protests of his parents, the mission to
which he is called by God as deliverer of his peo
ple, to Timnath he will go. The Philistine maiden
plays the coquette with him, cajoles him out of his
secret, and tells to his Philistine guests the answer
staying of the sun and moon, the story of Samson, certain of the
Elijah and Elisha stories, certain of the narratives in Genesis
which the element of folk lore enters into and modifies, and many
other of the Biblical narratives.

HEBREW FICTION 173
to the riddle which he has proposed. To pay his
wager of thirty changes of raiment he goes alone
across the country and takes the raiment from a
Philistine city; but his pride is wounded by the
deceit which has been practiced upon him, and
when the Philistine coquette marries one of the
guests who had come to his betrothal, he catches
three hundred jackals,1 ties them together two by
two by the tails, fastens a firebrand to each pair,
and lets them loose in the harvest season to set
fire to the Philistines' standing wheat. Then,
when the Philistines, with singular injustice, visit
their wrath on the bride and her father, putting
her to death, Samson, with characteristic fickle
ness, smites them hip and thigh with a great
slaughter. We next find him in the hands of
more formidable foes. When the Philistines come
up to avenge their wrongs on the nation which -
shelters Samson, and the Israelites deliver him
1 " Many interpreters, reflecting that the solitary habits of the
fox would make it very difficult to catch such a number, and that
Samson's great strength would be of no avail in such an under
taking, suppose that the author meant jackals, which roam in
packs, and could easily, it is said, be caught by the hundred.
That the Hebrew name may have included jackals as well as
foxes is quite possible ; the Arabs are said in some places to con
found the jackal with the fox, and in the modern Egyptiau dialect
the classical name of the fox is given exclusively to the jackal.
The decision of the question is of importance only to those who
take the story as a veracious account of an actual occurrence.
They should consider, however, whether the author would thank
them for their attempts to make Samson's wonderful perform
ance easy." Judges : in the International Critical Commentary, by
George Foot Moore, p. 341.

174 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
bound into their hands, he submits without oppo
sition, only to break the cords which bind him,
leap upon his would-be captors with a shout, and
slay a thousand of them with his own hands, with
no other weapon than the jaw-bone of an ass, and
afterwards celebrates his exploit with a running
couplet : — " With the jaw-bone of an ass,
I assailed my assailants ;
With the jaw-bone of an ass,
Have I slain a thousand men." 1
Twenty years later we meet him in Gaza, a Phi
listine city, whither, still yielding himself a slave to
his unbridled self-will and self-indulgent spirit, he
has gone in pursuit of a Philistine woman. The
Philistines close the gates and set a watch to catch
him at the dawn. At midnight he goes out, takes
the gates and posts upon his back and carries them
off, in scornful disdain of their boasted strength.
Such a man, weak in the conceit of his own strength,
never learns life's lessons. He falls in with an
other Philistine woman, sets his heart upon her,
and, with a folly for which there is no palliation,
walks open-eyed into the trap the treacherous Deli
lah has set for him. She undertakes to get from
him the secret of his superhuman strength. Three
times he mocks her with lying answers ; three times
discovers her treachery, and, despite it all, at last
1 Judges xv. 16. There is a play upon the Hebrew word which
means both ass and heap that cannot be imitated in the English ;
as though be had said, " With the jaw-bone of an ass, asses on
asses, have I slain a thousand men."

HEBREW FICTION 175
tells her the secret, lies down to sleep with his head
upon her lap, to awake, his vow broken, his locks
shaven, his strength gone, and himself an easy prey
to his enemies. In servitude he learns that lesson
of self-denial which he would learn nowhere else,
grinds away in the prison-house of his foes, little
by little gathers his strength, and in one last bar
baric yet heroic effort brings down the temple of
the Philistines' god, Dagon, upon himself and upon
the worshipers assembled to exult over him.
This story, found anywhere but in Hebrew lit
erature, we should assume to be that half-fiction,
half-history of which such stories in primitive lit
erature are always composed ; not only we should,
we do assume it to be such ; for the story of Samson
in Hebrew literature and the story of Hercules in
Greek literature remarkably parallel each other.1
To the same Semitic origin both names are traced
by linguists. Both are men of extraordinary
strength ; of both specifically the same traditions
are told ; both slay a lion with their own hands ;
both suffer death, though in different ways, at the
hands of their treacherous wives. One, a captive in
Philistia, summoned to make sport for his enemies,
pulls down the Temple of Dagon, and buries him
self and the Philistines under its ruins ; the other,
a captive in Egypt, led forth to be sacrificed to
Jupiter, breaks the bands which bind him, and
1 See the parallel traced in detail by Professor George F.
Moore in his commentary on Judges, The International Critical
Commentary, pp. 364, 365.

176 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
slays the priests and scatters the assemblage. Even
the custom of tying a lighted torch between two
foxes in the circus, in memory of the damage once
done the harvest-fields, was long kept up in Greece
— a singular witness to the extent of this athlete's
reputation. The modern or literary critic of the
Bible, whose point of view is that given in the first
article of this series, sees no reason for thinking
that the same substantial stories are fiction when
found in Greek literature and history when found
in Hebrew literature. The value of the stories does
not depend upon their historical vraisemblance ;
their value is in their ethical significance. The
lesson of the life is plain : muscular strength mated
to moral weakness never makes a hero ; the man
who lacks self-control can never be the deliverer or
the true leader of a people.

CHAPTER VIII
SOME HEBREW STORIES RETOLD
That fiction was deliberately used for didactic
purposes in the parable by the Hebrew is doubted
by none ; there is no reason to doubt that it was
half consciously used by story-tellers in folk-lore ;
and if we judge of Hebrew literature by the ordi
nary literary standards, it is equally clear that it
was sometimes artistically used by skillful story
tellers for the entertainment and inspiration of
their readers. Two notable illustrations of such
use are afforded, one by an Idyl of the Common
People, and the other by a Historical Romance.
The first,1 although it describes scenes taking place
prior to the organization of Israel as a kingdom,
was almost certainly written after the return from
the exile. ,
In their captivity the children of Israel had
learned to hate the heathen with hatred so strong
that it finds expression in the phrase, " Happy is
he that shall take thy little ones and dash them
against the stones." 2 With this not unnatural
1 The place of Ruth in the Biblical genealogies (Ruth iv. 22 ;
Matt. i. 5) indicates very clearly that there is an historical back
ground for this story, as its structure indicates very clearly that
it is in its spirit and form a work of fiction.
2 Psalm cxxxvii. 9.

178 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
spirit in their hearts they return to the holy land ;
in the period of their colonization a new patriotism
is born, — narrow, intense, bigoted, yet genuine.
The laws against any fellowship with foreigners are
revised, if indeed they are not now first enacted ;
especially marriage with foreigners is condemned
by the priests with great vehemence.1 Then it is
that some unknown dramatist writes the story of
Ruth.2 A Jew and his wife, driven by famine from
Judea, seek refuge in Moab, a heathen country.
1 Ezra ix. 11, 12 ; x. 10-17 ; Neh. xiii. 23-27.
2 I accept, partly for the reasons implied in the above passage,
a post-exilic date for the Book of Ruth, though the date is con
fessedly uncertain ; Dr. Driver places it prior to the exile. In
troduction to the Literature of the Old Testament, p. 455.
Dr. W. Robertson Smith's argument appears to me weighty if
not conclusive in favor of the later date : " If the book had been
known at the time when the history from Judges to Kings was
edited, it could hardly have been excluded from the collection ;
the ancestry of David was of greater interest than that of Saul,
which is given in 1 Sam. ix. 1, whereas the old history named no
ancestor of David beyond his father Jesse. In truth the book of
Ruth does not offer itself as a document written soon after the
period to which it refers ; it presents itself as dealing with times
far back (Ruth i. 1), and takes obvious delight in depicting details
of antique life and obsolete usages ; it views the rude and stormy
period before the institution of the kingship through the softening
atmosphere of time, which imparts to the scene a gentle sweet
ness very different from the harsher color of the old narratives of
the book of Judges. In the language, too, there is a good deal
that makes for and nothing that makes against a date subsequent
to the captivity, and the very designation of a period of Hebrew
history as ' the days of the Judges ' is based on the Deuteronomistic
additions to the book of Judges (ii. 16 sq.) and does not occur till
the period of the exile. ' ' Encyclopaedia Britannica, article Ruth.

SOME HEBREW STORIES RETOLD 179
Two sons are born to them, and two daughters-in-
law come into the home. Then the husband dies,
the sons die, and the widow and her two daughters-
in-law, both Moabites, are left. In her poverty
Naomi's thoughts return to the land of her fathers,
and she resolves to return thither. The daughters
start to go back with her. She pleads with them
to leave her. " Can I furnish you husbands?" she
says. " I am too old. And were I to marry and
to have sons, you could not tarry till they grew.
Go back, and leave me to my wretchedness." One
yields. The other, in an ever-memorable address,
insists on casting in her lot with her mother-in-law :
" Whither thou goest, I will go ; where thou lodg-
est, I will lodge ; thy people shall be my people,
and thy God shall be my God." 2
So they come, mother and daughter-in-law, in
want and wretchedness, to the land from which the
mother had gone forth some years before. It is
the time of the barley harvest. An ancient Jewish
law provides that when men are reaping in their
fields they shall leave the chance wheat which falls
for the poor to glean.2 This is not, it appears, a
dead letter; and Ruth goes out into the barley
harvest-field to glean for herself and her mother.
She happens to light upon the field of Boaz, and
begins gleaning, having first asked permission,
which is granted her. Boaz seems to me to have
1 Ruth i. 16.
2 Deut. xxiv. 19-22 ; probably a local custom before it was
framed into a law. See chapter on The Book of the Covenant.

180 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
fallen in love with this young widow at first sight,
for when he sees her he distinguishes her from all
the gleaners in the field, and asks the reapers who
she is. Then he summons her, and says to her :
" Glean on, and if you are thirsty, drink out of the
same water-jar as the young men ; and when we
sit down to our noon meal, sit with us and dip
your morsel of bread in our sour wine." So our
dramatist depicts the Moabitess eating and drink
ing with the pious Jews. He is too wise and too
artistic to point the moral, but as the Jew reads
the story his prejudices begin to disappear. After
the noon meal Boaz tells the young men not to reap
very carefully. " Be careless," he says, " and drop
handfuls of barley in your reaping on purpose for
her." One can easily see the picture so vividly put
before us : these young men reaping, the young
widow following after and looking with great won
dering eyes at their careless ways in leaving such
handfuls of barley for her to gather, and perhaps
wondering if they are in love with her, that they
are so providing for her; and Boaz meanwhile
looking out of the corners of his eyes, glad in her
gladness. I wonder whether, when they were mar
ried, if he ever told her how it happened? She
goes back to her mother, and tells the story of her
adventure. She has lost all hope of a new hus
band in leaving the land of Moab and coming to
Israel, for what Israelite would marry a Moabite ?
But a mother's cunning is more than a match for

SOME HEBREW STORIES RETOLD 181
either legal provisions or race prejudices. She
contrives how a good match shall be made for this
daughter of hers. "Go back," she says, "my
daughter, and when night has come, and the har
vesters lie down to their sleep upon the harvest
floor, lie down, too, at the feet of Boaz."
One thing that makes me think that he fell in
love with her at first sight is that already he had
sent out into the village to find out who she was,
and had learned from her neighbors that she was
a virtuous woman. But love is always timid ; and
though he is rich, he is, unhappily, too old, and
has, so he thinks, no chance with this fair young
widow. But when he wakes, and finds her at his
feet, and asks, "Who is this?" and learns, in
stantly it flashes upon him that there is some one
else in love beside himself, and he turns to her
with " Bless thee, my daughter, that thou hast not
fallen in love with a young man, rich or poor."
You easily fill up the rest of the sentence ; you
know with whom she has fallen in love. It is
quaint courtship of the ancient time ; a charming
love story, much better told in the old book than
told here. I hope this telling will send the reader
to the original. Land that once belonged to Eli-
melech, Naomi's husband, has been sold. He who
marries Elimelech's daughter, it would appear, has
a right to redeem the land, probably by repaying
to the owner the purchase money.1 We really
know more about this law from the story of Ruth
1 Deut. xxv. 7-9.

182 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
than from any other quarter ; but apparently be
fore he can legitimately marry her and redeem the
land he must offer the privilege to a nearer kins
man. They meet with the elders at the gate, an
informal local court. Boaz proposes to the nearer
kinsman that he shall redeem the land ; the kinsman
says, " I will." But Boaz says, " If you redeem
the land, you must take Ruth." " Oh, then," he
says, "I won't." So Boaz both redeems the land
and takes Ruth. And so the marriage is cele
brated. And is that all ? Yes, that is all. Just a simple,
beautiful, idyllic love story of the olden time.1 I
hardly know whether to try to play the part of
Greek chorus lest I spoil the story by pointing
out the moral — the strong, uninterpreted wit
ness against race prejudice ; the deep fidelity of a
woman's heart to a sorrowing companion ; the spir
itual appreciation of a higher and better religion
than that of the Moabite country from which she
came ; the simple peasant life on the fields of Beth-
1 "An old family tradition, religiously kept because of the
fame of the house it belonged to, told and retold for many gen
erations, and only crystallized and written down at last after
many centuries ; there is in brief the origin of the Book of Ruth,
now newly pictured and set forth for our later day. Whatever
the date when it was actually written, it still preserved, evidently,
all its original charm and oral naturalness and simplicity in taking
on a literary form. And still it keeps for us this freshness, in
every sympathetic detail, every touch of emotion, and moves us,
after all these centuries, like some affecting thing of yesterday, —
a true tale truly and beautifully told." The Book of Ruth, Intro
duction by Ernest Rhys, p. i.

SOME HEBREW STORIES RETOLD 183
lehem ; and, best of all, the love of one faithful
man to one faithful woman. We look back along
those intervening centuries and bless God that
man's love for woman and woman's love for man is
as old as humanity and as immortal as God.
The fourth type of fiction in the Bible is Histori
cal Romance, — the story of Queen Esther, a drama
in four acts : the scene is laid in Shushan, the
Persian capital, in the time of the exile.1
In the first act we see Xerxes, misnamed the
Great, upon his throne, — a small-minded, self-
willed, capricious, sensual Oriental despot ; the
Xerxes who in his campaign against Greece be
headed the engineers who built his bridge of boats
across the Hellespont because the bridge was de
stroyed by a storm, and then ordered the sea to be
scourged ; the Xerxes who, when his friend Pythias
had given five sons to the army, and asked that the
eldest might be suffered to remain at home, killed
the son and cut the body in two, that the army
1 " The Hebrew Ahasuerus (or Akhashverosh) is the exact cor
respondent of the Persian Khshayarsha, which the Greeks and
Romans rendered by Xerxes. The writer assumes that more than
one Ahasuerus is known to his readers, and seeks to make it clear
to them which Ahasuerus he is speaking of. First, he notes that
the subject of his narrative is a real king, and, therefore, not the
Ahasuerus of Daniel (ix. 1) ; secondly, that he ruled ' from India
to Ethiopia ' and, therefore, belonged to the later portion of the
Persian series, since it was well known that the earlier Persian
monarchs were not masters of India. He thus sets aside the
Ahasuerus of Ezra iv. 6 (Cambyses), and points with sufficient
clearness to Xerxes, the son of Darius Hystaspis." The Bible
Commentary, Esther, p. 475.

184 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
might pass between the two parts; the Xerxes
who, with the first disaster that came to his army,
fled, like the coward that he was, back to his em
pire again, leaving Mardonius to extricate it from
the toils into which his own folly had led it ; the
Xerxes who, leaving the affairs of state in stronger
hands, offered a premium to any man who would
discover a new form of pleasure, and gave himself
up to weeks of feasting and revelry. This Xerxes,
in one of his drunken orgies, calls on Vashti, his
queen, to come into the presence of the court and
exhibit her beauty to the courtiers. To ask a
woman to come into such a presence at any time
would be to insult her ; to ask her to come unveiled
into such a company in ancient Persia was to offer
too gross an insult to be endured. With womanly
courage, Vashti refuses to go. The king instantly
deposes her ; but, when the fumes of the orgy have
passed away, awakes to regret his sudden action,
and his courtiers awake to the necessity of finding
some way of pacifying his anger, or it would turn
against them. They propose to send out courtiers,
gather all the beautiful women of his kingdom,
select the handsomest, and put her in Vashti's
place. The scheme approves itself to this volup
tuous, self-willed, capricious monarch. A Jew, a
Pharisee of the strictest sort, is an attendant in
some capacity upon this court, and brings his niece,
Hadassah or Esther, to compete for the dangerous
honor. It seems strange that any guardian should
offer his ward for a place in the harem of such a

SOME HEBREW STORIES RETOLD 185
king, but we must remember that honored women
sought the hand of Henry VIII., though they took
the place which he had made vacant by bloody
decrees. Mordecai succeeds. Esther enters the
king's harem and becomes his favorite. So the
first act ends.
In the second act Haman appears upon the scene,
— cold, shrewd, deliberate, cunning, the villain of
the drama. He has climbed his way to the side
of the throne, and all other courtiers bow and show
him honor: all but one. In the universal adula
tion paid to Haman, Mordecai alone remains scorn
fully erect. Race animosity inflames the personal
hostility between these two. The Jew despises the
cunning but treacherous Amalekite ; the Amalekite
hates the rigorous virtue and inflexible pride of the
Jew. It is the Cavalier against the Puritan ; the
Jesuit against the Huguenot. Haman awaits his
time and nurses his wrath. Patience in passion is
the very climax of wickedness. To such patience
Haman attained. Nor is it enough for him to have
personal revenge on his personal enemy. Hating
the Jew with all the concentrated hate for an alien
race, he resolves that the race shall pay the penalty
for the slight that has been put upon him. The
Jews were then, as now, a thrifty people. Haman
calculates that their extermination and the confis
cation of their estates would put into the royal
treasury over ten million dollars. He proposes the
scheme to Xerxes, is so confident of the result that
he is willing to pay the sum in advance out of hia

186 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
own coffers, and finds a readier acceptance of his
offer from the king because the royal funds are ex
hausted by excessive luxury and dissipation. With
the capriciousness of a despot, he takes from his
finger the seal ring which serves as a signature and
gives it to Haman. " Do with them," said be, " as
it seemeth good unto thee." The decree is issued
accordingly. It provides for the extermination of
all the Jews within Xerxes's dominion, is posted
in the palace, is sent out by courtiers to every
province, and Haman and the king sit down to
ratify it in a drinking bout. Mourning is not
allowed in the palace. Letters are not delivered
in the harem ; newspapers do not exist. Esther
knows not the peril that threatens her people until
she sees sackcloth on Mordecai, and sends a mes
senger to bid him take it off. So communication
is opened between the uncle and the niece. He
sends her the news, and calls for her intervention.
Perhaps she remembers what came upon Pythias
when he offered remonstrance ; perhaps she remem
bers that the engineers were beheaded because the
storm broke their pontoon bridge. Sadly she re
calls to herself the fact that she is no longer the
king's favorite. " For thirty days I have not been
invited to meet the king," she says ; " and I can do
nothing." Mordecai's reply, such as a Cromwell
might have given to his daughter, interprets his
strenuous character. " Think not with thyself that
thou shalt escape in the king's house, more than all
the Jews. For if thou altogether holdest thy peace

SOME HEBREW STORIES RETOLD 187
at this time, then shall there enlargement and de
liverance arise to the Jews from another place; but
thou and thy father's house shall be destroyed ; and
who knoweth whether thou art come to the king:-
dom for such a time as this ? " The niece yields
to the strong influence of her adopted father. She
resolves to make the effort, though with but little
hope of its success. With dignity she says, " If I
perish, I perish." x So the second act ends, with
three days for prayer and fasting by her and her
maidens, for her by the people of her race.
The third act opens in the king's apartment.
The queen, understanding the king's weaknesses,
has prepared a banquet of wine for him. She has
attired herself with unusual care, making the most
of her extraordinary beauty. Then she crosses
the threshold of the harem, traverses the hall that
separates it from the court of the king's house,
pushes her way through the throng of surprised
courtiers and attendants, and stands at the door of
the throne-room, waiting, with what beating heart
we may guess, the signal that should give life and
hope to her nation or decree both death to it
and to her. The moment is auspicious. The king
holds out his sceptre in signal of favor. She draws
near, touches it, and prefers her request. Will the
king honor her with his presence at her banquet of
wine, and will he bring his favorite minister Haman
with him ? The invitation is accepted. The king
and the courtier sit down at the banquet of wine.
1 Esther iv. 14, 16.

188 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Pressed by the king to present her petition, she
holds back her request for another day. " What
wilt thou have," asks the king ; " it is granted, and
that before thou askest it." " Only this, my lord,"
she replies, " that you and Haman will come to
a greater feast to-morrow ; then I will tell you."
His curiosity is piqued, his interest is aroused.
Perhaps that was the reason why that night he
could not sleep, and sent for some one to read him
the court records to put him to sleep. What better
nightcap, as Thackeray calls it, than court records
could be devised ? But in this case it fails of its
purpose, for in these records the king finds it re
corded how not long ago two men had devised to
assassinate him, and one Mordecai had discovered
the plot and saved his life. " What has been done
for this Mordecai ? " he asks the reader. " No
thing." " Well, something must be done." With
that he falls to sleep. Meanwhile Haman, elated by
the honor conferred upon him, goes home, envied
by all his fellows save only Mordecai, who, erect
as ever and meeting the fiery glance of hate that
leaps from Haman's eyes with scorn invincible,
adds fresh fuel to that hate. He cannot wait for
the execution of the general decree ; he will ask for
Mordecai's execution to-morrow. Before he goes
to his bed he gives orders for the erection of the
gallows. So the third act ends, Haman preparing
for the execution of Mordecai, the king planning
how to honor him.
The fourth act opens the next morning with

SOME HEBREW STORIES RETOLD 189
Haman early at the palace. He is greeted as he
enters with the king's question, " What shall the
king do to him whom he delighteth to honor ? "
Haman thinks to himself, Who is it the king so
delights to honor as myself ? So he prescribes for
himself what his vanity desires. " Put him on the
king's horse, put the king's robe upon him, put
the king's crown on his head, and let some great
prince lead the horse through the streets, crying
everywhere, ' Thus doth the king to him whom he
delights to honor. ' : " Well said, wise counselor,"
responds the king. " Who is so great a prince as
yourself ? Put Mordecai on my horse, and lead
him through the streets, proclaiming to all the
people as thou hast said." There is no room for
objection, question, hesitation, or delay. With
what bitter malice at his heart Haman fulfills this
charge we are left to imagine. Then he goes
home and tells his wife and friends. His obsequi
ous followers drop away from him ; even his wife
warns him. of impending disaster. While they
are talking come the king's chamberlains to hasten
Haman to the banquet which the queen has pro
vided for him. Then all is not lost. Still he has
a place in the royal favor, and to the queen's ban
quet he goes, encouraging his heart with this hope
against hope.
So the last scene opens, with Haman, the king,
and the queen at the banquet table together.
Again the king repeats his question, " What is
thy petition, Queen Esther, and it shall be granted

190 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
thee ? and what is thy request, and it shall be per
formed, to half of the kingdom ? " Then she flings
herself at his feet, with all the pent-up anguish
of her woman's heart : " My lord the king, let my
life be given me at my petition, and my people at
my request, for we are sold, I and my people, to
be destroyed utterly." The king, who has forgot
ten his careless gift of the Jewish people, the ring,
the seal, and the decree, responds, " Who has
dared to do this ? " Then with flashing eye she
turns on Haman. " The adversary's name is this
wicked Haman." And the king in his wrath rises
and goes out ; and Haman flings himself on her
couch to implore her mercy ; and the king com
ing back and looking on him there cries, " Will
he insult the queen in my very presence ! " and the
courtiers, who had been obsequious to Haman in
his power, come in rejoicing in his fall, to hasten
his doom. " He has erected just outside the gate a
gallows for Mordecai," says one of them. " Hang
him thereon," replies the king. So they hang Ha
man on the gallows that he had prepared for
Mordecai. One would think that a decree should
have gone out for the protection of the Jews.
Whether the narrator thought it more dramatic to
give a different ending, or whether it was really
true that a decree once issued could not be re
called, I will not attempt to determine ; but, ac
cording to the story, a new decree is issued that
the Jews may defend themselves against their ene
mies, and in the battles that ensued seventy-five

SOME HEBREW STORIES RETOLD 191
thousand of the enemies of the Jews are slain ; and
so the story ends.
One has, it seems to me, but to read this story
to feel the life of a romance in it.1 The contrasted
characters — the sensual monarch, the unscrupu
lous minister, the proud Puritan, the brave woman,
brave with true womanly courage — are drawn in
few lines, but with marvelous skill. The plot, with
its play of character against character, its rapidity
of movement, its dramatic incident, its plotting
and counter-plotting, shows the highest constructive
skill ; and the moral inspiration of the story, incit
ing to hate of the sensuality of Xerxes and the
crafty malice of Haman, to admiration for the
courage of Mordecai, and a love that is more than
admiration for the womanly bearing of the queen,
is all the greater because the narrator does not
formulate it ; and the story is all the more reli
gious in its spirit because it is so wholly free from
the phraseology of religion in its language^ '
He who regards the Book of Esther as scien
tific history must explain as best he can how the
1 This aspect of the book is recognized by commentators, who
treat it rather as history than as fiction, e. g., J. W. Haley : " Much
of the fascination of the book is due to the skillful arrangement
of parts. There is all the effect which we are accustomed to as
cribe to the elaborate weaving of a plot in drama, or in a work of
fiction, and we find a well devised denouement. Every thread and
fibre is wrought into its place in the fabric, and there is nothing
irrelevant." The Book of Esther. A New Translation with Notes,
etc., by John W. Haley, M. A.
2 It is the only book in the Bible in which the name of God
does not appear.

192 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
historian obtained his knowledge of the facts in
the minute detail with which he records them. Who
was present to hear the conference between Haman
and Ahasuerus ; the colloquy between the king and
the queen in the first banquet ; the conversation
between Haman and his wife ; the question of the
king to the king's chamberlains ; the conversation
between Haman and the king; and the plea of
Esther for the life of herself and her people ? J It
is very probable, indeed almost certain, that the
story has an historical basis, but it is equally certain
from the very structure of the narrative itself that
the story has been told with the freedom of the
romancer, who was using the material for literary
and moral effect, not for a scientific purpose.
A fifth type of fiction, Satirical Romance, is
afforded by the Book of Jonah. Of this book
there are three interpretations : first, that it is his
tory, and all the events took place exactly as nar
rated; secondly, that it is allegory, that Jonah
represents the Jewish people, the fish the heathen
lands, the capture of Jonah by the fish the cap
tivity, the vomiting of Jonah out upon the land
again the return from captivity ; third, that it is a
satirical romance, written for the purpose of satiriz
ing the narrowness of the Jewish religion, and
teaching the wideness of God's love.2 This latter
l Est. iii. 8-11 ; v. 6-8, 14; vi. 3, 7-10; vii. 3-6.
2 For the first or historical view, which is the more ancient and
traditional, the student is referred to Dr. William Smith's Bible
Dictionary, article Jonah, especially to the supplemental article

SOME HEBREW STORIES RETOLD 193
I believe to be the true interpretation, and the one
which I assume to be true in telling and interpret-
by Dr. Calvin E. Stowe ; to the Introduction to the Book of
Jonah in the Commentary on the Minor Prophets, by Dr. E. B.
Pusey ; and to the Preface to the Book of Jonah in the Commen
tary on the Minor Prophets, by Dr. E. Henderson ; and to a mono
graph in pamphlet, Light on the Story of Jonah, by Dr. Henry
Clay Trumbull, 1894. This view, however, it must be recognized,
has been questioned from the very earliest ages ; thus Josephus
prefaces and closes his account of the strange experiences of the
prophet in a way clearly to indicate his doubt of its historicity :
" I cannot," he says, " but think it necessary for me, who have
promised to give an accurate account of our affairs, to describe
the actions of this prophet so far as I have found them written
down in the Hebrew books." Antiquities cf the Jews, book ix.,
chapter x., § 2. For the second or parabolic view the reader is
referred to The Book of the Twelve Prophets, by George Adam
Smith, D. D. " Nor does this book," he says, " written so many
centuries after Jonah had passed away, claim to be real history. On
the contrary, it offers to us all the marks of the parable or allegory."
After indicating what these marks are, he adds, " The purpose of
the parable, and it is patent from first to last, is to illustrate the
mission of prophecy to the Gentiles, God's care for them, and their
susceptibility to his word. More correctly, it is to enforce all
this truth upon a prejudiced and thrice reluctant mind. . . .
The writer had in view, not a Jewish party but Israel as a whole
in their national reluctance to fulfill their Divine mission to the
world. ... Of such a people Jonah is the type. Like them he
flees from the duty God has laid upon him. Like them he is
beyond his own land, cast for a set period into a living death, and
like them rescued again only to exhibit once more upon his return
an ill-will to believe that God had any fate for the heathen except
destruction. According to this theory, then, Jonah's disappear
ance in the sea and the great fish, and his subsequent ejection
upon dry land, symbolize the Exile of Israel and their restoration
to Palestine." Pp. 498, 501, 502, 503. The third view, which
regards the book as a romance, with a moral meaning, the view
which differs in detail rather than in essence from the second, is
thus stated by Ewald : " This much is apparent from the style and

194 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
ing the story here. Of the correctness of the
interpretation the reader must form his own judg
ment on its bare presentation, without argument
or defense.
In the outset, however, we are confronted by the
claim that Jesus Christ has solved this question for
us by his reference to the Book of Jonah. There
are two accounts of this reference, one in Luke,
one in Matthew. They are as follows : —
Matthew xii. 39, 40, 41. Luke xi. 29, 30, 32.
But he answered and said And when the people were
unto them, An evil and adulter- gathered thick together, he be-
character of the little book which now perpetuates the prophet's
name, from the failing end of the story, and (which is the most
decisive thing) from the true meaning of the whole book, namely,
that the author beheld in the legendary material which was ready
to his hand simply a given medium for presenting in an attractive
form a prophetic truth which lived in his own heart." He com
pares the story of the prophet's adventure to the stories in the
Arabian Nights' Entertainments, a common form of Oriental fic
tion, and implies that it is analogous to them in its literary form,
but differs from them in its moral significance. " The course
of ancient Hebrew literature," he says, "is distinguished from
that of the other ancient literatures, not as regards its form, but
only as regards its subject-matter and its higher prophetic ten
dencies." Commentary on the Prophets of the Old Testament, by
Dr. Georg H. A. von Ewald, vol. v. pp. 90, 92. Analogous to
Dr. Ewald's interpretation is that of Dr. Caverno, who says :
" Whoever wrote Jonah meant satire on the prophets as Lowell
meant satire on the politicians of the day of the Biglow Papers,
inly the strokes in Jonah are of lighter touch than even those of
Lowell." A Narrow Ax in Biblical Criticism, by Rev. Charles
Caverno, A. M., LL. D., p. 82. For a careful study of the Book
of Jonah, and a careful consideration of its various aspects, see
Jonah in Fact and Fancy, by the Rev. Edgar James Banks,
M. A., Ph. D.

SOME HEBREW STORIES RETOLD 195
ous generation seeketh after a gan to say, This is an evil gen-
sign ; and there shall no sign be eration : they seek a sign ; and
given to it, but the sign of the there shall no sign be given it,
prophet Jonas : For as Jonas but the sign of Jonas the pro-
was three days and three nights phet. For as Jonas was a sign
in the whale's belly ; so shall unto the Ninevites, so shall also
the Son of man be three days the Son of man be to this gen-
and three nights in the heart of eration. The men of Nineveh
the earth. The men of Nineveh shall rise up in the judgment
shall rise in judgment with this with this generation, and shall
generation, and shall condemn condemn it : for they repented
it : because they repented at the at the preaching of Jonas ; and,
preaching of Jonas ; and, behold, behold, a greater than Jonas is
a greater than Jonas is here. here.
The reference to Jonah as being three days and
three nights in the fish's belly is given only by
Matthew, not by Luke. There are two reasons
why the modern critic does not regard this as evi
dence that the Book of Jonah is history. In the
first place, even if Christ used the words reported
by Matthew, such use does not indicate that the
book is historical. If a modern speaker, addressing
an American audience, were to say, " As Ulysses
sailed between Scylla and Charybdis," this would
not indicate that he believed the story of Scylla
and Charybdis to be historical. Incidental refer
ence to an ancient story does not indicate that the
person who makes the reference vouches for its
historical character. But, in the second place, the
modern critic does not believe that Christ ever
used the words, "As Jonah was three days and
three nights in the whale's belly ; so shall the Son
of man be three days and three nights in the heart

196 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
of the earth." He thinks that these words are in
terpolated in Matthew's account, and do not belong
with the words that Christ is uttering. The Phari
sees demanded a sign. Christ declares that they
shall have no other sign than that of the prophet
Jonah. Does he mean no other sign than the re
surrection — that is, the greatest of all signs? No.
What he means is, the people of Nineveh had no
miracle, for there is nothing to indicate that they
ever heard of Jonah's strange adventure ; they re
pented at the mere preaching of Jonah, and Christ
says that his generation has had the preaching of
one greater than Jonah. Professor Moulton, in
" The Modern Reader's Bible," has indicated the
true place of this phrase in Matthew, by putting it
in his edition of the gospel in a footnote. The
modern critic believes that this phrase was added
by an early scribe, or possibly by Matthew himself,
as his interpretation of Jesus' words ; the reader
must remember that in those days there was no way
to add such an interpretation other than by incor
porating it in the text. That this was not Jesus'
meaning is further indicated by the fact that the
parallel is not a true one. Jesus was not three
days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
He was buried on Friday ; he rose from the tomb
on Sunday : he was in the earth one day and two
nights. Whether the story is history or fiction is
not determined, therefore, by this reference to it in
the Gospels. It is to be determined by the struc
ture of the story itself. What is the story ?

SOME HEBREW STORIES RETOLD 197
A prophet is called upon by God to" preach to a
pagan city. He refuses. He does not believe in
the heathen ; he does not care for the heathen ; he
does not think religion is intended for the heathen ;
he refuses to accept the commission. He attempts
to fly from Jehovah by fleeing from the province
of Palestine, over which alone, according to his
narrow conception, Jehovah has jurisdiction ; gets
into a ship going to Tarshish, and as soon as the
ship is fairly out to sea goes to bed and goes to
sleep, thinking himself safe. But Jehovah is God of
the sea as well as of the land ; he sends out a great
wind into the sea ; the prophet is presently awak
ened and summoned to the deck, and there is called
on to join with the worshipers of other gods in a
prayer-meeting in which each one invokes his own
god for protection. So he learns his first lesson,
that those whom he thought pariahs and outcasts
have also some faith in the divine. The storm
continues ; the sailors cast lots to ascertain who is
culpable ; the lot falls upon the prophet ; he tells
his tale and bids them cast him into the sea. This
they are unwilling to do, and, ceasing their prayers
to their various gods, they row hard to bring the
boat to land, but all in vain. Thus he learns his
second lesson : the heathen whom he thought pari
ahs and outcasts, for whom he cared nothing, are
humane and care for him. At last they throw him
overboard, yielding to his entreaty and compelled
by the peril which threatens to engulf them all.
The storm ceases, and a great fish which Jehovah

198 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
has prepared swallows up the prophet.1 In the
belly of the fish he proceeds to compose a poem,
which, when we study it, we find is made up of
reminiscences of an ancient psalm.2 Then Jehovah
speaks to the great fish, and the great fish hears
and obeys and vomits the prophet out upon the dry
land. One would have thought that this would have
been enough to take the narrowness out of the pro
phet, but it did not. It is difficult to get narrow
ness out of a narrow ecclesiastic. Jehovah again
directs him to go to Nineveh, and he goes, though
with unmistakable reluctance. So great is the city
that it takes three days to walk from one gate to
the other through the centre. He enters the city
and begins his mission. He has gone but one day's
journey, that is, one-third way through the city,
when the whole people of the city accept the mes
sage, proclaim a fast, put on sackcloth from the
greatest even to the least of them, and are com
manded by the king to turn every one from his evil
way in hope that God will repent and turn from the
fierceness of his anger. So great a result from a
single day's preaching was never heard of before
or since in the history of the race. What is very
curious, the history of Israel gives no record of any
1 There is no reason to call it a whale ; it is not called whale
either in the Old or the New Testament ; the word in the New
Testament rendered whale simply means great fish. According
to the narrative, Jehovah prepares a special fish to swallow him,
and the fish does what it has been made to do.
2 Psalm lxxxviii. 5-8.

SOME HEBREW STORIES RETOLD 199
such revival among the Ninevites, and the history
of Nineveh contains no suggestion of it. God ac
cepts the penitence of the city, repents him of the
evil that he had said that he would do, and does it
not, and the prophet is rejoiced ? No ! He is very
angry ; he expostulates. " Was not this," he says
to Jehovah, " my saying when I was in my own
country? That was the reason I fled beforehand
into Tarshish, because I knew that thou art a God
gracious and merciful, slow to anger and of great
kindness, and repentest thou of the evil."1 I knew
— that is, this is the effect of his expostulation —
that if I came here and preached, God would not
do what I told them He would do, and I should be
left in the position of a false prophet. So he goes
out from the city, builds him a little hut, and sits
down there to see what will happen. God prepares
a gourd that serves him as a shield from the sun,
and Jonah is glad because of the gourd. Then
God prepares a worm to smite the gourd, and it
withers, and God prepares a vehement east wind
and a hot sun to beat upon the head of Jonah,
and in his misery he wishes for death. Then God
expostulates : " Dost thou well to be angry for the
gourd ? " and the sulky prophet replies, " I do well
to be angry." Jehovah patiently continues his ex
postulations : " Thou hast had pity on the gourd,
for the which thou hast not labored, and should not
I have pity on Nineveh, wherein are more than six-
score thousand persons that cannot discern between
1 Jonah iv. 2.

200 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
their left hand and their right hand, and also much
cattle?"1 But he gets no answer. And so the
story ends — Jonah left sulky and cross like a
petulant child in the hot sun outside the walls of
Nineveh, angry because God is merciful. The
meaning of the story seems to me to be writ in
large and luminous characters : " There is a wide-
ness in God's mercy like the wideness of the sea."
When, from that splendid truth, brought out more
clearly in the story of Jonah than in any other
book of the Old Testament, we turn aside to dis
cuss the question whether a whale has a throat big
enough for a man to pass through, we are abandon
ing the great lesson which God meant to teach
through our imagination to debate a physiological
fact of absolutely no consequence.
1 Jonah iv. 9-11.

CHAPTER IX
A DRAMA OF LOVE1
Literature is an interpretation of life. The
interpreter may expound in a philosophical manner
1 There are three conceptions of the Song of Songs ; the first
regards it as an allegory of the spiritual union between the soul
and God or between Christ and his Church. This mystical view
finds, perhaps, its best interpreter in Mme. Guyon. One or two
quotations from her will serve to illustrate the spirit of this
method of interpretation : " Chapter i. verse 1, ' Let him kiss me
with the kisses of his mouth.' This kiss, which the soul desires of
its God, is essential union, or a real, permanent, and lasting pos
session of its divine object. It is the spiritual marriage." . . .
" Verse 4, ' I am black but comely, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, as
the tents of Kedar, as the curtains of Solomon.' . . . What is this
thy blackness, O thou incomparable maiden ? (we say to her) tell
us, we pray thee. I am black, she says, because I perceive by the
light of my divine Sun, hosts of defects, of which I was never
aware until now ; I am black, because I am not yet cleansed from
self. . . . Verse 7, ' I charge you, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, by
the roes and by the hinds of the field, that ye stir not up, nor awake
my love till she please.' The soul is in a mystic slumber in this em
brace of betrothal, in which she enjoys a sacred rest she had never
before experienced. . . . The daughters of Jerusalem are loving and
meddlesome souls, who are anxious to wake her, though under
the most specious pretexts ; but she is so soundly asleep that she
cannot be aroused. . . . Verse 9, ' King Solomon made himself a
chariot of the wood of Lebanon.' The Son of God, the King of
Glory, made himself a chariot of his Humanity, to which he be
came united in the Incarnation, intending to be seated upon it to
all eternity, and to make of it a triumphal car, upon which he will

202 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
the laws of life, illustrating them more or less by
pictures produced by his imagination or by inci-
ride with pomp and splendor in the sight of all his creatures." The
Song of Songs cf Solomon, with Explanations and Reflections hav
ing Reference to the Interior Life, by Madame Guyon, pp. 23, 33, 51,
66. — The second view regards the book as a collection of love
songs exchanged between two lovers, Solomon and the Shulamite
maiden ; or even a collection of entirely independent songs, the
only unity being their common theme, Love. It has even been
suggested that the poem was written to celebrate the nuptials
between Solomon and the daughter of Pharaoh. This, which is
the traditional view, is adopted by Hengstenberg, Delitzseh, Keil,
Kingsbury, and Professor Moulton. The English reader will
most readily find it and the arguments in support of it in The
Bible Commentary, and in the Modern Reader's Bible. In the
latter this view is thus stated by Professor Moulton : ' ' King
Solomon with a courtly retinue, visiting the royal vineyards upon
Mount Lebanon, comes by surprise upon the fair Shulamite. She
flies from them. Solomon visits her in the disguise of a shepherd,
and so wins her love. He then comes in all his royal state, and
calls upon her to leave Lebanon and become his queen. They
are in the act of being wedded in the royal palace when the poem
opens. This, which is the story as a whole, is brought out for us
in seven idyls, each independent, all founded on the one story, but
making their reference to different parts of it as these occur to
the minds of the speakers, without the limitation to order of suc
cession that would be implied in dramatic presentation." Modern
Reader's Bible, Biblical Idyls, Intro, p. xi. — The third view, the
one adopted in this chapter, regards the book as a drama in which
there are three principal characters : Solomon, the Shulamite
maiden, and her shepherd lover. This view is thus summarized
by Dr. Driver : " ATieaiitiful Shulamite maiden, surprised by the
king and his train on a royal progress in the north (vi. 11, 1.'),
has been brought to the palace at Jerusalem (i. 4, etc.), where
the king hopes to win her affections, and to induce her to exchange
her rustic home for the honor and enjoyments which a court life
could afford. She has, however, already pledged her heart to a
young shepherd, and the admiration and blandishments which

A DRAMA OF LOVE 203
dents from history or from other authors ; he may
portray life in action and accompany the portrayal
with some description and interpretation ; he may
simply create the characters and place them in the
situations which he has invented for them, and
leave them to interpret themselves by their speech
and their actions. The first form of literature is
Essay, the second is Novel, the third is Drama.
Emerson elucidates the nature of heroism thus :
" Self-trust is the essence of heroism. It is the
the king lavishes upon her are powerless to make her forget him.
In the end she is permitted to return to her mountain home,
where, at the close of the poem, the lovers appear hand in hand
(viii. 5), and express, in warm and glowing words, the superiority
of genuine, spontaneous affection over that which may be pur
chased by wealth or rank (viii. 6, 7)." An Introduction to the
Literature of the Old Testament, 6th edition, by S. R. Driver, D. D.,
pp. 437, 438. I agree with Dr. Driver that an attentive study of
the poem can leave little doubt that the modern view (i. e., the
dramatic) is decidedly more probable than the traditional view
(i. c, the lyrical). For the reasons which lead to this conclusion,
except as they are apparent in the dramatic version of the Song
here given, the reader is referred to Dr. Driver's Introduction;
and for a fuller explanation of this dramatic rendering- of the
book he is recommended to consult The Lily Among Thorns, by
William Elliot Griffis, D. D., to whom I gladly acknowledge my
indebtedness in the preparation of this chapter. A special trans
lation and dramatic arrangement can be found in the interesting
monograph on the Song of Songs, by the Rev. William C. Daland
(Leonardsville, N. Y.). They both follow the previous work along
the same line by Ewald, whose analysis of the poem is given by
Driver in his Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament.
It may be added that the date and authorship of the Song of
Songs are both uncertain ; it is quite clear that Solomon is not the
author ; " The Song of Solomon " must be taken to mean a Song
about Solomon, not a song by him.

204 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
state of the soul at war, and its ultimate objects
are the last defiance of falsehood and wrong, and
the power to bear all that can be inflicted by evil
agents." x Thackeray, in " The Newcomes," gives
us no definition of heroism, but in Colonel Newcome
he paints the picture of a hero. We see, however,
not only the portrait, but the artist at his work
painting it. We know what he thinks of his sitter,
for he tells us very frankly : " With that fidelity
which was an instinct of his nature, this brave man
thought ever of his absent child and longed after
him. He never forsook the native servants and
nurses who had charge of the child, but endowed
them with money sufficient (and little was wanted
by the people of that frugal race) to make all
their future lives comfortable. No friends went
to Europe, no ship departed, but Newcome sent
presents and remembrances to the boy and thanks
to all who were kind to his son." 2 Here the hero
is seen, but seen through the eyes of the artist
who is painting his hero's portrait. In " Clive "
Browning portrays a hero, but says no word of
eulogy or criticism. He simply bids you look and
see Clive's deed; summons you, as a bystander
might, to the door of the club-room to see the
scene : —
" Twice the muzzle touched my forehead. Heavy barrel, flurried
wrist, 1 Essays, by Ralph Waldo Emerson, Heroism.
2 The Newcomes, chap. v.

A DRAMA OF LOVE 205
Either spoils a steady lifting. Thrice: then, 'Laugh at Hell
who list,
I can't ! God 's no fable either. Did this boy's eye wink once ?
No!
There 's no standing him and Hell and God, all three against me
— so
I did cheat ! '
And down he threw the pistol." 1
In the Essay the principle is elucidated ; in the
Novel it is illustrated ; in the Drama it is simply
portrayed. In the Essay the author interprets ; in
the Novel he portrays and interprets ; in the Drama
his portrayal is left to be self-interpretative. This
self-interpretative nature of the drama is one of
the characteristics which fit it for presentation on
the stage, but by no means the only one. The
drama may be a story so constructed that it can
be told " by actual representation of persons by
persons, with imitation of language, voice, gesture,
dress, and accessories or surrounding conditions ; " 2
but this is by no means essential. Browning's
" Ring and the Book," which could by no possi
bility be acted on the stage, is as truly a drama
as is " Hamlet " or " Faust." The real distinction
between the dramatic and the epic poem is well
defined by Boucicault : " In the epic poem there is
only one speaker — the poet himself. The action
is bygone. The scene is described. The persons
are spoken of as third persons. There are only
1 Dramatic Idylls, " Olive," Browning's Works, Riverside Edi
tion, vol. vi. p. 160.
2 Century Dictionary.

206 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
two concerned in it, the poet and the reader. In
the drama the action is present, the scene is visi
ble, the persons are speakers, the sentiments and
passions are theirs." x
It is in this sense that the " Song of Songs " is a
drama. It is a portrayal of woman's love resisting
the enticements of ambition. In it there are three
characters : a Shulamite 2 maiden ; her peasant
lover, to whom she is betrothed, and to whose love
she remains faithful under strong temptations to
abandon him for a supreme place at the court
of King Solomon, as the head of his harem ; and
Solomon himself. There is also a chorus of women
attached to the court, who lend their influences in
cooperation with the endeavors of the king to win
the maiden from her betrothed. No moral is
drawn ; no characterizations are furnished ; no in
terpretation is afforded ; the poet is unseen ; an
invisible artist summons us to look on while the
royal lover endeavors by every blandishment to win
the peasant girl; we are invited to listen to her
replies, to witness even her night-dreams, and to
see at last the victory which her love, never for a
moment vacillating, wins for her and for woman.
In studying this book there are three considerations
which must be constantly in the mind of the stu
dent. I. This is a drama only in the largest sense of
that word : it was not probably composed to be
1 Quoted in Century Dictionary under Drama.
2 Chap. vi. 13 ; a form of Shunammite, a native of Shunem (Shulem).

A DRAMA OF LOVE 207
enacted on a stage, and is not adapted for that
purpose, though it might lend itself to performance
as a musical interlude, with the simplest scenic
effects, or with none at all. There are clearly dif
ferent songs to be sung by different singers, some
male, some female ; but these songs are not as
signed by the author to their respective characters.
Except King Solomon, no personage is named.
There are no stage directions ; and except in the
account of Solomon's entrance into Jerusalem no
scenic descriptions. There is no conversation ; no
thing that can properly be called a dialogue.1 The
interplay of thought and emotion is effected by the
contrast between monologues. The Song of Songs
is indeed rather a cycle of dramatic love songs
than a drama in the modern sense of the word. It
resembles an oratorio rather than an opera, though
it cannot properly be said to resemble either ; ex
cept that, as in the oratorio, the scenery, the occa
sion, the distinctive character of the three principal
personages are all left to the imagination of the
auditor. It is for this reason the commentators have
differed so widely in their interpretation : that
some have conceived that there are but two charac
ters, others that there are three ; that some sup-
1 The dramatic critics generally introduce a dialogue element
in chap, i., where they represent the Shulamite's song, depreciating
her beauty, as interpreted by the chorus with the words " but
comely," and in chap, iii., which they conceive to be & dialogue
between different citizens commenting on the splendor of the royal
procession. This appears to me too modern and artificial to be a
probable interpretation of the design of the author.

208 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
pose the description of Solomon in Jerusalem1
to be furnished dramatically by a trio representing
different citizens, others regard it as a piece of
description furnished by the poet himself and to
be interpreted either by a kind of Greek chorus,
or in recitative by an interpreter ; that some re
gard the duet in chapter iv. 8-v. 1 as represent
ing an ideal, others as representing a real, interview
between the Shulamite and her peasant lover ; that
in some instances the same song is attributed to
different characters by different interpreters. In
the interpretation of the Song of Songs given in
this chapter I follow the dramatic interpreter ; but
the reader must remember that it is impossible to
give such an interpretation without modernizing
and occidentalizing an ancient and Oriental song-
cycle, and that in such an interpretation much
necessarily depends upon the temper of the inter
preter.2 II. The reader must also constantly bear in
mind the difference between the language of im
agination and the language of symbolism. The
language of imagination is framed for the purpose
1 Song of Songs, iii. 6-11.
2 " In case some surprise should be felt at the amount which
(upon either view) has, as it were, to be read between the lines, it
may be pointed out that, if the poem is to be made intelligible,
its different parts must, in one way or another, be assigned to
different characters ; and as no names mark the beginning of the
several speeches, these must be supplied, upon the basis of such
clues as the poem contains, by the commentator." Driver's Intro
duction to the Literature of the Old Testament, sixth ed., p. 438.

A DRAMA OF LOVE 209
of calling up in the mind of the auditor or reader
some image. It ought always to be possible to
translate the figure of speech into a figure on canvas.
It is intended to be a picture, and it is imperfect
if it cannot be translated into a picture. But the
language of symbolism is not intended to call up
in the mind of the auditor or reader a picture ; it
cannot be translated into a figure on canvas ; it is
not, and is not intended to be, pictorial. It uses
things to represent ideas, much as in the earliest
hieroglyphic writing things were used to represent
ideas. When, for example, the Hebrew poet says
God is a rock, he does not mean to call up in the
mind of the reader the picture of a rock and com
pare God therewith ; he means to call up the idea
of strength and stability ; he uses a concrete thing
to represent an abstract idea. The language of
these love songs is not the language of imagination,
and they are not only despoiled of their meaning,
but in some instances a grotesque meaning is im
ported into them, by reading them as though they
were imaginative. They are symbolical. Thus
when the maiden sings of her lover, " His aspect
is like Lebanon, excellent as the cedars," she does
not mean to call up an image of the mountain or
the trees ; she means to call up the ideas of
strength and beauty which they represent, and the
emotions which they evoke : the sight of him
would be exhilarating to her as would be the view
of her beloved cedar-clad mountains in her rural
home. So when Solomon, praising the maiden,

210 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
sings to her, " Thy neck is like a tower of David
builded for an armoury," he does not intend to call
up an image of that tower, and trace a parallel be
tween the two ; he intends to call up the emotions
which are aroused by the beauty and perfection
of the finest piece of architecture in the city, and
affirm that like emotions are evoked by the beauty
and perfection of the maiden's neck and shoulders.
Such symbolical use of language is not as common
with us as it was with the ancient Hebrews, yet it
is not uncommon. When we say of a person, " He
has a sunny disposition," we do not wish to call up
a reminiscence of the sunshine ; we use the sun
shine as a symbol, because the disposition we de
sire to describe produces on our spirits an effect
something analogous to that produced by sunshine
breaking through a cold, lowering, and gloomy
day. The reader must resolutely get rid of the
idea that the language of these love songs is
the language of imagination. He must get from
the symbol the idea or emotion it is calculated
to produce and translate it into that idea or emo
tion. III. The reader must remember also, in reading
this cycle of dramatic love songs, that they are dra
matic not didactic. The object of the essayist is
to teach a lesson, the object of the dramatist is to
produce an impression. The reader is not to look
in this drama for a lesson taught ; he is to be re
ceptive to the impression intended to be produced.
That impression is the spontaneity and the fidelity

A DRAMA OF LOVE 211
of love. It is expressed in the refrain " Stir not
up nor awaken love until it please," and in the
closing song ; " If a man would give all the sub
stance of his house for love, he would utterly be
contemned." The reader must remember, too, that
the dramatist describes life as he sees it, not as a
moralist might idealize it ; that this dramatist is an
Oriental and is writing for Oriental readers ; and
that in the Orient love is warmer and more pas
sionate, and its expression is both cruder and more
unreserved, than in the modern life of the West.
In short, the reader must remember that the Song
of Songs is not a sermon but a drama ; that in it
the author, an Oriental, uses Oriental symbolism,
in portraying Oriental life, for the purpose of pro
ducing an impression of the purity and the strength
of woman's love.
Bearing these considerations in mind let the
reader turn to the Song of Songs itself, as it is
here interpreted in a series of dramatic love songs,
with occasional chorus.1 The scene opens in North
ern Palestine, whither Solomon, with his court and
his harem, has come upon a summer excursion.
The listener to the love songs which follow must
imagine for himself the scene : the royal encamp
ment, the white tents set out upon the plain, the
1 In this interpretative rendering of this cycle of dramatic love
songs, I follow the Revised Version, sometimes adopting the
marginal reading, and in one or two instances varying the trans
lation on the authority of eminent scholars, to make the meaning
clearer.

212 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
royal tent in the centre, the military bands, the
court officers, the ladies of the harem in their
gorgeous apparel. In the midst of them is a sun
burned peasant girl, with that fresh beauty which
appears all the more striking in contrast with the
formal and artificial and somewhat worn beauties
of the women who make up the Oriental court.
The women of the harem in solos and chorus
glorify the king; the Shulamite maiden depre
ciates her beauty, which is her peril, yet cannot resist
the temptation coyly to qualify her self-deprecia
tion. CHOBUS WITH SOLOS : COUBT WOMEN AND THE SHULAMITE.1
Chorus. " Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth ;
For thy love is better than wine.
Thine ointments have a goodly fragrance ;
Thy name is as ointment poured forth ;
Therefore do the maidens love thee.
Draw me ; we will run after thee :
The king hath brought me into his chambers :
We will be glad and rejoice in thee,
We will make mention of thy love more than of wine :
Rightly do they love thee.
Shulamite. " I am black — but comely —
O ye daughters of Jerusalem,
As the tenta of Kedar,
As the curtains of Solomon.
Look not upon me, because I am swarthy,
Because the sun hath scorched me.
My mother's sons were incensed against me,
They made me keeper of the vineyards ;
But mine own vineyard have I not kept."
1 Chap. i. 2-8.

A DRAMA OF LOVE 213
Then she turns from the women of the court
and addresses herself, in imagination, to her absent
lover. " Tell me, O thou whom my soul loveth,
Where thou f eedest thy flock, where thou makest it to rest at noon :
For why should I be as one that wandereth
Beside the flocks of thy companions ?
Chorus (satirically). " If thou know not, O thou fairest among
women,
Go thy way forth by the footsteps of the flock,
And feed thy kids beside the shepherds' tents."
Solomon enters and prefers his suit in person.
Then follows a duet between the two : he promises
her jewels, she longs for her lover ; he flatters her
beauty, she recalls her peasant home ; he promises
her a dwelling-place in a palace of cedar, she replies
that she is but a lily of the valley ; he answers that
such a lily in such peasant and poor surroundings
is as a lily among thorns, she responds with remi
niscences of the simple joys of her village life and
her village lover.
DUO: SOLOMON AND THE SHULAMITE.1
Solomon. " I have compared thee, O my love,
To a steed in Pharaoh's chariots.
Thy cheeks are comely with plaits of hair,
Thy neck with strings of jewels.
We will make thee plaits of gold
With studs of silver.
Shulamite. " While the king sat at his table,
My spikenard sent forth its fragrance.
My beloved is unto me as a bundle of myrrh,
That lieth betwixt my breasts.
My beloved is unto me as a cluster of henna-flowers
In the vineyards of En-gedi. i Chap. i. 9-ii. 7.

214 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Solomon. " Behold, thou art fair, my love ; behold, thou art fair ;
Thou hast doves' eyes.
Shulamite (recalling her lover). "Behold, thou art fair,^my
beloved, yea pleasant :
Also our couch is green.
Solomon.' "The beams of our house are cedars,
And our rafters are firs.
Shulamite. " I am a rose of Sharon,
A lily of the valleys.
Solomon. "' As a lily among thorns,
So is my love among the daughters.
Shulamite. " As the apple-tree among the trees of the wood,
So is my beloved among the sons.
I sat down under his shadow with great delight,
And his fruit was sweet to my taste.
He brought me to the banqueting house,
And his banner over me was love.
Stay ye me with cakes of raisins, comfort me with apples :
For I am sick with love.
Let his left hand be under my head,
And his right hand embrace me.
1 1 adjure you, 0 daughters of Jerusalem,
By the roes, and by the hinds of the field,
That ye stir not up, nor awaken love,
Until it please."
Love is spontaneous ; love springs up of itself.
Jewels cannot buy it, gold cannot purchase it,
ambition cannot arouse it, courtly offers cannot
win it. " I adjure you that you try not to stir or
awaken love." It springs spontaneously or not at
all. Then follows a reminiscent song, in which the
Shulamite, as in a day-dream, sees her lover coming
to her, and hears his love song at her latticed win
dow, and imagines herself replying to him with a
familiar verse from their shepherd life : " Take us
the foxes, the little foxes."

A DRAMA OF LOVE 215

DUO: THE SHULAMITE AND THE PEASANT LOVER.1
Shulamite. " The voice of my beloved ! behold, he cometh,
Leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills.
My beloved is like a roe or a young hart :
Behold, he standeth behind our wall,
He looketh in at the windows,
He sheweth himself through the lattice.
My beloved spake, and said unto me :
Lover's Song. " Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come
away.
For, lo, the winter is past,
The rain is over and gone ;
The flowers appear on the earth ;
The time of the singing of birds is come,
And the voice of the turtle is heard in our land ;
The fig-tree ripeneth her green figs,
And the vines are in blossom,
They give forth their fragrance.
Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.
O my dove, that art in the clefts of the rock, in the covert of the
steep place,
Let me see thy countenance, let me hear thy voice ;
For sweet is thy voice, and thy countenance is comely.
Shulamite's Song. " Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that
spoil the vineyards ;
For our vineyards are in blossom.
My beloved is mine, and I am his :
He feedeth his flock among the lilies.
When the day breaks, and the shadows flee away,
Turn, my beloved, and be thou like a roe or a young hart,
Upon the mountains which separate us." 2
i Chap. ii. 8-17.
2 The verse is a reminiscence of a vinedresser's song ; and it
intimates that her duties in the vineyard prevent her from imme
diately joining him. She imagines herself separated from his
vineyard by some intervening hills, and begs him at the early
dawn to climb over the mountains which separate them and come
to her. All is in the realm of imagination.

216 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
The scene changes. The King has returned
from Northern Palestine to Jerusalem, bringing
the Shulamite maiden with him. He hopes that
separation from her lover will cause her to forget
her love. But in vain ; in her sleep she dreams of
her lover ; dreams that she sought him in the city,
found him, and brought him to her mother's house.
The song of her dream ends with the distich we
have already heard, " Stir not up, nor awaken love,
until it please." SOLO : THE SHULAMITE.1
The Shulamite's Dream. " By night on my bed I sought him
whom my soul loveth :
I sought him, but I found him not.
I said, I will rise now, and go about the city,
In the streets and in the broad ways,
I will seek him whom my soul loveth :
I sought him, but I found him not.
The watchmen that go about the city found me :
To whom I said, Saw ye him whom my soul loveth ?
It was but a little that I passed from them,
When I found him whom my soul loveth :
I held him, and would not let him go,
Until I had brought him into my mother's house,
And into the chamber of her that conceived me.
I adjure you, 0 daughters of Jerusalem,
By the roes, and by the hinds of the field,
That ye stir not up, nor awaken love,
Until it please."
To enhance the dramatic effect of the next scene,
in which the King's appeal to the ambition of the
Shulamite maiden is presented with all the elo-
1 Chap. iii. 1-5.

A DRAMA OF LOVE 217
quence of which the royal suitor is capable, the
poet acts the part of Greek Chorus and describes
the King and the military procession which accom
panies him in the streets of the capital.
SOLO OK CHORUS.1
' Interpreter. " Who is this that cometh up out of the wilderness
like pillars of smoke,
Perfumed with myrrh and frankincense,
With all powders of the merchant ?
Behold, it is the litter of Solomon ;
Threescore mighty men are about it,
Of the mighty men of Israel.
They all handle the sword, and are expert in war :
Every man hath his sword upon his thigh,
Because of fear in the night.
King Solomon made himself a palanquin
Of the wood of Lebanon.
He made the pillars thereof of silver,
The bottom thereof of gold, the seat of it of purple,
The midst thereof being paved with love,
From the daughters of Jerusalem.
Go forth, O ye daughters of Zion, and behold King Solomon,
With the crown wherewith his mother hath crowned him in the
day of his espousals,
And in the day of the gladness of his heart." 2
The King in this splendor of his city life renews
his suit : see how he does it — foolish wise man —
by flattery, not by love ; and woman's heart is won
1 Chap. iii. 6-11.
2 By Griffis and Daland, following Delitzsch and Ewald, this is
broken up into responsive utterances by different citizens : one
asks, Who is this that cometh up out of the wilderness, a second
replies, Behold, it is the litter of Solomon, etc. This appears to
me to impart a modern artificiality into the poem. See note on
page 207, ante.

218 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
by love, not by flattery. The response is a renewed
protestation of her devotion to her peasant lover.
DUO: SOLOMON AND THE SHULAMITE.1
Solomon. " Behold, thou art fair, my love ; behold, thou art fair ;
Thou hast doves' eyes behind thy veil : 2
Thy hair is as a flock of goats,
That lie along the side of mount Gilead.
Thy teeth are like a flock of ewes that are newly shorn,
Which are come up from the washing ;
Whereof every one hath twins,
And none is bereaved among them.
Thy lips are like a thread of scarlet,
And thy mouth is comely :
Thy temples are like a piece of a pomegranate
Behind thy veil.
Thy neck is like the tower of David builded for an armoury,
Whereon there hang a thousand bucklers,
All the shields of the mighty men.
Thy two breasts are like two fawns that are twins of a roe.
Thou art all fair, my love ; and there is no spot in thee.8
Shulamite. " My beloved is mine and I am his,
He feedeth his flock among the lilies.
When the day breaks and the shadows flee away
I will get me to the mountain of myrrh
And to the bill of frankincense." 4
1 Chap. iv. 1-7.
2 Compare chap. i. 15. She was not veiled in the country ; now
that she has come up to Jerusalem and the palace she wears her
veil. 8 This is all the language of symbolism, not of imagination.
See page 208 ff. He praises the delicacy of her hair, the white
ness of her teeth, the purity of her complexion, the fine lines of
her mouth, the perfect proportion of her neck and shoulders.
4 For reasons for this change in the text see Dr. Griffis's The
Lily Among Thorns, pp. 204-207. Verse 6 where it stands in
the usual text makes a break in Solomon's song, which is out of
character with the King, and the fact that it repeats the words of
the Shulamite in chap. ii. 16, 17, affords a sufficient reason for

A DRAMA OF LOVE 219
All the scenic effects in this drama, it must be
remembered, are left to the imagination of the
auditors. Already the poet has portrayed the
Shulamite imagining herself at home, and her lover
coming to her over the intervening hills, and his
song and her reply ; and again as dreaming of him
by night and of herself as seeking him in vain in
the city of Jerusalem ; now again he portrays her
day-dream of him interpreted by a duet between
the two. She imagines him coming to her with his
love song, full of the reminiscences of the country,
— a song in spirit entirely different from that of her
royal suitor's ; and she gives to this peasant lover's
suit an answer very different from that which she
has given to the king. "A garden spring art
thou," she imagines him saying to her ; and herself
replying, " Let my lover come into his garden and
eat his precious fruit."
DUET : THE PEASANT LOVER AND THE SHULAMITE.1
The Peasant Lover. " Come with me from Lebanon, my bride,
With me from Lebanon :
Come from the top of Amana,
From the top of Senir and Hermon,
From the lions' dens,
From the mountains of the leopards.
Thou hast ravished my heart, my sister, my bride ;
Thou hast ravished my heart with one look from thine eyes,
With one chain of thy neck.
How fair is thy love, my sister, my bride !
How much better is thy love than wine !
believing that it is here misplaced, and should be regarded as the
maiden's reply to the royal suitor.
1 Chap. iv. 8-v. 1.

220 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
And the smell of thine ointments than all manner of spices !
Thy lips, 0 my bride, drop honey :
Honey and milk are under thy tongue ;
And the smell of thy garments is like the smell of Lebanon.
A garden barred is my sister, my bride ;
A spring shut up, a fountain sealed.
Thy shoots are an orchard of pomegranates, with precious fruits ;
Henna with spikenard plants,
Spikenard and saffron,
Calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of frankincense ;
Myrrh and aloes, with all the chief spices.
Thou art a fountain of gardens,
A well of living waters,
And flowing streams from Lebanon.
The Shulamite. " Awake, 0 north wind ; and come, thon south ;
Blow upon my garden, that the spices thereof may flow ont.
Let my beloved come into his garden,
And eat his precious fruits.
The Peasant Lover. " I am come into my garden, my sister,
my bride :
I have gathered my myrrh with my spice ;
I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey ;
I have drunk my wine with my milk.
Eat, 0 friends ;
Drink, yea, drink abundantly, 0 beloved." J
She who dreams of her peasant lover by day
dreams of him also by night ; she recites the dream
she had while she slept, but her heart kept awake
with love, and thought of him who was absent, yet
to her thoughts ever present. In this dream she
is at first in her peasant home; she hears his voice ;
he has come dressed with care for his call; his
hands are anointed with the myrrh, which even
1 The Shulamite imagines that the anticipated wedding with
her peasant lover has taken place, and he, rejoicing in winning
her, his bride, invites the guests to join in the wedding festivities.

A DRAMA OF LOVE 221
the peasants used. She is reluctant to arise and
soil her feet on the earthen floor ; when she does
arise and takes hold of the latch her hands are
covered with the myrrh — but he is gone. And
when she goes out to seek him, lo ! she is a stranger
in the strange city, unprotected and maltreated.
The contradictions of the scene are just such as
are common in dreams.
SOLO AND CHORUS : THE SHULAMITE AND THE COURT WOMEN.1
The Shulamite' s Second Dream. " I was asleep, but my heart &
waked.
It is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying,
Lover. " Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled :
For my head is filled with dew,
My locks with the drops of the night.
Shulamite. " I have put off my coat ; how shall I put it on ?
I have washed my feet ; how shall I defile them ?
My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door,
And my heart was moved within me.
I rose up to open to my beloved ;
And my hands dropped with myrrh,
And my fingers with liquid myrrh,
Upon the handles of the bolt.
I opened to my beloved ;
But my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone.
My soul failed me when he spake :
I sought him, but I could not find him ;
I called him, but he gave me no answer.
The watchmen that go about the city found me,
They smote me, they wounded me ;
The keepers of the walls took away my veil from me.
I adjure you, 0 daughters of Jerusalem, if ye find my beloved,
That ye tell him, that I am sick with love."
The women of the harem can see no reason why
1 Chap. v. 2-vi. 3.

222 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
the Shulamite should refuse the tempting offer of
the king for the sake of her peasant lover. What
is her beloved more than any other beloved ? Un
solved puzzle of all ages : why is one woman to one
man more than all other women, and one man to
one woman more than all other men ? She cannot
tell ; they cannot tell ; no one can tell. But it
always has been so since Eve was brought to Adam
and they twain became one flesh. She tries to
answer by giving a portrait of him. When did a
lover's portrait ever seem true to other than the
lover who painted it? In our estimate of this
portrait we must remember that the language is
not that of imagination, but that of Oriental sym
bolism.1 Chorus of Women. " What is thy beloved more than another
beloved,
O thou fairest among women ?
What is thy beloved more than another beloved,
That thou dost so adjure us ?
The Shulamite. " My beloved is white and ruddy,
The chiefest among ten thousand.
His head is as the most fine gold,
His locks are curling, and black as a raven.
His eyes are like doves beside the water brooks ;
Washed with milk, and fitly set.
His cheeks are as a bed of spices, as banks of sweet herbs :
His lips are as lilies, dropping liquid myrrh.
His hands are as rings of gold set with beryl :
His body is as ivory work overlaid with sapphires.
His legs are as pillars of marble, set upon sockets of fine gold :
His aspect is like Lebanon, excellent as the cedars.
His mouth is most sweet : yea, he is altogether lovely.
1 See ante, page 208 ff.

A DRAMA OF LOVE 223
This is my beloved, and this is my friend,
O daughters of Jerusalem.
Chorus (sarcastically). " Whither is thy beloved gone,
0 thou fairest among women ?
Whither hath thy beloved turned him,
That we may seek him with thee ?
Shulamite. " My beloved is gone down to his garden, to the
beds of spices,
To feed in the gardens, and to gather lilies.
I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine :
He feedeth his flock among the lilies."
One more effort the King makes ; he promises
her that if she will come to him she shall be in
very truth his queen, supreme, above all others, the
only one. But in vain his pleading, in vain the
anticipations of her glory by the chorus of women.
SOLO AND CHORUS: SOLOMON AND THE COURT WOMEN.1
Solomon. " Thou art beautiful, 0 my love, as Tirzah,
Comely as Jerusalem,
Terrible as an army with banners.
Turn away thine eyes from me,
For they have overcome me.
Thy hair is as a flock of goats,
That lie along the side of Gilead.
Thy teeth are like a flock of ewes, ¦
Which are come up from the washing ;
Whereof every one hath twins,
And none is bereaved among them.
Thy temples are like a piece of a pomegranate
Behind thy veil.
There are threescore queens, and fourscore concubines,
And maidens without number.
But my dove, my undefiled, is but one ;
She is the only one of her mother ;
She is the choice one of her that bare her.
1 Chap. vi. 4-10.

224 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
The daughters saw her, and called her blessed ;
Yea, the queens and the concubines, and they praised her.
Chorus of Women. " Who is she that looketh forth as the
morning,
Fair as the moon,
Clear as the sun,
Terrible as an army with banners ? "
All is in vain ; her heart is with her lover in the
garden of nuts, watching to see whether the vine is
in bud and the pomegranate is in flower ; compared
with these pleasures of her rural life those of the
court are nothing to her. She will not be ungra
cious : when the women ask her to give them a
specimen of her rural dancing, she complies with
the request. They join in praising her grace and
beauty, the king adds his praises ; 2 but this com
mingling in the life of the court, these courtier-like
flatteries, have no charm for her. Her heart is
with her absent lover ; she longs to return to him
and to her rural life and its simple pleasures.
SOLO AND CHORUS : THE SHULAMITE, THE PEASANT LOVER, AND
THE VTLLAQERS.2
The Shulamite. " I am my beloved's,
And his desire is toward me.
Come, my beloved, let us go forth into the field ;
Let us lodge in the villages.
Let us get up early to the vineyards ;
Let us see whether the vine hath budded, and its blossom be open,
And the pomegranates be in flower :
There will I give thee my love.
1 Chap. vi. 11-vii. 9. See Daland's monograph for some sug
gestive translations and interpretations of the description of the
dance. 2 Chap. vii. 10-viii. 7.

A DRAMA OF LOVE 225
The mandrakes give forth fragrance,
And at our doors are all manner of precious fruits, new and old,
Which I have laid up for thee, 0 my beloved.
Oh that thou wert as my brother,
That sucked the breasts of my mother !
When I should find thee without, I would kiss thee ;
Tea, and none would despise me.
I would lead thee, and bring thee into my mother's house,
Who would instruct me ;
I would cause thee to drink of spiced wine,
Of the juice of my pomegranate.
[ To the women.] His left hand should be under my head,
And his right hand should embrace me.
I adjure you, 0 daughters of Jerusalem,
That ye stir not up, nor awaken love,
Until it please."
The scene once more changes back to Northern
Palestine. . Love has won. The Shulamite maiden
appears, leaning upon the arm of her peasant lover.
The village maidens sing a song of greeting to vil
lage bride and groom, as they come back to her
birthplace, to the home beneath the apple-tree
where she was given birth by her mother, and
given a second birth by love. For no woman is
truly born into womanhood until she is born anew
by love.
Chorus of Village Maidens. " Who is this that cometh up from
the wilderness,
Leaning upon her beloved ?
Song of Peasant Lover. " Under the apple-tree I awakened
thee:
There thy mother was in travail with thee,
There was she in travail that brought thee forth.
Shulamite's Love Song. " Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as
a seal upon thine arm :
For love is strong as death ;

226 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Jealousy is cruel as the grave :
The flashes thereof are flashes of fire,
A very flame of the Lord.
Many waters cannot quench love,
Neither can the floods drown it :
H a man would give all the substance of his house for love,
He would utterly be contemned."
Love is strong as death ; many waters cannot
quench it ; floods cannot drown it ; and if a man
would give all the substance of his house in ex
change for love he would utterly be condemned ;
that is the moral and meaning of this cycle of
dramatic love songs.
Remembering what life was in the Orient, how
far men had strayed away from the first marriage
law, — one husband wedded to one wife till death
do them part, — how love had died and licentious
ness had taken its place in that awful system of
polygamy which created the harem, can we say that
there was no need of an inspired drama to produce
the impression of the " Song of Songs " on the
Eastern world ? Are we sure, as we look at life in
America, that there is no need that this impression
be produced to-day on our own world? Is mar
riage a la mode unknown with us ? Are there no
parents who think a good match for the daughter
fs a match to a wealthy or a titled suitor? Are
there no men who weigh love against houses and
lands and call love the lighter weight of the two ?
Are there no women who find themselves dis
traught between the plea of ambition and the plea
of love and know not which plea to accept ? It

A DRAMA OF LOVE 227
may be said that it is the commonplace of drama
and fiction to contrast love and ambition and exalt
love. But what shall we say of the writer who
first told the story of this battle between love and
ambition and put love first ? And I doubt whether
there can be found anywhere in ancient literature
a story of pure womanly love antedating the Song
of Songs.
I cannot but think that its lesson needs especial
emphasis in our time and in our country. The
higher education and the larger life of woman
bring with them special temptation. Entering into
literature, business, politics, woman is tempted by
ambitions of which formerly she knew nothing.
In public address the home is often scoffed at, the
husband is treated as a slaveocrat, and the notion
is sedulously advocated that woman rises into a
larger life if she turns from wifehood and mother
hood to the lecture-room, the professional career,
the business office. These doors ought not to be
shut against her ; but it is impossible that these
doors should be opened, and that larger life given,
and all the powers quickened by a broader educa
tion, without subjecting her to the temptation to
take ambition in place of love. Against the notion
that it is a nobler thing to be in business, in a pro
fession, in politics, in literature, or on the platform
than to be the life-companion of one man, loving
him with fidelity and loved by him, this Song
of Songs exerts its sweet and sacred influence in

228 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
behalf of love strong as death, ... a very flame
of the Lord.
In some true sense to every one of us, man or
woman, come love and ambition : God who is love,
and the world which is ambition.1 As Hercules
was invited in one direction by pleasure and in the
other by wisdom, so every one of us is called in
one direction by ambition and in the other direc
tion by love ; and the great and final message of
the Song of Songs is that love is the supreme
factor in human life. And this truth of life is
itself a parable, interpreting the still deeper truth
that to love God and to be united to him is at once
the supreme end and the supreme felicity of life.
For the Song of Songs is an allegory in the same
sense in which marriage is a symbol. The lesson
of the Song of Songs is the strength and the joy
of human love ; but that is itself a prophetic inter
pretation of the strength and the joy of God's love
for his own, and of their love for him.
1 "The typical interpretation is perfectly compatible with
Ewald's view, and, indeed, if combined with it, is materially
improved ; the heroine's true love then represents God, and Solo
mon, in better agreement with his historical position and character,
represents the blandishments of the world, unable to divert the
hearts of his faithful servants from him." An Introduction to the
Literature of the Old Testament, by S. R. Driver, D. D., p. 451.

CHAPTER X
A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY
The Book of Job is unique in literature. It is
almost impossible to classify it. Professor Genung
calls it " The Epic of the Inner Life." It is, how
ever, only by a kind of figure that it can be so
called. The epic poem is supposed to relate at
length and in metrical form " a series of heroic
achievements or events under supernatural guid
ance." x This the Book of Job does not do. Pro
fessor Genung explains the title which he gives to
the book, and with the explanation the title is ex
ceedingly felicitous : " I regard," he says, " this
ancient book as the record of a sublime epic action,
whose scene is not the tumultuous battle-field, nor
the arena of rash adventure, but the solitary soul
of a righteous man." 2 But on the one hand, to
designate the narrative of such a struggle in the
soul of a righteous man as an epic is to give to the
word a new, though a not inappropriate meaning ;
and on the other, this description of the poem indi
cates but one phase, and not the most important
nor even the most interesting phase, of the book.
1 Century Dictionary.
3 The Epic of the Inner Life, by John F. Genung, pp. 20-26.

230 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
It is called, with great verisimilitude, a drama, by
John Owen, and he not inaptly compares it with
" The Prometheus Bound " of iEschylus, Goethe's
" Faust," Shakespeare's " Hamlet," and Calderon's
" Wonder- Working Magician." J Yet this word
" drama " certainly suggests, if it does not require,
action accompanying and helping to create the
necessity for the speech, and in the Book of Job,
except in the prologue, there is no action. What
ever may be said of its spirit, in its form it does
not resemble the other great dramas to which Mr.
Owen compares it. Biblical scholars have gen
erally classified the Book of Job with the " Wisdom
Literature." The Wisdom Literature was the
nearest approximation which the Hebrews made to
philosophy. The philosopher is interested in truth
for its own sake ; interested in the interrelation
ship of different truths; interested in correlating
and harmonizing truths and so adjusting them as
to make a more or less complete system of truth.
The Hebrew had little or no interest in this pro
cess ; he never undertook it ; he was interested in
truths but not in truth, and in truths only as they
bore upon conduct and life. His wisdom, therefore,
took the form not of general systems, but of spe
cific affirmations of principles in their relation to
actual life conditions. The Hebrew's philosophy
was not abstract, but concrete ; not generic, but
applied ; not scholastic, but expressed in the terms
of experience. Thus the tendency of his philosophy
1 The Five Great Sceptical Dramas of History, by John Owen.

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 231
was either to aphoristic forms, as in the Book of
Proverbs ; or to dramatic forms, as in the Song
of Songs and the Book of Job ; or to an admixture
of the two, as in the Book of Ecclesiastes. On the
whole it appears to me that in Biblical criticism
the Book of Job has been correctly classified ; that
its epic character — as the narrative of a soul
struggle, — and its dramatic character — as the in
terplay of human thought and emotion, — are sub
sidiary to its philosophic character, as the discus
sion of a profound problem of human life ; but
that this discussion is not abstract and intellectual
but vital and dramatic. Its interest lies not in any
theory which it promulgates, but in human experi
ence and in the bearing of a popular theory upon
human experience in a time of trial. Professor
Kent calls the book " Philosophical Drama." J I
should rather, with a slight difference in emphasis,
call it Dramatic Philosophy.2
1 The Wise Men of Ancient History and their Proverbs, by
Charles Foster Kent, Ph. D.
2 It is hardly necessary to consider as a possible theory that the
Book of Job is historical ; the epilogue alone is quite conclusive
upon that point. At the same time it is possible that it had an
historical foundation, as most of the greater works of fiction have
had. "' Hamlet ' rests on an historical foundation ; so does 'Mac
beth ; ' yet they are works of imagination. ' The Ring and the
Book ' is founded on fact ; Mr. Browning dug the substance of
the story out of an old law report. In Ezekiel Job is referred to
as if he were a well-known person. It is possible, of course, that
the allusion here may be literary. We often speak of Polonius,
or Colonel Newcome, or Mr. Pickwick as though they were real
characters. It is, however, altogether probable that Job was an
historical person, and that traditions concerning him were current

232 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Without, then, endeavoring to classify the Book
of Job, we may say of it that it has some of the
qualities of all three types of literature, — the epic,
the drama, philosophy, but not all of the character
istics of either. If it be regarded as an epic, it is
what Professor Genung calls it, an epic of the inner
life. The epics of Homer deal with external ad
venture and with character as it is evolved out of
and manifested in adventurous experiences. There
is no action in the Book of Job. Throughout the
poem the central figure sits among the ashes, his
only adventures those of the spirit, striving by
much vain reflection to solve the mystery of life.
Not even by external symbols, as in Dante, are his
spiritual struggles represented. If the book be
regarded as a drama it is a monodrama. The
celestial movement is introduced in the prologue
simply to interpret the drama to us ; the wife and
the friends are but foils, partly to give occasion to
Job's discourse, partly by contrast to interpret it.
All attempt to find in them distinctive characters
is in vain. Froude well says, " The friends repeat
one another with but little difference ; the sameness
being of course intentional, as showing that they
were not speaking for themselves but as represen
tatives of a prevailing opinion." J The only actor
in the drama is Job himself ; the only action the
among the Jews." Seven Puzzling Bible Books, by Washington
Gladden, D. D., p. 109.
1 Short Studies on Great Subjects : The Book of Job, by James
Anthony Froude, M. A., p. 249.

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 233
battle between faith and skepticism, hope and de
spair, in his own soul. If the book be regarded
as philosophy, it is philosophy translated into the
terms of experience. There is here no philosopher
coolly studying the problem of life as a geologist
studies an ancient fossil, or an anatomist the dead
body which he dissects. The problems of life, love,
death, and sorrow are not studied as problems.
There is no argument here for immortality as in
the Phaedo of Socrates, no argument for the exist
ence of a God as in Diman's "Theistic Argument "
or Flint's " Theism," no balancing of probabilities
to reach a conclusion as in Bishop Butler's " An
alogy of Religion." The soul of a good and godly
man is portrayed in its living agony, seeking to
find, in spite of the apparent injustice of life, a
ground for its faith in the reality and the sov
ereignty of truth and goodness. Job is a kind of
spiritual Laocb'on, wrestling with the twin serpents
of doubt and despair, and to him they are such
dreadful realities that he has no thought for fine
philosophies or scientific reasonings. The method
of the Book of Job is the reverse of the scientific
method ; the problem is presented to the reader as
one of experience, not as one of philosophy.
The date of the book is entirely unknown, as is
its author ; formerly it was supposed to be one of
the oldest books in the Bible;1 modern scholars
1 Thus in Townsend's Bible, which undertook to print the whole
of the Bible in a true chronological order, the Book of Job is
printed among the Genesis narratives immediately prior to the

234 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
regard it as one of the latest.1 Thus the supposed
date for its composition has fluctuated between
B. C. 2337 and B. C. 400. The arguments for the
earlier date may all be summed up in the fact that
the scene is laid in the patriarchal age ; the chief
argument for the later date is that the line of
thought in the book presupposes a much later in
tellectual development than can be attributed to
the patriarchs.2
Whatever the date of the composition, there is
no doubt as to the time fixed in the author's mind
for the events described and the discussion to which
those events give rise. It is as certain that the
Book of Job deals with conditions existing prior to
the giving of the law under Moses, as it is that
Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar" deals with scenes
and events in Rome in the first century before
Christ. And while the date and authorship of the
call of Abram. Mr. Townsend says, " The life of Job is placed
before the Ufe of Abraham, on the authority of Dr. Hales. Job
himself, or one of his contemporaries, is generally supposed to
have been the author of this book ; which Moses obtained when
in Midian, and, with some alterations, addressed to the Israelites."
The Old Testament arranged in Historical and Chronological Order,
by the Rev. George Townsend, M. A., p. 35, note.
1 " It is not possible to fix the date of the Book (Job) precisely ;
but it will certainly not be earlier than the age of Jeremiah, and
most probably it was written either during or shortly after the
Babylonian captivity." An Introduction to the Literature of the
Old Testament, by S. R. Driver, D. D., p. 432.
2 For the arguments for the earlier date see note in Townsend's
Bible, p. 35 ; for arguments for the later date see Driver's Intro
duction, pp. 431-435, and The Book of Job, by R. W. Raymond,
Ph. D., pp. 50-62.

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 235
book are matters of no considerable importance, the
date affixed by the author to the scenes and discus
sions in the book is of the first importance. The
discussions of the book concern the profoundest
problems of religion ; but there is no suggestion in
it of a temple, a tabernacle, a Levitical priesthood,
a sacrificial system, the Ten Commandments, or to
any prophet or any events in Jewish history, or
indeed to any revelation of God whatever other
than that which is made through nature. The
object of the book, whoever wrote it, and whenever
it was written, is to portray the mental and spir
itual conditions of an earnest and devout soul, con
fronted by the profoundest problem of human life,
— the significance of suffering, — with no other
light upon that problem than such as is afforded
by a study of nature. This fact is to be kept con
stantly in mind in reading this poem. It cannot
be understood at all, except as the reader puts
himself back in imagination into the early patri
archal age, the age of Abram before his vision of
God, the age which preceded or was outside of all
special revelation of God in and to human experi
ence through prophets or lawgivers. The success
with which the author has achieved the difficult
task, not merely of portraying the outward charac
ter of this age, but of interpreting its mental and
moral conditions, constitutes the strongest reason
for questioning the conclusion of modern scholars
that it was written after the age of Solomon. If
they are right in their conclusions, — and on such

236 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
questions it is generally wise for the inexpert reader
to accept the conclusions of the expert, — the im
aginative genius of the unknown author is almost
without a parallel in literature. Historic dramas
and novels are almost invariably full of anachro
nisms. Not only the outward life is often imper
fectly portrayed, but habitually sentiments and
thoughts which belong to a later age are imputed
to the characters of a previous age. Shakespeare's
historic plays do not attempt accuracy either in
their historic setting or in their psychological
portraiture. Walter Scott's historical novels have
even less vraisemblance to the mental and moral
life of the times in which they are laid. Of modern
novels " Henry Esmond " and " Lorna Doone "
are perhaps the only two which can be said to ap
proximate accuracy as historical pictures of either
the outer or the inner life. But the Book of Job
is almost if not absolutely free from anachronisms.
All that we know of the patriarchal age leads us to
the conclusion that the book is photographic in its
realistic portraiture of that time, and in its sympa
thetic understanding of the thoughts of a people
unto whom no light had come from any open
vision. Let us try first to restate to ourselves in
undramatic form the mental state of such a people.
Says George Eliot, " A shadowy conception of
power that by much persuasion can be induced to
refrain from inflicting harm, is the shape most
easily taken by the sense of the Invisible in the
minds of men who have always been pressed close

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 237
by primitive wants, and to whom a life of hard toil
has never been illuminated by any enthusiastic
religious faith."1 That she here correctly de
scribes the primitive form of religious belief, which
is founded on fear of some unknown supernatural
power or powers, is clear to all who have made any
study of pagan religions. Imagine that there has
been gradually added to this earliest belief the
conviction expressed in Abram's question, " Shall
not the Judge of all the earth do right ? " the con
viction that there is one God and that he is a right
eous God ; the deduction is inevitable and irresist
ible, that the way to avoid the harm which he can
and sometimes does inflict is by living righteously.
Thus life is conceived of as under divine law and a
divine lawgiver ; if we obey his righteous will and
are righteous he will reward us ; if we disobey his
righteous will and are unrighteous he will punish
us. Happiness and suffering cease to be regarded
as either accidental occurrences or arbitrary inflic
tions ; they constitute a system of rewards and
punishments ; prosperity is interpreted as a sign of
divine approval, and suffering as a sign of divine
condemnation. Thus far and no farther had reli
gious faith developed in the patriarchal age. The
reward of virtue was attested in Abram's career by
a great wealth of flocks and herds ; the penalty of
vice was attested by the destruction of the Cities of
the Plain. What measure of truth there is in this
conception of happiness and suffering as a divine
1 Silas Marner, by George Eliot, chap. i.

238 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
system of rewards and penalties, it does not come
within my province here to consider ; that it is the
whole truth no one will believe who regards Jesus
Christ as at once the supreme object of his Father's
approving love and as the Man of Sorrows. That
pain is sometimes penal is certain ; that it has other
ministries than punishment is also certain ; that
it is in itself an evidence of divine disfavor no
Christian believer can for a moment seriously sup
pose. But in the patriarchal age this was the uni
versal estimate of the place of pain in the divine
economy. Trained in this belief until it had become axio
matic with him, not an opinion consciously deduced
from a study of life, but a part of his intellectual
existence into which he had grown from his youth
up, Job had lived a virtuous life and had prospered.
His religion had been real, not formal; had ruled
his life, not merely served as an appendage to it.
Stung by the reproaches of his friends he thus
describes the spirit of his life ; and the divine ap
proval explicitly expressed by Jehovah, alike in the
prologue and at the end of the drama, shows con
clusively that it is no complacent self-portraiture
of an unconscious pretender, but is intended by the
author as a dramatic representation of the hero of
his story.
" Oh that I were as in the months of old,
As in the days when God watched over me ;
When his lamp shined upon my head,
And by his light I walked through darkness ;
As I was in my autumn days,

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 239
When the friendship of God was over my tent ;
When the Almighty was yet with me,
And my children were about me ;
When my steps were washed with butter
And the rock poured me out rivers of oil ;
When I went forth to the gate by the city ;
When I fixed my seat in the open place.
The young men saw me, and withdrew themselves,
And the aged rose up and stood ;
The princes refrained talking
And laid their hand on their mouth ;
The voice of the nobles was hushed,
And their tongue cleaved to the roof of their mouth.
For the ear that heard blessed me ;
Aud the eye that saw bare witness for me ;
Because I had delivered the poor when he cried,
The fatherless also, and him that had no helper.
The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me ;
And I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy.
I clothed myself with justice, and it clothed itself with me ;
As a mantle and as a turban was my judgment.
I was eyes to the blind,
And feet was I to the lame.
I was a father to the needy
And the cause of him that I knew not I searched out.
And I brake the fangs of the unrighteous
And from his teeth I snatched the prey. " 1
Such was the character, such the previous life of
the central figure in the poem, by whose experience
the current theology of his time is to be tested ;
1 Job xxix. 2-17. The translations throughout this chapter are
taken either from the Revised Version, or from Professor Genung's
translation in The Epic of the Inner Life, or are produced by a
combination of the two. To Professor Genung's volume, one of
the best fruits of the modern or literary study of the Bible, I
desire to acknowledge my special indebtedness in the preparation
of this chapter.

240 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
in whose experience the world drama of life, love,
death, and sorrow is to be portrayed ; through
whose experience also is to be illustrated, if I read
the story aright, the soul's need of some other reve
lation of God and his truth than is afforded by the
mere study of nature and of life.
The drama opens with a prologue in the celestial
sphere. The sons of God come on a certain day
before the throne of Jehovah to give an account
of themselves. They are like inspectors who have
gone out into the various parts of the king's domain
and come back to report what they have seen.
One of them is called the Adversary. He is not
the embodiment of all evil, — a demon of malice, a
prince of wickedness, the Satan of Milton, the
Apollyon of Bunyan. He is a type of wickedness
in its earlier stages ; the cynic among the angels ;
who does not believe in disinterested virtue; but
who yet makes his tour of the earth with other
angels and with them comes, unforbidden, into the
court of heaven to report what he has seen. To
this cynic Jehovah says : " Have you considered
Job, my servant, how upright a man he is ? "
" Upright ! " replies the Adversary ; " who would
not be upright if he were paid as well as Job?
Doth he serve God for naught? Take away his
prosperity and see how quickly he will part with
his uprightness." Thus dramatically is presented
the one conclusive argument against the doctrine
that virtue is paid for by Providence. If it were
paid for it would not be virtue ; it would only be a

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 241
subtler and shrewder form of self-service. The
argument is not formulated, but its force is instinc
tively felt by the reader, who perceives that if Job
does not stand the test proposed he will be proved
not to have been virtuous but only shrewd. Virtue
must be its own reward or it is no virtue. To this
unexpressed premise of the cynic's argument Je
hovah accedes ; he accepts the challenge ; and he
gives the Adversary freedom to apply the test him
self ; " only," he says, " upon him put not forth
thine, hand."
The scene is shifted to the earth, where the
Adversary's work is seen by the spectator, though
the part of the Adversary is unknown to those who
suffer from it. There is a family gathering ; all
the sons and daughters of Job have met in the
eldest brother's house ; Job, as we should say provi
dentially, is somewhere without, when a messenger
comes to him with the word that the Sabeans in a
foray have carried off a portion of his property and
slain the servants ; a second messenger treads close
upon his heels with the report of a bolt of lightning
which has destroyed his sheep and killed the shep
herds ; a third follows with the word that three
bands of Chaldeans have carried off the camels
and slain their keepers ; a fourth that a great wind
has smitten the house in which his sons and daugh
ters were feasting and buried them in the ruins
and not one has escaped alive. This morning Job
was prosperous and happy ; now he is in poverty
and bereaved. But he does not surrender his

242 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
virtue nor lose his faith. " Naked," he says, " I
came into the world, and naked shall I go out;
Jehovah hath given, Jehovah hath taken away;
blessed be the name of Jehovah."
The scene shifts back to the celestial sphere,
where the cynic comes with the other angels to
make his report. Jehovah asks him if he is satis
fied that Job's virtue was disinterested : " He still
holdeth fast his integrity, although thou movedest
me against him to destroy him without cause."
But the cynic is not satisfied : " Skin for skin," he
says ; " yea, all that a man hath will he give for his
life. But put forth thine hand now and touch his
bone and his flesh, and he will renounce thee to
thy face." Jehovah accepts the second challenge ;
again gives the Adversary permission to do his
worst to Job, so that he save him alive. And the
Adversary goes forth, first to smite Job with a
painful and humiliating disease ; then to turn his
wife also into a cynic ; x and finally to send him
three friends to console him by telling him that he
must have been a great sinner or he could not be a
1 " One of the curious difficulties of the Book of Job is the
various renderings of which its somewhat strange language seems
to be capable. In our English Bible the wife's counsel is ' Curse
God and die.' In the vulgate, followed by the French, it is ' Bless
God and die.' And yet, radical as seems the difference, the
difference is more apparent than real ; in the one ease she speaks
seriously, ' Of what benefit is your God to you ? Curse him and
then die ; ' in the other she speaks ironically, ' You bless your
Jehovah, do you ? you worship him ? you say blessed be the name
of Jehovah that taketh away ? Well, bless him and die ! What
will he do for your blessing ? "

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 243
great sufferer. So the Epilogue ends, and the true
drama, the debate between Job and his friends,
begins. His wife believes in his integrity, but not
in his principles. She sneers at his faith ; counsels
him to abandon it ; and advises suicide as a last
and only refuge. His friends share his sorrow,
share it so heartily that for seven days and nights
they sit speechless beside him ; but while they
believe in his theology they do not believe in his
integrity ; for truth to tell, it is impossible to believe
in both. That theology is very simple : Jehovah
is the ruler of life and Jehovah is just ; therefore
if suffering has fallen upon any man it must be
because he has sinned and deserves punishment.
First gently, then with continually increasing pun
gency, and sometimes with temper, they urge Job
to confess the sins which he has kept concealed
from his fellows, and so escape the continued dis
pleasure of his God.
At times Job seems inclined to accept his wife's
counsel. He does not curse God, but he curses the
day wherein he was born with an execration so
bitter that it arouses the pious protest of his friend
Eliphaz. He does not commit suicide nor think
of so doing, but he longs for death, and beseeches
Jehovah to crush him.
" Wherefore," he cries, " is light given to him that is in misery,
And life unto the bitter in soul ?
Which long for death but it cometh not,
And dig for it more than for hid treasures,
Which rejoice exceedingly,
And are glad when they can find the grave ?

244 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Why is light given to a man whose way is hid,
And whom God hath hedged in ? " 1
But never once does he yield to the exhortations of
his orthodox friends ; never once does he lose faith
in his own integrity ; never once does he entertain,
even for an instant, the suggestion that he make
his peace with the unknown God, by pretending to
a confession of sins which he has not committed, a
penitence which he does not feel, and a recognition
of the justice of his sufferings against which his
soul vehemently protests. It is this conflict be
tween the theology which had become a part of his
religion, and this truth of life which nothing will
induce him to deny, which makes the tragedy of
his spiritual experience. His religion has been
built on his faith that a just God is the ruler of
this life, and therefore this life is just. To him has
never come any external revelation ; he knows no
thing of the deliverance of Israel from Egypt ; of
the passage through the Red Sea ; of the giving
of the law to Moses at Mt. Sinai ; of the preser
vation of Israel in the wanderings in the wilder
ness ; of God's patient forgiveness of his sinning
people; of Joshua's victories; of David's songful
visions of God ; of Elijah's experiences of divine
support. He cannot buttress his weakened faith by
resting in these confirmatory experiences of others.
He can get no help from his wife, who has aban
doned faith in his theology ; nor from his friends,
who have abandoned faith in him ; nor from any
1 Job iii. 20-23.

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 245
accepted hope in a future life which may redress the
wrongs of this, for in his age there is no such hope.
To him, as to the men of his time, life is but a
breath, which man gaspeth out and then is gone.
" The cloud vanisheth away, and is gone,
So he that goeth down to the grave shall not come up again." 1
What to believe he knows not ; only he knows this,
that he has not so sinned as to deserve this punish
ment. The tragedy of his life is not that his pro
perty has been swept away, his children slain, his
health destroyed, his wife made a tempter, his
friends a deceitful hope, " like a channel of brooks
that pass away," leaving but a dry bed to taunt the
thirst of the perishing pilgrim. The tragedy is
this : that his conception of life as a kingdom ruled
over by a just God is shattered, and his faith in
God himself as a God of justice is darkened and
at times well-nigh destroyed. The foundation of
his moral life — his faith in the supremacy of
righteousness — is imperiled, and he realizes the
peril. His anguish of spirit presages that cry of a
greater Sufferer than Job, " My God, my God, why
hast thou forsaken me ? " while he has not, as that
Divine Sufferer had, the unconquerable faith, which
even in the hour when he seemed forsaken could
still cry, " My God."
The theology of his friends is entirely self-con
sistent ; the only difficulty with it is that it is not
consistent with the facts of life. This theology is
1 Job vii. 9.

246 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
put by Eliphaz in his first speech of pious counsel
to Job :
" Bethink thee now ; who that was guiltless hath perished,
And where have the upright been cut off ?
As I have seen — they that plough iniquity,
And that sow wickedness, reap the same.
By the breath of God they perish,
And by the blast of his anger they are consumed." 1
The practical application follows logically enough,
though Eliphaz leaves Bildad to state it :
" Doth God pervert judgment ?
Or doth the Almighty pervert justice ?
If thy children have sinned against him,
And he have delivered them into the hand of their transgression :
If thou wouldest seek diligently unto God,
And make thy supplication to the Almighty ;
If thou wert pure and upright ;
Surely now he would awake for thee,
And make the habitation of thy righteousness prosperous.
And though thy beginning was small
Yet thy latter end should greatly increase." 2
And when Job indignantly resents the implication
that he has been a great sinner else great suffering
would not have fallen upon him, his friends are
quite ready to invent facts in order to sustain their
theory. He must have sinned or he would not
have been punished : so Eliphaz concludes :
" Is not thy wickedness great ?
Neither is there any end to thine iniquities.
For thou hast taken pledges of thy brother for nought,
And stripped the naked of their clothing.
Thou hast not given water to the weary to drink,
1 Job iv. 7-9.
2 Job viii. 3-7.

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 247
And thou hast withholden bread from the hungry.
While the man of the strong arm — his was the land,
And the respected of persons dwelt therein !
Thou hast sent widows away empty,
And the arms of the fatherless have been broken.
Therefore snares are round about thee,
And sudden fear troubleth thee,
Or darkness, that thou canst not see,
And abundance of waters cover thee." 1
The argument is very simple, and would be en
tirely adequate if it were in accordance with the
facts, but it is not ; and it angers Job, not because
it is unjust to him, but because it is false and
assumes that God is one to be pleased with false
hood used in his defense. Job's splendid burst of
indignation against the use of falsehood in defense
of God is one of the most notable passages in the
poem, and deserves to be often repeated in our
own time. For in all ages, alas ! even in ours also,
ecclesiasticism has imagined that the cause of reli
gion can be supported by falsehood, and that the
spirit of reverence can be nurtured by denying or
concealing from ourselves and others the facts of
life. Job protests against all such special pleading
for God : " Will ye speak lies for God,
And talk deceitfully for him ?
Will ye show him favor ?
Will ye be special pleaders for God ? " 2
But if the theology of the three friends is simple
and consistent, Job's is not. In truth he has no
1 Job xxii. 5-11.
2 Job xiii. 7, 8.

248 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
theology ; he has only experience. This experience
to which, when we share it, we rarely dare to give
expression, he utters with an abandon which seems
to his companions profane, and which to the modern
reader would perhaps seem so were it not found
in the Bible, and there somewhat softened by the
Authorized Version. The experience of a soul in
vain endeavoring to harmonize the apparent injus
tice and even cruelty of life, when he is suffering
from it, with his faith in the justice and goodness
of God, in whom he is struggling to retain his
faith, is never consistent. Job recognizes and con
fesses his own inconsistency : " I am not myself,"
he cries ; and this inconsistency he attributes to the
right cause, — the indignation born of his wretched
ness and aggravated by the self-complacent counsels
of his friends.
" Oh that my indignation were weighed, were weighed,
And my calamity were laid in the balances against it I
For now it would be heavier than the sand of the seas :
Therefore have my words been rash.
For the arrows of the Almighty are within me,
Whose poison my spirit drinketh up." 1
At times he resents with bitter scorn their cool
assumption that he must be a sinner above all
others because his afflictions are so great ; at times
he pleads with them with touching pathos to put
themselves in his place, and trust him, their old
and well proved friend.
" Now therefore be pleased to look upon me ;
For surely I shall not lie to your face.
1 Job vi. 2-4.

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 249
Return, I pray you, let there be no injustice
Yea, return again, my cause is righteous.
Is there injustice on my tongue ?
Cannot my sense discern what is wrong ? " l
He confesses that he is not faultless : —
" How shall a man be just before God ?
If one should desire to contend with him
He could not answer him one of a thousand." 2 !
But he calls himself "the just, the upright;" denies
that he has done anything to deserve the afflictions
which have fallen upon him, and declares that inno
cence is vain, and virtue no protection against the
Almighty and the Inscrutable One.
" I know that thou wilt not hold me innocent.
I shall be condemned ;
Why then do I labor in vain ?
If I wash myself with snow water
And make my hands never so clean ;
Yet wilt thou plunge me in the ditch,
And mine own clothes shall abhor me." 8
But he does not concede the justice of this con
demnation ; he resents it ; he affirms its essential
injustice ; he has no fear of a Day of Judgment
and he will not pretend. On the contrary he longs
for it ; and with the splendid audacity of self-con
scious virtue he challenges God to make known the
verdict against him, a challenge which he repeats
again and again.
" Is it good unto thee that thou shouldest oppress,
That thou shouldest despise the work of thine hands,
And shine upon the counsel of the wicked ?
1 Job vi. 28-30. 2 Job ix. 2, 3.
8 Job ix. 28-31.

250 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Hast thou eyes of flesh,
Or seest thou as man seeth ?
Are thy days as the days of man,
Or thy years as man's days,
That thou inquirest after mine iniquity,
And searchest after my sin,
Although thou knowest that I am not wicked ;
And there is none that can deliver out of thine hand ? " 1
And he insists that his experience of the injustice
of life is not peculiar. His friends aver that virtue
is always rewarded and sin is always punished : they
have described life as they think it ought to be.
He describes life as it is ; and if it must be con
ceded that his picture is much too dark, yet it is
not darker than it often appears to the soul tried
in the experience of an apparently unjust sorrow,
as Job is tried.
" Wherefore do the wicked live,
Become old, yea, wax mighty in power ?
Their seed is established with them in their sight,
And their offspring before their eyes.
Their houses are safe from fear,
Neither is the rod of God upon them.
Their bull gendereth and f aileth not ;
Their cow calveth and casteth not her calf.
They send forth their little ones like a flock,
And their children dance.
They sing to the timbrel and harp,
And rejoice at the sound of the pipe.
They spend their days in prosperity,
And in a moment they go down to the grave.
Yet they said unto God, Depart from us ;
For we desire not the knowledge of thy ways.
What is the Almighty that we should serve him ?
And what profit should we have if we pray unto him ? " a
1 Job x. 3-7. 2 Job xxi. 7-15.

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 251
To the insistence of his friends that the prosperity
of the wicked is short-lived, "that his prosperity
shall not endure," that
" The heavens shall reveal his iniquity,
And earth shall rise up against him,
And the increase of him shall depart,"
Job replies scornfully : —
" How oft is it that the lamp of the wicked is put out ?
That their destruction cometh upon them ?
That God distributeth sorrows in his anger ?
That they are as stubble before the wind
And as chaff that the storm carrieth away ?
Ye say, God layeth up his iniquity for his children.
Let him recompense it unto the wicked himself, that he may feel
it.
Let his own eyes see his destruction,
And let himself drink of the wrath of the Almighty." 1
If Job could but believe in immortality he might
derive some consolation from such a belief ; not so
much because it would give him a reward hereafter
to compensate for the suffering here, for Job does
serve God for naught, and his complainings are
less against the sufferings which have fallen upon
himself than against the revelation of the injustice
of life which those sufferings have brought to him.
But if he could believe in immortality he might
believe in divine justice. He argues with himself ;
tries to persuade himself of immortality ; seeks in
nature for some analysis to furnish such a hope ;
but with the result which generally has attended
similar endeavors : a hope of immortality founded
1 Job xxi. 17-20.

252 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
on an analysis drawn from nature furnishes but a
poor support in time of actual trial : —
..." there is hope of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout
again
And that the tender branch thereof will not cease.
Though the root thereof wax old in the earth,
And the stock thereof die in the ground ;
Yet through the scent of water it will bud,
And put forth boughs like a plant.
But man dieth, and wasteth away :
Yea, man gaspeth out his breath, — and where is he ?
As the waters fail from the sea
And the river decayeth and drieth up ;
So man lieth down and riseth not ;
Till the heavens be no more they shall not awake,
Nor be roused out of their sleep.
Oh that thou wouldest hide me in the grave ;
That thou wouldest keep me secret, until thy wrath be past,
That thou wouldest appoint me a set time and remember me I
If a man die shall he live again ?
Then all the days of my warfare would I wait,
Till my release should come." x
Once indeed out of his very despair a hope of im
mortality is struck as a spark by the blow of flint
on steel, but only to expire as speedily as such a
spark. He cannot disbelieve in the divine justice ;
this life is not just; therefore there must come,
there will come, a day of vindication : —
" I know that my Vindicator liveth, —
And that he shall stand up at the last upon the earth :
And after my skin hath been thus destroyed,
Yet without my flesh shall I see God :
Whom I shall see for myself,
And mine eyes shall behold and not another." 2
1 Job xiv. 7-14.
2 Job xix. 25-27. The word Redeemer or Vindicator " denotes

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 253
But this hope, born of despair, is but a momentary
gleam, like a star shining through a murky atmos
phere ; then the clouds roll up again and it is gone.
The bitterness of Job's experience is not that
his theology is shattered — he does not lament its
loss ; nor that his faith in immortality is over
thrown — he lived before the age of faith in im
mortality and was learning one ground of that
faith in learning the imperfection and injustice of
this earthly life, if this life is indeed all. It is not
even in the desertion of him by his friends or the
scornful abandonment of his faith by his wife. It
is that the God whom he had believed to be a just
God and a personal friend has become in his
thought a personal Enemy, an Adversary, a Spy
of Men,1 whose justice it is well-nigh impossible
for him any longer to believe in. He tauntingly
the next of kin whose duty it was to avenge the blood of a mur
dered man (see Numbers xxxv. 19), and to succor the bereaved and
needy (see Ruth iii. 9-13 ; iv. 1-8). With wonderful skill Job
chooses the word that gathers into itself all that he has longed
for ; it means one who will befriend him, avenge his wrong, be
his Daysman, make God his friend again." The Epic of the Inner
Life, by John F. Genung, p. 236, note. Does it not rather mean
God himself ? is it not a spiritual reaction from his skepticism
back into his fundamental faith in the righteousness of God ? A
similar reaction is illustrated in the contrast in chapter xxiii.
between verses 8, 9 and verse 10. The phrase rendered in the
Authorized Version "in my flesh" is literally "from my flesh,"
and might mean either '" out from my flesh " or " apart from my
flesh." The context clearly demands the latter rendering, and
" without my flesh " is given by the Revision in the margin.
1 Job vii. 20, Renan's translation. " Watcher of men " in
Revised Version.

254 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
challenges God to produce his accusations ; he
would meet them as a prince ; he would glory in
them. It almost seems as though by his challenge
he would provoke the Almighty to this trial in the
court of reason and of justice : —
" Oh that I had one to hear me !
(Lo, here is my signature, let the Almighty answer me.)
And that I had the indictment which mine adversary hath
written !
Surely, I would carry it upon my shoulder ;
I would bind it unto me as a crown.
I would declare unto him the number of my steps ;
As a prince would I go near unto him." 1
But the Almighty keeps silence. Would even that
he would reveal himself through another ; that
some man would come in human experience to in
terpret the Unknown : —
" He is not a man like me, that I should answer him,
That we should come together in judgment ;
Nor is there any daysman betwixt us,
That might lay his hand upon us both." 3
But God sends no Daysman, no Interpreter ; he
presents no charges ; he makes no revelation ; He
is the Unknown and the Unknowable, the Almighty
yet the Inscrutable. This self-hiding of God is
the gravamen of Job's complaint against him :
" Oh that I knew where I might find him 1
That I might come even to his seat !
I would set in order my cause before him ;
And fill my mouth with arguments.
I would know the words which he would answer me ;
And understand what he would say unto me.
1 Job xxxi. 35-37. 2 Job ix. 32, 33.

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 255
Would he contend with me in the greatness of his power ?
Nay ; but surely he would give heed unto me.
There the upright might reason with him ;
So should I be delivered forever from my judge.
Behold I go forward, but he is not there ;
And backward, but I cannot perceive him :
On the left hand, when he doth work, but I cannot behold him;
And on the right hand he hideth himself that I cannot see him." J
Job even doubts at times whether the case would
be bettered if God were to reveal himself ; responds
to the imagined indictment against himself by an
indictment of his judge, which in one breath he
utters, in the next half takes back.
" Though I were righteous, yet would I not answer ;
Must I make supplication to mine adversary ?
H I had called, and he had answered me,
Yet would I not believe that he hearkened unto my voice.
For he breaketh me with a tempest,
And multiplieth my wounds without cause.
He suffereth me not to recover my breath,
For he surf eiteth me with bitternesses.
Is the question of strength, — behold, the Mighty One He !
Of judgment, — ' Who will set me a day ? '
Were I righteous, mine own mouth would condemn me ;
Perfect were I, yet would he prove me perverse.
Perfect I am, — I value not my soul — I despise my life — •
It is all one — therefore I say,
Perfect and wicked he consumeth alike.
If the scourge destroyeth suddenly,
He mocketh at the dismay of the innocent.
The earth is given over into the hands of the wicked ;
The face of the judges he veileth ; —
If is not he, who then is it ? " 2
At length the passionate indignation of Job
burns itself out ; his friends are silenced and no
1 Job xxiii. 3-9. 2 Job ix. 15-24.

256 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
longer add fuel to the flames ; l and he himself
presages the conclusion to which the monodrama
eventually conducts the reader.2 A theodicy is im
possible ; the ways of God are not to be justified
to man; we are too little and he is too great for our
understanding of him ; at best we know truth only
in fragments ; we are surrounded on every side by
the Infinite, and we can peer but a little way into
its solemn mysteries. Men mine for the precious
metals ; where no bird has ever flown and no beast
has ever made a pathway for himself, man discov
ers the silver and the gold, and the precious stones.
So where no man has ever gone, where no winged
imagination has ever soared, no human enterprise
has ever explored a way, is wisdom hidden : God
alone knows its hiding place.
1 It does not come within the province of this chapter to con
sider the question whether the speech of Elihu (chapters xxxii.-
xxxvii.) is an interpolation or not. Froude summarizes well the
arguments in the affirmative (Short Studies, vol. i. p. 257, note) ;
Genung the arguments in the negative ( The Epic of the Inner Life,
p. 78, note). In either case, as Genung says, it " presents the
friends' side of the question freed from the heats and disturbances
of the controversy, and brought to its best expression," and there
fore it may be omitted from further consideration here.
2 Professor Moulton puts the passage paralleling the miner's
search for gold with the philosopher's search for wisdom into the
mouth of Zophar. The Modern Reader's Bible. There is admit
tedly some difficulty in the text, and it seems not improbable that
chapter xxvii. 8-23 was uttered by Zophar, not by Job, since it
agrees with the general position of the three friends and disagrees
with that insisted on by Job. But chapter xxviii. anticipates the
conclusion of the whole poem, and clearly in its spirit belongs
rather to Job, to whom life is a profound mystery, than to the
three friends, who can see no mystery in it.

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 257
" Surely, there is a mine for silver
And a place for gold which they refine.
Iron is taken out of the earth,
And brass is molten out of the stone.

That path no bird of prey knoweth,
Neither hath the falcon's eye seen it ;
The proud beasts have not trodden it,
Nor hath the fierce lion passed thereby.
He putteth forth his hand upon the flinty rock ;
He overturneth the mountains by the roots.
He cutteth out channels among the rocks ;
And his eye seeth every precious thing.
He bindeth the streams that they trickle not ;
And the thing that is hid bringeth he forth to light
But Wisdom — where shall it be found ?
And where is the place of understanding ?
Man knoweth not the price thereof ;
Neither is it found in the land of the living.
The deep saith, It is not in me ;
And the sea saith, It is not with me.
God understandeth the way thereof,
And he knoweth the place thereof,
For he looketh to the ends of the earth,
And seeth under the whole heaven ;
To make a weight for the wind ;
Yea, he meteth out the waters by measure,
When he made a decree for the rain,
And a way for the lightning of the thunder ;
Then did he see it and declare it :
He established it, yea, and searched it out.
And unto man he said,
Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is Wisdom ;
And to depart from evil is understanding." 1
This is the conclusion to which the author of
Ecclesiastes comes ; it is the final and only con-
1 Job xxviii. 1-28.

258 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
elusion of the Wisdom Literature of the Ancient
Hebrews ; the conclusion of a consecrated and de
vout agnosticism. It recalls also the conclusion of
Paul, the Christian analogue of the Ancient He
brew wise man : " Now we see truth as in a mirror
in enigmatical reflections, but then face to face ;
now I know only from fragments, then shall I
know thoroughly, even also as I am known. But
even as things are, there abide faith, hope, love, —
these three. But the greatest of these is love." l
And when at the close of this monodrama God
answers Job and his friends out of the whirlwind,
this is the conclusion which he impresses upon
them : Nature is full of mystery ; wonder not at
moral mysteries in life. This is the substance of
Jehovah's reply to Job and his friends : —
" I will ask thee ; and inform me thou.
Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth ?
Declare if by knowledge thou understandest.
Hast thou comprehended the breadths of the earth ?
Tell if thou knowest it all.
Hast thou visited the treasuries of the snow ?
And the treasuries of hail hast thou seen them, —
Which I have reserved for the day of distress ?
Wilt thou even disannul my right ?
Wilt thou condemn me, that thou mayest be justified ? " 2
1 1 Cor. xiii. 12, 13.
2 Job xxxviii. 3, 4, 18, 22, 24 ; xl. 8. John Owen sums up the
argument very effectively : " If it be granted that all the opera
tions of nature and creation which man sees about him are inexpli
cable, may not a similar unsearchableness, ex natura rerum, per-

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 259
To attempt to epitomize the sublime chapters
which close this poem and in which this lesson is
illustrated and enforced would be hopeless. The
reader must turn to his Revised Version of the
Bible and read these chapters for himself. Let
him not, however, fail to note that God condemns
the three friends whose sophisticated arguments
have falsified the facts of life in their special plead
ing for him, — rather let us say for their own the
ology which they have confounded with him, —
and commends Job in spite of his apparently auda
cious irreverence. The poet does not leave us in
doubt whether his sympathies are with Job or with
his three friends.
" Jehovah said to Eliphaz the Temanite, My wrath is
kindled against thee, and against thy two friends : for
ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right as my
servant Job hath." a
The epilogue, in which seven sons and three
daughters were restored to Job as though they
were raised from the dead, and in which all his
property is doubled, does not here concern us, ex
cept that it constitutes a conclusive demonstration
that in this book we have presented to us a drama,
not a history.
tain to God's dealings with men ? If Job cannot see whence comes
the rain or determine beforehand the path of the lightning, may
not a similar inability extend to others of the divine operations
in which man's welfare is more especially concerned ? " Five
Great Skeptical Dramas, p. 154. Mr. Owen's entire treatment of
Job, and especially his comparison of it with the Prometheus
Bound, is very suggestive.
1 Job xiii. 7.

260 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
There is a philosophy called Utilitarianism : the
popular though crude expression of which is found
in the phrase, Be virtuous and you will be happy.
The Book of Job brings this philosophy to the test
of life : he is virtuous and he is not happy. There
is a philosophy called Naturalism : it assumes that
neither is there any divine revelation nor any need
of one. The Book of Job brings this philosophy
to the test of life : in sorrow the light of nature
proves to be a great darkness. There is a philoso
phy called Agnosticism : it assumes that God and
the future life must remain forever unknown to us.
The Book of Job does not answer this philosophy ;
but it interprets the anguish of the soul in this
ignorance by the cry, " Oh that I knew where I
might find him! " Centuries must pass before the
Great Unknown of the captivity will bring his
message to Israel that only by the Suffering Ser
vant of Jehovah can Israel be saved ; more centu
ries, before the Nazarene will take up his cross and
bid his followers take up theirs and enter into
glory through crucifixion ; before his great Apostle
will declare that he glories in tribulation also ; be
fore his beloved disciple will give the world the
vision of the saints of God redeemed and redeem
ing by means of great tribulation ; and many more
centuries, it seems, must pass before the world can
understand the lesson, learned so slowly and with
such difficulty, that suffering is not punitive but re
demptive. " In the world," said Christ, " ye shall
have tribulation : but be of good cheer ; I have

A SPIRITUAL TRAGEDY 261
overcome the world." a In the book of Job we see
the tribulation of an honest heart uncheered by
this promise of victory. " I am persuaded," said
Paul, " that neither death, nor Hfe, nor angels, nor
principalities, nor things present, nor things to
come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any
other created thing, shall be able to separate me
from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our
Lord." 2 In the Book of Job we see the devout
and honest soul struggling to hold fast to the love
of God which hfe is trying to wrest from him, and
which has not been authenticated to him by the
love and life and death of Jesus Christ.
For in the Book of Job the problem of the ages
is portrayed in microcosm ; the problem of suffer
ing as it has presented itself in all ages to sincere
souls, conscious of their innocence and not con
scious of that call to service through sacrifice
which the life and passion of Jesus Christ has
made vocal to all the world. In this ancient
drama the spiritual tragedy of all the ages is inter
preted. In it is the audacious challenge to life of
a William Ernest Henley : —
" In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud ;
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed." 8
In it is the pathetic counter-pleading against life
of a Matthew Arnold : —
1 John xvi. 33. 2 Rom. viii. 38, 39.
3 Life and Death (Echoes), iv.

262 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
" Let us be true
To one another ! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain ;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night." *
And by it we are conducted to the conclusion of
Alfred Tennyson : —
" Our little systems have their day ;
They have their day and cease to be :
They are but broken lights of thee,
And thou, 0 Lord, art more than they.
" We have but faith : we cannot know ;
For knowledge is of things we see ;
And yet we trust it comes from thee,
A beam in darkness : let it grow." 2
" We cannot know : " this is the conclusion of the
Book of Job ; let us be humble and patient, do our
duty, be true to one another, and wait for the solu
tion of life's mystery. Let us realize that charac
ter, not happiness, is the end of life, and that if we
do not serve God for naught we do not serve him
at all. Let us not aggravate the sufferings of life
by predicating their injustice ; nor sacrifice our
loyalty to truth in our endeavor to prove that loy
alty to God is reasonable.
1 Dover Beach ; Poems, 211.
2 In Memoriam.

CHAPTER XI
A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY — I
Moral teachers may be divided into three
classes, which may be respectively termed the em
pirical, the legal, and the prophetic. The empirical
teacher observes life, and from his observations de
duces certain moral maxims. He perceives that cer
tain courses of conduct produce happiness, — these
he calls right ; certain other courses of conduct pro
duce pain, — these he calls wrong. He measures
conduct by its results, and deduces the principles
of moral action from his observation of such results.
These principles find their most common and popu
lar expression in such maxims as " Honesty is the
best policy ; " they are based upon experience and
observation ; they are often, though by no means
always, purely prudential ; they are more apt to be
rules than principles ; and they constitute rather a
series of practical maxims than a system of theo
retical ethics. The legalist is not content with
these results. He carries his researches further,
or thinks that he does so. From his observation
and experience, he deduces certain laws of life, or
he accepts such laws as promulgated by some au
thority, human or divine. These laws of life some-

264 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
times derive their authority solely from observation
of their results ; sometimes added authority is given
to them by their promulgation by the Church or
the State ; often it is maintained that they are de
rived directly or indirectly from God or the gods,
in which case the supreme authority of a divine
lawgiver is claimed for them. Virtue consists, ac
cording to this school, in obedience to law, human
or divine ; and this obedience is to be rendered
regardless of possible or probable results ; for
virtue consists in doing what is commanded, not in
doing merely what appears to be beneficial. The
prophetic teacher is not satisfied to stop with the
discovery of a law, whether that law is human or
divine. He asks, Why has this law been promul
gated? why has the Church or the State forbidden
or commanded ? why has God forbidden or com
manded? And his reply to this inquiry is not
derived from any observation of the effects of obe
dience or disobedience. Virtue he regards not as
a means to happiness as an end ; it is itself the end.
It is to be pursued whether it is commanded or
forbidden ; whether it produces pleasure or pain.
The prophetic teacher does not think that certain
conduct is righteous because it produces happiness,
though he believes that generally happiness follows
from virtue ; he does not think that it is righteous
because it is commanded, but that it is commanded
because it is righteous. Law he regards as inher
ent in the nature : the laws of the material universe
are the nature of matter and force ; the laws of

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 265
health are the nature of the body ; the laws of God
are the nature of God ; and these are also the laws
of man because man is made in the image of God.
The authority of law is from within ; law is inher
ent, eternal, immutable. God is righteous and his
commands are righteous, but righteousness is not
created by the commands which define and inter
pret it ; the careful observation of life confirms the
practical wisdom of righteousness in all its various
applications, but righteousness does not depend on
the results which proceed from it. The author of
the Epistle to the Hebrews has given an ancient
prophet's utterance of this view in the phrase " it
is impossible for God to lie." F. W. Faber has
given a modern prophet's utterance of it in the
verse, — " For right is right, since God is God ;
And right the day must win :
To doubt would be disloyalty,
To falter would be sin."
The moralists of the eighteenth century and the
stoics of the first century may be regarded as a
type of the first school ; the Puritans of the seven
teenth century and the nobler spirits among the
Pharisees of the first century may be regarded as
a type of the second ; the mystics of all ages and
the Hebrew prophets of the period before and
during the exile may be regarded as a type of the
third. Often these schools are critical of and antago
nistic to each other. The empiric condemns the

266 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
legalist as dogmatic, and the prophet as vague and
mystical ; the legalist condemns the empiric as un
authoritative and unscientific, and the prophet as
unauthoritative and mystical ; and the prophetic
teacher condemns the empiric as one who substi
tutes prudence for virtue, and the legalist as one
who substitutes the obedience of fear for the spon
taneous life of love. Yet they are not necessarily
antagonistic except as they are made mutually ex
clusive. The religious teacher may believe with
the prophet that righteousness is inherent in the
nature of God; with the legalist that law is more
than a principle, it is also the expression of the
righteous will of a righteous God ; and with the
empiric that the observation and experience of life
interpret and confirm the intuitive moral percep
tion of these divine embodiments of this eternal
principle. The greatest teachers combine the three
methods of ascertaining, interpreting, and confirm
ing moral truth. When in the Sermon on the
Mount Christ gives to his disciples the counsel,
" Agree with thine adversary quickly whiles thou
art in the way with him ; lest at any time the
adversary deliver thee to the judge and the judge
deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into
prison," he commends the pacific disposition by a
purely prudential motive derived from an observa
tion of the facts of life ; x when he says : " I say
1 " Lest the adversary deliver thee to the judge." " This part
is explained by some in a metaphorical sense, that the Heavenly
Judge will act toward us with the utmost rigor, so as to forgive

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 267
unto you, " Swear not at all ; neither by heaven, for
it is God's throne ; nor by the earth, for it is his
footstool ; neither by Jerusalem, for it is the city
of the Great King," he promulgates a definite law,
and bases it not on the experience of life, but on
the authority of the conscience and the reason in
terpreting the laws of God; and when he says,
" Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do
good to them that hate you, and pray for them that
despitef uUy use you and persecute you, that ye may
be the children of your Father which is in heaven,"
he enunciates a divine principle of righteousness
which inheres in the nature of God, and of man as
the child of God, made in God's image, dependent
for its authority neither on the results which it
produces, nor on the will of the lawgiver who for
mulates it, but on its own inherent, eternal, abso
lute rightfulness.
All three of these voices, that of the empiric,
that of the legalist, and that of the prophet or in-
tuitionalist, are found in the Old Testament. The
Book of Job may be taken as the voice of the
prophet. Job will pay no reverence to Jehovah if
Jehovah be not righteous. Righteousness of char
acter, that is, conformity to the eternal principles
us nothing, if we do not labor to settle those differences which
we have with our neighbors. But I view it more simply, as
an admonition that, even among men, it is usually advantageous
for us to come to an early agreement with adversaries, because,
with quarrelsome persons, their obstinacy often costs them dear."
Commentary on a Harmony of the Evangelists, Matthew, Mark, and
Luke, by John Calvin, vol. i. p. 288.

268 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
of justice, is the only ground of authority which
he will recognize. The Hebrew code may be re
garded as the voice of the legalist : its message is
summed up in the words, " If ye will obey my voice
and keep my covenant, then shall ye be a peculiar
treasure unto me above all people : " all virtue is
summed up in obedience to a supreme, a divine
King. The voice of the empiric, who derives
moral maxims from an observation of life, and
commends them by their practical results as seen
in life, is chiefly interpreted in two books, — the
Book of Proverbs and the Book of Ecclesiastes.
As the Levitical code is the expression of the re
ligious life as interpreted by the priesthood ; as
the Deuteronomic code is the expression of that
life as interpreted by the statesmen ; as the Book
of Psalms is the expression of that life as inter
preted by the lyric poets ; as the Books of Amos,
Hosea, Micah, and Isaiah are perhaps the sublim-
est expression of that life as interpreted by the in-
tuitionalists or prophets, so the Books of Proverbs
and of Ecclesiastes are the expression of that life
as interpreted by the Wise Men.1 These Wise
Men constituted no order, as did the priests ; they
did not profess to have received a special divine
call, as did the prophets ; rarely if ever do they
claim to speak in the name or on behalf of Jeho
vah ; but they did constitute an unorganized and
1 For an excellent account of this school see The Wise Men of
Ancient Israel and their Proverbs, by C. T. Kent, Ph. D., pp. 17-
31.

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 269
undefined school of thought ; their analogue in our
times is to be found in the equally inorganic School
of Ethical Culture.
Proverbs are the coined experience of a people.
The maker of a proverb is not one who has seen
deeply into the inward nature of things ; he is
not a poet, nor one who has a clear apprehension
of great laws ; he is not a philosopher : the maker
of a proverb is one who has a keen observation of
the actual phenomena of life, and has been able to
put the result of his observation into a single sen
tence so that it flashes light like a diamond. The
Book of Proverbs is the experience of the Hebrew
people coined into current aphorisms by men of
native wit. These proverbs are not written by
men of remarkable spiritual vision ; nor by men
notable for their clear vision of great laws, whether
discovered by philosophical inquiry or divinely re
vealed ; they are aphorisms which have been struck
out of human experience by the attrition of life,
have received concise interpretation in compact
sentences, and have passed current among the peo
ple. Such a book can have no author ; rather it
has many authors, though it may have one editor.
No man can with deliberate purpose sit down to
write proverbs. One man once made the endeavor,
but since Martin Farquar Tupper's "Proverbial
Philosophy " no man has repeated the experiment.
The book is called in our Bible " The Proverbs of
Solomon," not because he wrote them, nor because
fie gathered them together, but because he was one

270 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
of the first men of the Hebrew nation to take this
utilitarian, this prudential, this ethical-culture view
of life and put it into proverbs. He was perhaps
the very first; others, inspired by his thinking,
produced other proverbs ; these were from time to
time gathered into various collections, and these
various collections were finally brought together
in the general collection now known as the Book
of Proverbs.
There is therefore in this book no unity.1 It is
simply a collection of aphorisms which have been
formulated by the wise moralists among the He
brews and which have passed current in the Hebrew
nation. This character of the book is indicated
by its title-page : —
" The proverbs of Solomon, the son of David, king of
Israel ; To know wisdom and instruction ; to perceive
the words of understanding ; To receive the instruction
of wisdom, justice, and judgment, and equity ; To give
subtilty to the simple, to the young man knowledge
and discretion. A wise man will hear, and will increase
learning ; and a man of understanding shall attain unto
wise counsels ; To understand a proverb, and the inter
pretation : the words of the wise, and their dark say-

1 For an admirable presentation of the Proverbs as collections
of collections and in their different literary form as sonnets, riddles,
separate aphorisms, etc., see The Modern Reader's Bible : The
Proverbs, by R. G. Moulton. For an elaborate interpretation of
the book from the other point of view, as spiritual and pro
phetic, and in a sense Messianic, see A Commentary on the Pro
verbs with a New Translation, by John Miller.
2 Prov. i. 1-6.

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 271
Here is not a word said about the law of God, nor
about revelation from him. The object of the
book is simply to give practical wisdom by giving
practical understanding of the experiences of life.
As such it is to be read.
We are not, then, to look in the Book of Proverbs
for a system of philosophy or theology. Theology
is the science of religion, and the Book of Proverbs
is not scientific. It contains no religious creed,
and nothing suggesting one ; no ethical system and
no hint that any such system was in the mind of
the authors or the editor. It contains no hint of
what are called the great doctrines of Christianity,
such as trinity, revelation, inspiration, divine sov
ereignty, and the like ; no systematic counsels for
the conduct of life, such as we find in the Sermon
on the Mount. Separated instructions, fragments
of wisdom, coined results of experience, — these are
what are presented, and without system, deliber
ately and intentionally without system. The book
never refers to Israel as the chosen people of God ;
contains no suggestion of a coming Messiah, — the
great hope of Israel ; and no revelation of the im
mortality of the soul. It contains five incidental re
ferences to sacrifices ; x but none to Temple or Tab
ernacle or priesthood or Levitical code ; and none
to the Mosaic moral code. Its reference to the law
is to the moral law as interpreted by the reason
and the conscience ; its sanctions are in the main
found, not in any supreme obligation to obey
1 Prov. vii. 14 ; xv. 8 ; xvii. 1 ; xxi. 3, 27.

272 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Jehovah, but in the consequences which follow in
this life, upon obedience and disobedience, that is,
upon temporal and prudential considerations.
The contrast between the prophetic and the pro
verbial method in the treatment of life is brought
out clearly by the contrast between two poems
covering the same ground, — one in the Book of
Psalms, the other in the Book of Proverbs. They
might well be given the same title, " The Two
Paths." The poet's description of the two paths
in the First Psalm is as follows : —
" Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the wicked,
Nor standeth in the way of sinners,
Nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.
But his delight is in the law of the Lord ;
And in his law doth he meditate day and night.
And he shall be like a tree planted by the streams of water,
That bringeth forth its fruit in its season,
Whose leaf also doth not wither ;
And whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
The wicked are not so ;
But are like the chaff which the wind driveth away.
Therefore the wicked shall not stand in the judgment,
Nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.
For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous :
But the way of the wicked shall perish."
That is a poet's interpretation of life, figurative in
"phraseology, ideal in spirit, written by one whose
conception of life is derived from his conception of
what life ought to be because his faith in a just
God makes him sure that what ought to be will be.
The other poem on the two paths, in the fourth
chapter of Proverbs beginning at the tenth verse,
reads as follows : —

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 273
" Hear, 0 my son, and receive my sayings ;
And the years of thy life shall be many.
I have taught thee in the way of wisdom ;
I have led thee in paths of uprightness.
When thou goest, thy steps shall not be straitened ;
And if thou runuest, thou shalt not stumble.
Take fast hold of instruction ; let her not go :
Keep her ; for she is thy life.
Enter not into the path of the wicked,
And walk not in the way of evil men.
Avoid it, pass not by it ;
Turn from it, and pass on.
For they sleep not, except they have done mischief ;
And their sleep is taken away, unless they cause some to falL
For they eat the bread of wickedness,
And drink the wine of violence.
But the path of the righteous is as the shining light,
That shineth more and more unto the perfect day.
The way of the wicked is as darkness :
They know not at what they stumble."
Here there is no figurative language : no tree
growing beside the still waters, no leaf not wither
ing, no chaff blown away by the wind ; all is plain,
simple, prosaic, — a description of life as the au
thor has actually seen it.
This view of the Book of Proverbs is important,
because a very different interpretation has often
been given to the book, and a misunderstanding
has resulted therefrom. Men have taken this book
as though it were written by prophets ; as though
it contained a system of theology ; as though it
even embodied a prophetic revelation of the law
and the Gospels of the New Testament ; instead
of being what it is, simply a mirror held up to
human life. Many readers will probably recall

274 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
sermons preached upon the following passage as
though it were a portraiture of God's treatment of
the too-late repentant sinner : —
" How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity ?
And scorners delight them in scorning,
And fools hate knowledge ?
Turn you at my reproof :
Behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you,
I will make known my words unto you.
Because I have called, and ye refused ;
I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded ;
But ye have set at nought all my counsel,
And would none of my reproof :
I also will laugh in the day of your calamity ;
I will mock when your fear cometh ;
When your fear cometh as a storm,
And your calamity cometh on as a whirlwind ;
When distress and anguish come upon you.
Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer ;
They shall seek me diligently, but they shall not find me. " ]
Who is speaking ? Jehovah ? The God who
sent his own Son into the world that he might save
men who rejected him ? The God depicted in the
parable of the prodigal son as coming forth to
meet the boy who has thrown away his life, and by
ungrudging mercy to bring him back to manhood
again ? Is it this Father who says, " I will laugh
at their calamity, . . . they shall call upon me, but
I will not answer ? " No ! not Jehovah ! — wisdom !
This is a picture of life as the author has actually
seen it, as we have all seen it. The young man
had wise counsels ; he was told that if he went on
in his present career he would bring evil on him-
1 Prov. i. 22-28.

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 275
self. But he was headstrong, he was wiser than
his father, he would take his own course, he has
taken it, he has ruined himself, he is dishonored
and disgraced in his own eyes and in the eyes of
all men. And now these counsels of the past come
flocking about him like ghosts, taunting him and
saying to him, I told you so. His father may not
say so ; his mother may not say so ; if they are
wise, they will not, but life says so. And then,
while all these ghosts of the wisdom of the past are
repeating to him the story of his folly, while they
are scourging him with whips like scorpions, then
comes to him the voice of Jehovah as it is inter
preted by the idealist : —
" Seek ye the Lord while he may be found, call ye
upon him while he is near ; let the wicked forsake his
way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts : and let him
return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him ;
and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For
my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your
ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are
higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your
ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts." *
The reason for the difference between the first
chapter of Proverbs and the fifty-fifth chapter of
Isaiah is that the writer of Proverbs shows forth
the thoughts of man, while the prophet shows
forth the thoughts of God, and God's thoughts are
not our thoughts, neither are his ways our ways.
And when this experience of our own folly rises
1 Isa. lv. 6-9.

276 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
up to taunt us, this voice of divine forgiveness
summons us from ourselves to him ; the answer to
Proverbs is in Isaiah ; the refuge from the mocking
voice of human wisdom is turning from ourselves
to him whose ways are higher than our ways and
his thoughts than our thoughts.
The Book of Proverbs contains a great number
of single aphorisms. It is in vain to look for any
connection between them, for there is no connec
tion. They are not even classified according to
subjects. They cover a large range of human ex
perience. They are observant, shrewd, keen-edged,
often humorous, more often satirical. " The Pro
verbs," says Professor W. J. Beecher of Auburn
Theological Seminary,1 "are remarkably rich in
humor, though this is a fact which most readers
fail to appreciate, by reason of our accustomed
solemn way of looking at everything in the Bible ; "
a sentence worth consideration by those who think
it irreverent to find occasion for merriment in a
book which explicitly declares that " a merry heart
is a good medicine." 2 Three examples of this
humor will suffice to illustrate this characteristic
of the collection.
" Confidence in an unfaithful man in time of tronble
Is a broken tooth and a foot out of joint." 8
You relied on your tooth to feed you; it is
1 The Bible as Literature, p. 119. The chapter in this volume
on the Wisdom Literature by Professor Beecher is an admirable
sketch of its salient characteristics.
2 Prov. xvii. 22. Compare xv. 13, 15.
8 Prov. xxv. 19.

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 277
broken, and every movement gives you a twinge of
pain ; you relied on your foot to carry you ; at
every step you limp, or you halt altogether. Such
is the friend you relied upon to stand by you in
trouble and who when the trouble came left you
in the lurch.
" He that passeth by and vexeth himself with strife belonging not
to him
Is like one that taketh a dog by the ears." 1
Why ? Because when one has once gotten an ugly
dog by the ears one cannot let go. Analogous to
this is the Chinese proverb : " Riding the tiger —
hard riding, but you cannot get off."
" A continual dropping in a very rainy day
And a contentious woman are alike :
He that would restrain her restraineth the wind,
And his right hand encountereth oil." 2
He cannot stop her ; and if he tries to do it, she
slips out from under him and begins again in the
same strain.
But this Book of Proverbs contains not only
single aphorisms ; it also contains odes, sonnets,
riddles, life portraits : in one respect only like the
single aphorisms, — they are drawn from the obser
vation and experience of life.
RIDDLES.
" For three things the earth doth tremble,
And for four things which it cannot bear."
What are they ?
1 Prov. xxvi. 17. 2 Prov. xxvii. 15, 16.

278 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
" For a servant when he is king ;
And a fool when he is filled with meat ;
For an odious woman when she is married ;
And for an handmaid that is heir to her mistress." x
" There be four things which are little upon the earth,
But they are exceeding wise."
What are they ?
" The ants are a people not strong ;
Yet they provide their meat in the summer;
The conies are but a feeble folk,
Yet make they their houses in the rocks ;
The locusts have no king,
Yet they go forth all of them by bands ;
The lizard thou canst seize with thy hands,
Yet is she in kings' palaces." 2
These hardly seem to us like riddles, but they have
the same quality : a question or comparison ; the
answer concealed for a moment, and then given.
There are Meissonier pictures : minute, graphic,
realistic, unromantic, unimaginative, — pictures
drawn not by Fancy, but by Observation.
THE PROSPEROUS FARMER.
" Be thou diligent to know the state of thy flocks,
And look well to thy herds :
For riches are not forever ;
And doth the crown endure unto all generations ?
The hay is carried,
And the tender grass showeth itself,
And the herbs of the mountains are gathered in.
The lambs are for thy clothing,
And the goats for the price of the field :
And there will be goats' milk enough for thy food,
For the food of thy household ;
And maintenance for thy maidens." a
1 Prov. xxx. 21-23. 2 Prov. xxx. 24-28.
8 Prov. xxvii. 23-27. For other illustrations of this pictorial

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 279
With it contrast : —
THE UNPROSPEROUS FARMER.
" I went by the field of the slothful,
And by the vineyard of the man void of understanding ;
And, lo, it was all grown over with thorns,
And the face thereof was covered with nettles,
And the stone wall thereof was broken down.
Then I beheld, and considered well :
I saw, and received instruction.
Yet a little sleep, a little slumber,
A little folding of the hands to sleep :
So shall thy poverty come as a robber ;
And thy want as an armed man." 1
Not only there is no theology in the Book of
Proverbs, that is, no system of divine truth ; there
is also no ethical system ; truth is not taught in a
system. But the ethical standard is high. " Its
maxims," says Professor Toy, " all look to the
establishment of a safe, peaceful, happy social life
in the family and the community."2 These pro
verbs commend the common virtues, and denounce
or satirize the common vices of mankind, but they
do not bring to bear upon the reader the highest
realism, see The Tippler, chapter xxiii. 24-35, and The Virtuous
Woman, chapter xxxi. 10-31.
1 Prov. xxiv. 30-34.
2 Professor Toy deduces a very simple theology from the Book
of Proverbs, but it is avowedly his deduction from the book, not
the deduction from life by the author or editor of the book. This
theology includes the following : Monotheism is taken for granted ;
sin is the violation of law ; salvation, which is deliverance from
earthly evil, is secured by obedience to law ; there is no judgment
after death, and the future of men in Sheol has no relation to
moral character. The International Critical Commentary : The
Book of Proverbs, by Crawford H. Toy, Introduction, pp. xv., xvi.

280 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
motives ; they do not urge obligation to obey law
because it is the law of God, nor because it is abso
lutely and eternally just and right, nor even be
cause it promotes the general welfare ; but because
obedience will promote the well-being of the obedi
ent. The spirit of the book is not idealistic ; not
that of loyalty to Jehovah, nor that of obedience
to conscience, nor that of regard for others; it
is prudential. The book never antagonizes the
higher motives ; it is entirely consistent with them ;
but it does not appeal to them. It deals with the
relations of man to his fellow man, it deduces the
maxims respecting these relations from experience
of life, not from a revealed will of God, nor from
an inward witness of the conscience. The maxims
which it thus commends are consonant with those
which law as interpreted by the legalist and life as
interpreted by the idealist commend ; but it does
not formulate any great principles or laws of moral
life ; it is a book of maxims based upon experience.
In general the basis of these maxims is univer
sal experience. In this respect Hebrew proverbs
are unlike those of other nationalities. Proverbs,
being based on experience, are often provincial
in tone ; they take on their form, if they do not
derive their ethical character, from the peculiar
circumstances of the nation which has given them
birth. Thus it is Germany, land of the Reforma
tion, that coins the proverb, " God's friend is the
priest's foe ; " Germany, the land that abounds
with beer, that produces the proverb, " More men

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 281
are drowned in the bowl than are drowned in the
sea ; " and it is in Germany, which requires a new
discovery in order to confer a Ph. D., that the
people have coined the proverb, " Always some
thing new, seldom something good." We cross
the border and come into Italy; it is in Italy,
land of the bandits, that the proverb appears, " To
him who can take what thou hast, give what he
asks ; " it is Italy, land of the siesta, that coins the
proverb, "First get a good name, then go to
sleep ; " it is Italy, land of treachery, poisons, and
assassinations, that coins the proverbs, " Even
woods have ears " and " Even among the Apostles
there was a Judas." Cross the border again and
come into France ; it is France, one of whose
writers said that England had twenty religions
and only one sauce, that coins the proverb, " For
wolf's flesh, dog sauce ; " France, where men rarely
go to church and still more rarely absent them
selves from the table, that coins the proverb, " A
short mass and a long dinner." In Holland, sturdy
land of thrift, the proverbs appear, "Persever
ance brings success ; " " Every day a thread makes
a skein in the year;" "Biding makes thriving."
In Armenia, where no man knows whether what
he owns belongs to him or not, the proverb is
coined, " He feeds the hen with one hand, and
takes her egg with the other ; " in Armenia, where
men have lived long under the terror of the Turk,
appears the proverb, " The wolf knows no reckon
ing;" in Armenia, land of dishonesty because of

282 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
cruelty under oppression, runs the proverb, " I do
not want it, put it in my pocket." This provin
cial character of proverbs receives striking illus
tration in the transformation which proverbs some
times undergo in passing from one country to an
other. Thus the English proverb, " A May flood
never did good " becomes in southern Spain and
Italy " Water in May is bread for all the year ; "
and the English proverb " Dry August and warm
does harvest no harm " is converted in Spain into
" When it rains in August it rains honey and
wine." In the Hebrew proverbs there is nothing pro
vincial and little or nothing distinctively Hebraic.
They seem to belong neither to the race nor to the
age, but to be expressions of a universal experi
ence. Literature is the expression of life : there
fore the greater the life expressed, the greater the
literature. The essay, poem, or drama which repre
sents simply a provincial and temporary phase of
life, in a provincial dialect, belongs to the lowest
class ; that which represents the characteristic life
of its age belongs in the second class ; that which
represents universal experience, that of all men in
all ages, — a Homer, a Dante, a Shakespeare, —
belongs in the highest class. It is one character
istic of the proverbs of the Hebrew people that
they are expressions of universal experience, appli
cable to America in the twentieth century scarcely
less than to the Hebrew people in the fifth century
before Christ.

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 283
There is no cynicism in the Hebrew proverbs.
The Hebrew satirizes the unfaithful friend, but
his experience of a friend's unfaithfulness does
not make him skeptical concerning friendship.
Contrast with the cynical proverb of the French :
" God save me from the friends I trust in," or of
the Spanish, " A reconciled friend is a double
enemy," with the carefully defined comparison of
an unfaithful friend to a broken tooth. The He
brew satirizes the contentious woman, but nowhere
does he treat woman with the cynical contempt of
Pope : " Every woman is at heart a rake ; " no
where do we find in this collection of Hebrew pro
verbs the contempt for woman's intelligence ex
pressed in the old English proverb " When an ass
climbs a ladder one may find wisdom in women."
On the contrary, it would be difficult to find in
literature a more appreciative portraiture of the
faithful housewife than in the last chapter of Pro
verbs ; I say housewife, for the portrait is not, and
does not profess to be, an ideal ; there are no ideals
in the Book of Proverbs ; it is a realistic picture
of an industrious woman at her housewifely work
for her husband and her children ; not a " Dream
of Fair Women," not a Raphael's Madonna, but
a Dutch artist's photographic reproduction from
daily life, a Mrs. Primrose in the " Vicar of Wake
field " ; common, prosaic, realistic, but not cynical.
Nowhere in the Book of Proverbs do we find aph
orisms analogous to these taken, almost at random^
from modern collections : —

284 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
" We all have strength enough to bear other people's
troubles." " The poorhouses are filled with the honestest peo
ple." " The worst pig gets the best acorn."
" No camel ever sees his own hump."
" Gratitude is a lively sense of favors to come."
" Repentance is fear of ill yet to come upon us."
" Love of justice is the fear of suffering injustice."
" The public ! How many fools does it take to make
the public ? "
" Celebrity is the advantage of being known to people
who do not know you."
Cynicism involves contempt for man and gener
ally contempt for the common virtues, and neither
contempt for man nor contempt for the common
virtues is to be found in the Book of Proverbs.
Even the satire of the Hebrew Proverbs is a kindly
satire ; they are pervaded by a spirit of cheerful
ness and good-fellowship ; they are keyed to a
high standard of ethics ; among them are maxims
which in their spirit suggest, though they do not
equal, those of the New Testament. Compare, for
example, these counsels of the Hebrew wise men
with the later counsel of Christ. They are almost
identical, not only in the advice given, but in
the prudential foundation on which the advice is
based. THE HEBREW WISE MAN.
" Put not thyself forward in the presence of the king
And stand not in the place of great men :
For better it is that it be said unto thee, Come up hither ;

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 285
Than that thou shouldest be put lower in the presence of the
prince,
Whom thine eyes have seen." 1
CHRIST.
" When thou art bidden of any man to a wedding, sit
not down in the highest room, lest a more honorable
man than thou be bidden of him. And he that bade
thee and him come and say to thee, Give this man place ;
and thou begin with shame to take the lowest room.
But when thou art bidden, go and sit down in the low
est room ; that when he that bade thee cometh, he may
say unto thee, Friend, go up higher ; then shalt thou
have worship in the presence of them that sit at meat
with thee." 2
Or again compare the ethical instruction of Paul
with that of the Book of Proverbs from which he
quotes it : — PROVERBS.
" If thine enemy be hungry, give him bread to eat ;
And if he be thirsty, give him water to drink :
For thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head,
And the Lord shall reward thee." 3
PAUL.
" Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather
give place unto wrath : for it is written, Vengeance is
mine ; I will repay, saith the Lord. Therefore, if thine
enemy hunger, feed him ; if he thirst, give him drink :
for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his
head." 4
1 Prov. xxv. 6, 7. 2 Luke xiv. 8-10.
8 Prov. xxv. 21, 22. * Kom. xii. 20.

286 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
The counsel is the same ; but the Wise Man in the
Proverbs promises a reward to those who follow it ;
Paul promises nothing; and Christ who calls to
his followers to give a like treatment to their ene
mies, summons to love as well as to service, and
for motive appeals to the highest aspiration of the
soul : " That ye may be the children of your Father
which is in heaven." *
God speaks to us with many voices. To men
whose conscience is alert he speaks through law,
saying : " I am the Lord thy God ; thou shalt have
no other gods before me ; " to the men whose imag
ination is receptive he speaks through poetry,
declaring that in his temple everything saith
" Glory ; " to the man of broad observation he
speaks in history, showing in the course of Israel's
history how Jehovah is revealed in his dealing
with the sons of men ; to the man who is a cere-
monialist he speaks through the Levitical code,
pointing out justice on the one hand and mercy on
the other ; and to the man whose horizon is limited
by this world, who has no clear hope beyond the
grave and no clear vision of the Eternal Father,
he speaks through the Book of Proverbs, saying
in effect : If there were no God, and if there were
no life to come, still sin would be ' folly and virtue
would be wisdom. 1 Matt. v. 43-48.

CHAPTER XII
A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY — II
The Book of Ecclesiastes is like the Book of
Proverbs in that it is an interpretation of life from
the point of view of experience ; x it differs from
1 The difficulties which attend the interpretation of the Book
of Ecclesiastes are illustrated by the following summary of opin
ions which have been expressed respecting it by different scholars :
" We are positively assured that the book contains the holy lamen
tations of Solomon, together with a prophetic vision of the split
ting up of the royal house of David, the destruction of the temple,
and the captivity ; and we are equally assured that it is a discus
sion between a refined sensualist and a sober sage. Solomon pub
lishes it in his repentance, to glorify God and to strengthen his
brethren ; he wrote it when he was irreligious and skeptical dur
ing his amours and idolatry. The Messiah, the true Solomon,
who was known by the title of son of David, addresses this book
to the saints ; a profligate who wanted to disseminate his infa
mous sentiments palmed it upon Solomon. It teaches us to de
spise the world with all its pleasures and flee to monasteries ; it
shows that sensual gratifications are men's greatest blessing upon
earth. It is a philosophic lecture delivered to a literary society
upon topics 'of the greatest moment; it is a medley of heteroge
neous fragments belonging to various authors and different ages.
It describes the beautiful order of God's moral government, show
ing that all things work together for good to them that love the
Lord ; it proves that all is disorder and confusion and that the
world is the sport of chance. It is a treatise on the summum bo-
num ; it is a chronicle of the lives of the kings of the house of
David from Solomon down to Zedekiah. Its object is to prove
the immortality of the soul ; its design is to deny a future exist-

288 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
the Book of Proverbs in that it is by a single
author, who interprets life chiefly from the point
of view of a single experience, that of King Solo
mon. All modern or literary students of the Bible
are agreed that Solomon is not the author of the
book.1 The fact that in its title-page 2 authorship
is attributed to " the Preacher, the Son of David,
King in Jerusalem," is not conclusive. That cer-
ence. Its aim is to comfort the unhappy Jews in their misfor
tunes ; and its sole purport is to pour forth the gloomy imagina
tions of a melancholy misanthrope. It is intended to ' open
Nathan's speech (1 Chron. xviii.) touching the eternal throne of
David,' and it propounds by anticipation the modern discoveries
of anatomy and the Harveian theory of the circulation of the
blood. It foretells what will become of man or angels to eternity,
and, according to one of the latest and greatest authorities, it is a
keen satire on Herod, written 8 B. c, when the king cast his son
Alexander into prison." C. D. Ginsburg : Encyclopedia Britan-
nica, article Ecclesiastes. The student will find the material for a
careful study of the Book of Ecclesiastes in Dr. Samuel Cox's
Commentary on Ecclesiastes, Expositor's Bible; in Dean Plump-
tre on Ecclesiastes, The Cambridge Bible ; in Professor Moul-
ton's view of Ecclesiastes as given in the Modern Reader's Bible ;
and in Dean Stanley's interpretation of Ecclesiastes in his Lectures
on the Jewish Church, vol. ii. pp. 282-287.
1 For a clear statement of the grounds on which this considera
tion is based see Professor Moulton's Modern Reader's Bible, Ec
clesiastes, Introduction, § 1 ; Plumptre's Commentary on Ecclesi
astes, The Cambridge Bible, Introduction, pp. 19-34 ; Driver's
Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament, pp. 465-478.
The arguments are chiefly two : first, that the language and style
are not those of the Solomonic era ; second, that Solomon's reign
was one of great material prosperity, while the Book of Ecclesi
astes assumes a condition of national adversity under cruel foreign
oppression. 2 Eccles. i. 1.

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 289
tainly means Solomon ; but in all ages it has been
customary for men to write in the name of some
other character, real or fictitious. Such writing is
not fraudulent, unless the object of the writer is to
palm off a false name upon his readers in order
to secure for his writing a false authority. In this
case there certainly is no such endeavor by the
author to secure divine authority for his book, for
the experience portrayed is anything but a divine
experience. No one charges Robert Browning with
fraud because in the " Death in the Desert " he
puts his own sentiments into the mouth of the
dying Apostle John. In some such manner a poet,
probably of the fourth century before Christ, took
Solomon as a vehicle for the expression of a cer
tain interpretation of life. But though Solomon
did not write this prose-poem, in interpreting it
we may make use of our knowledge of Solomon, as
our understanding of the character of King John
will help us to understand Shakespeare's play of
that name. What sort of character, then, was Solo
mon, and what sort of experience of life would a
poet attribute to him ?
Solomon, more than any other man in Old
Testament history, represents that complexity of
character which Paul has so graphically described
in the seventh chapter of Romans. He was brought
up by religious parents ; had a religious training ;
was familiar with the law of God and with the
ritual of the Temple ; his conscience was educated
by the law, his reverence by the ritual. But when

290 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
he came to full age and the possession of power and
wealth he departed from his religious training and
became the great sensualist of Israelitish history.
The description of the splendor of his court, given
in the Books of Kings and Chronicles, is paralleled
by the historical accounts of the analogously cor
rupt splendor of the reign of Louis XIV. in France.
He built a magnificent palace ; his throne was of
ivory ; his dishes were gold ; silver, it is said, was
nothing accounted of ; he had all the sensual plea
sures of an Oriental court, — men singers and
women singers and dancers ; he had a great retinue
of servants ; at his table, it is said, there were daily
consumed thirty oxen, one hundred sheep, and quan
tities of game. The accuracy of the figures does
not concern us ; there is no reason to doubt the
accuracy of the picture which they convey. He
introduced the harem, and the sensual worship of
pagan gods ; and this latter carried with it, in
both social and religious life, the imitation of
pagan ideals. It was his ambition, not only to ape
but to rival other contemporaneous empires. Yet
with it all he maintained a certain intellectual
glory. Trained in religion, possessing an educated
conscience, and surrounding himself with a bar
baric and sensual splendor, he was far famed for
his 'wisdom. He was a coiner of proverbs ; from
his reign, apparently, dates the beginning of what
is known as the Wisdom Literature of the Old
Testament. When the Queen of Sheba, attracted
by the fame of his splendor, came to see him, she

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 291
came, it is said, to try him with hard questions.
What they were we are not told, but she was satis
fied with the shrewdness of his answers. It is such
a man as this, with these contradictory and conflict
ing elements, — a religious training, an educated
conscience, a sensual and self-indulgent nature, and
a philosophic mind dealing with the actualities of
life and trying to understand the riddle of exist
ence, — that the poet who wrote the Book of Eccle
siastes chose for his mouthpiece. He imagines
Solomon musing over the problem of life ; reflect
ing upon wealth, sensual pleasure, gratified ambi
tion, philosophic wisdom, and what these bring ;
and while this meditative musing on the varied ex
periences of life is going on, there break in upon
him from time to time the memory of his child
hood's instruction, the sanctions of God's law, the
protest of his own conscience, and reflections sug
gested by his faith in the righteousness of God and
a future judgment.
Thus the Book of Ecclesiastes is a dramatic
monologue portraying the complicated experiences
of life ; these voices are conflicting, but they por
tray the conflict of a single soul at war with itself.
In this monologue the man is represented as argu
ing with himself ; weighing the contrasted experi
ences of life over against one another.1 A philoso-
1 " As the Book of Job is couched in the form of a dramatic
argument between the Patriarch and his friends, as the Song of
Songs is a dramatic dialogue between the Lover and his Beloved
One, so the Book of Ecclesiastes is a drama of a still more tragic

292 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
pher would take these problems in order ; he would
consider first the value of pleasure, then that of
ambition, then that of wisdom, etc., and finally he
would draw from this orderly and consecutive con
sideration a logical conclusion as to life's teaching.
The interpreter of Ecclesiastes, translating it into
an orderly and philosophical form, is obliged to do
this. But the writer of Ecclesiastes is not a philo
sopher ; he is a poet interpreting human experience.
And it is not in such well ordered thinking our
experiences are fashioned within us. On the con-
kind. It is an interchange of voices, higher and lower, mournful
and joyful, within a single human soul. It is like the struggle
between the two principles in the Epistle to the Romans. It is
like the question and answer of the ' Two Voices ' of our modern
poet. It is like the perpetual strophe and antistrophe of Pascal's
Pensies. But it is more complicated, more entangled, than any
of these, in proportion as the circumstances from which it grows
are more perplexing, as the character which it represents is vaster
and grander, and more distracted. Every speculation and thought
of the human heart is heard, and expressed, and recognized in
turn. The conflicts which in other parts of the Bible are confined
to a single verse or a single chapter are here expanded to a whole
book." The History of the Jewish Church, by Arthur Penrhyn
Stanley, D. D., Lecture xxviii. pp. 282, 283. — Dean Plumptre
suggests another parallel to Ecclesiastes in the 144th sonnet of
Shakespeare : —
" Two loves I have of comfort and despair
Which, like two BpiritB, do suggest me stiU.
The better angel is a man right fair,
The worser spirit a woman colored ill.
To win me soon to hell, my female evil
Tempteth my better angel from my side,
And would corrupt my saint to be a devil,
Wooing his purity with her foul pride."
Ecclesiastes, The Cambridge Bible, Introduction by E. H. Plump
tre, D. D., p. 43.

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 293
trary, thoughts come tumultuously into our mind ;
they fight their battle out within our consciousness ;
ambition, sensuality, wisdom, conscience, — all con
tend for the mastery. There are no parliamentary
laws in the human soul, and no one to keep" order, —
first one voice speaks, and then another ; they shout
against one another, they drown one another. Thus
the Book of Ecclesiastes is deliberately and of in
tention confused, because it is the portrayal of the
confused experiences of a soul divided against itself.
This confusion is enhanced by one literary charac
teristic. The writer has told us, in the last chap
ter, that he has sought out proverbs ; that is, ranged
over literature to get apothegms that will throw
light upon the problem which he is considering.
These proverbs, familiar in his time, are inserted
in the dramatic monologue ; in our time they would
be put in quotation marks, with a footnote to say
where they had come from. But there were no
quotation marks at that time, and the proverbs are
incorporated in the body of the text. How much
of the book is gathered from a wide range of liter
ature and how much is original with the writer, we
do not know ; but at times there are literary breaks
in the order which may fairly be attributed to quo
tations, more or less apt.
We are then to imagine a man with religious
training, an educated conscience, an apostate life,
who has tried the various phases of self-seeking, —
sensuality, philosophy, ambition, — and has under
taken to transcribe the results of his experiences.

294 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
The product is a journal of fragments, in this
respect analogous to Amiel's Journal. After an
introduction giving general expression to his spirit
of pessimistic fatalism, the poet records the experi
ences which wealth and self-indulgence bring. He
pictures the king as throwing himself with a certain
abandon into a life of self-indulgent luxury, and
yet remaining, as it were, outside of himself, a
spectator of himself, a self-student, his wisdom re
maining with him, as he expresses it, that he may
thus investigate and see what is the value of wealth
and self-indulgence. He thus reports the result of
this spiritual vivisection : —
" I said in mine heart, Go to now, I will prove thee
with mirth ; therefore enjoy pleasure : and, behold, this
also was vanity. I said of laughter, It is mad : and of
mirth, What doeth it ? I searched in mine heart how
to cheer my flesh with wine, mine heart yet guiding me
with wisdom, and how to lay hold on folly, till I might
see what it was good for the sons of men that they
should do under the heaven all the days of their life. I
made me great works ; I builded me houses ; I planted
me vineyards ; I made me gardens and parks, and I
planted trees in them of all kinds of fruit : I made me
pools of water, to water therefrom the forest where
trees were reared : I bought men servants and maidens,
and had servants born in my house ; also I had great
possessions of herds and flocks, above all that were
before me and in Jerusalem : I gathered me also silver
and gold and the peculiar treasure of kings and of the
provinces : I gat me men singers and women singers,
and the delights of the sons of men, concubines very

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 295
many. So I was great, and increased more than all
that were before me in Jerusalem : also my wisdom
remained with me. And whatsoever mine eyes desired
I kept not from them : I withheld not my heart from
any joy, for my heart rejoiced because of all my labor ;
and this was my portion from all my labor. Then I
looked on all the works that my hands had wrought, and
on the labor that I had labored to do ; and behold, all
was vanity and vexation of spirit, and there was no
profit under the sun." J
The king is next portrayed as giving himself in
a similar spirit to ambition, with a like reflection
on the experiment while he is trying it ; the result
is the same : " What hath a man of all his labor,
and of the striving of his heart wherein he laboreth
under the sun? For all his days are but sorrows,
and his travail is grief ; yea even in the night his
heart taketh no rest. This also is vanity." 2
The preacher's experience of wealth, pleasure,
ambition is much that which Lord Byron has
expressed, imputing his interpretation to Childe
Harold : — " Tears steal
Fire from the mind as vigor from the limb ;
And life's enchanted cup but sparkles near the brim.
" His had been quaffed too quickly, and he found
The days were wormwood ; but he filled again,
And from a purer fount, on holier ground,
And deemed its spring perpetual ; but in vain I
Still round him clung invisibly a chain
Which gall'd for ever, fettering though unseen,
1 Eccles. ii. 1-11. 2 Eccles. ii. 22, 23.

296 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
And heavy though it clanked not ; worn with pain,
Which pined although it spoke not, and grew keen,
Entering with every step he took through many a scene." 1
Next the king tries philosophy ; the result is no
better. The wise man is none the better off for
all his thinking: for
"that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts ;
even one thing befalleth them : as the one dieth, so dieth
the other ; yea, they have all one breath ; and man hath
no pre-eminence above the beasts : for all is vanity. All
go unto one place ; all are of the dust, and all turn to
dust again." 2
Wisdom, ambition, wealth, pleasure, all are van
ity. It is useless to build houses and plant gardens
and get men singers and women singers ; useless to
allow oneself to be inspired by a great ambition to
attempt great things in the world, or to be incited
by a great curiosity to understand life's mysteries ;
for nothing can be changed and nothing can be
discovered; all is vanity of vanities. The poet's
conclusion as to wisdom, " of making many books
there is no end and much study is a weariness of
the flesh," brings to mind that of the Persian poet,
Omar Khayyam, as interpreted by Edward Fitz
gerald : —
" Myself when young, did eagerly frequent
Doctor and Saint, and heard great argument
About it and about : but evermore
Came out by the same door as in I went."
1 Childe Harold : Canto iii., stanzas viii. and ix.
3 Eccles. iii. 19.

_ A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 297
Next, the king tries the golden mean : he pro
poses to take life as he finds it ; to live day by day
without ambition, without philosophy ; to choose
the middle path, the path of safety. He will try
the plan of taking care of his own interests, but
with some regard for his neighbor's property : —
" Two are better than one ; because they have a good
reward for their labor. For if they fail, the one will
lift up his fellow ; but woe to him that is alone when he
falleth and hath not another to lift him up. Again, if
two lie together, then they have warmth, but how can
one be warm alone ? And if a man prevail against him
that is alone, two shall withstand him ; and a threefold
cord is not quickly broken." x
Combination is better than unregulated competi
tion : not because love and service are higher than
self-seeking, but because combination is a wiser
kind of self-seeking. All excess fails : feasting is
to be moderated by sympathy for the mourner, for
" it is better to go to the house of mourning than
to the house of feasting : for that is the end of all
men ; and the king will lay it to his heart." It is
well to be righteous, but not too righteous ; there is
a golden mean between abandoning oneself unre
servedly to self-indulgence and devoting oneself too
heroically to virtue : —
" Be not righteous over much ; neither make thyself
over wise ; why shouldest thou destroy thyseK ? Be not
overmuch wicked, neither be thou foolish ; why should
est thou die before thy time ? " 2
1 Eccles. iv. 9-12. 2 Eccles. vii. 16, 17.

298 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
The satirical conclusion of the king may be
stated thus : be as virtuous as the public opinion
of your time requires ; more than that is perilous ;
less than that is fatal. In the same spirit of keen
satire Cardinal Newman has graphically described
" the safe man : " —
" In the present day, mistiness is the mother of wis
dom. A man who can set down a half a dozen general
propositions, which escape from destroying one another
only by being diluted into truisms, who can hold the
balance between opposites so skillfully as to do without
fulcrum or beam, who never enunciates a truth without
guarding himself against being supposed to exclude the
contradictory, — who holds that Scripture is the only
authority, yet that the Church is to be deferred to, that
faith only justifies, yet that it does not justify without
works, that grace does not depend on the Sacraments,
yet is not given without them, that bishops are a divine
ordinance, yet those who have them not are in the same
religious condition as those who have, — this is your
safe man and the hope of the Church ; this is what the
Church is said to want, not party men, but sensible,
temperate, sober, well-judging persons, to guide it through
the channel of no-meaning between the Scylla and Cha
rybdis of Aye and No." *
To be as good as the public opinion of your time
requires is the golden mean. And what comes of
that ? How does it seem when old age comes on
and death draws near ? The poet endeavors in ima
gination to forecast the end of life, and with beau-
1 Apologia Pro Vita Sua. By John Henry, Cardinal Newman,
pp. 102, 103.

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 299
tiful poetic figures describes the habitation of the
old man breaking down into decay and ruin : —
" Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth ; and let thy
heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in
the ways of thine heart, and in the sight of thine eyes ;
but know thou, that for all these things God will bring
thee into judgment. Therefore remove sorrow from thy
heart, and put away evil from thy flesh ; for youth and
the prime of life are vanity. Remember also thy Cre
ator in the days of thy youth, or ever the evil days come,
and the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no
pleasure in them ; or ever the sun, and the light, and the
moon, and the stars, be darkened, and the clouds return
after the rain ; in the day when the keepers of the house
shall tremble, and the strong men shall bow themselves,
and the grinders cease because they are few, and those
that look out of the windows be darkened, and the doors
shall be shut in the street ; when the sound of the grind
ing is low, and one shall rise up at the voice of a bird,
and all the daughters of music shall be brought low :
yea, they shall be afraid of that which is high, and ter
rors shall be in the way ; and the almond tree shall blos
som, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, and the
caperberry shall fall : because man goeth to his long
home, and the mourners go about the streets ; or ever
the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken,
or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel
broken at the cistern ; and the dust return to the earth
as it was, and the spirit return unto God who gave it. . . .
..." This is the end of the matter ; all that hath been
heard : fear God, and keep his commandments ; for this
is the whole duty of man. For God shall bring every

300 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
work into judgment, with every hidden thing, whether
it be good or whether it be evil." '
Perhaps in this chapter I have laid too much
stress on the cynical and satirical view of life which
pervades this poem. It is truly a poem of two
voices ; in it the two spirits speak. Through it
are scattered nuggets of practical wisdom which
are not cynical nor satirical ; such are those which
commend the cultivation of the cheerful spirit, the
joyous life, the real and right use of the world and
what it brings to man : " Go thy way, eat thy bread
with a joy and drink thy wine with a merry heart ; "
" Live joyfully with thy wife whom thou lovest all
the days of the life of thy vanity ; " " Rejoice, O
young man in thy youth ; " such are those which
counsel to moderation and self-restraint, to self-
respect and the cultivation of a sound mind : " A
good name is better than precious ointment ; " " The
patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit ; "
" Wisdom is as good as an inheritance ; " such are
some of the proverbs which seem not to belong to
the poem, but to be attached to it, much as in a
journal the writer incorporates apothegms which
have impressed him as specially worthy of preser
vation : " He that diggeth a pit shall fall into it ; "
" If the serpent bite before it is charmed there is
1 Eccles. xi. 9-xii. 7, xii. 13, 14. Some critics think that this
conclusion of the whole matter was written by another pen. I
cannot understand their point of view. It seems clear to me that
from the beginning to the end that was the result constantly kept
in mind by the writer of this gnomic monodrama.

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 301
no advantage in the charmer ; " " Cast thy bread
upon the waters, for thou shalt find it after many
days." But these are incidental rather than essen
tial to the poem. Its theme is indicated by its
opening and its closing fines : " Vanity of vanities,
all is vanity ; " what then ? " Let us eat and drink,
for to-morrow we die"? No! "Fear God and
keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty
of man."
I do not know, and cannot easily imagine, what
he makes out of the Book of Ecclesiastes who be
lieves that every sentence in the Bible is equally
authoritative with every other sentence. " Be not
righteous overmuch." Is that a divinely inspired
counsel ? " Vanity of vanities, all is vanity." Is
that a divine interpretation of life? If so, how
shall we reconcile it with the declaration of Paul :
" All things are yours, whether Paul, or Apollos,
or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things
present, or things to come," or that other declara
tion that "God giveth us all things richly to enjoy"?
The truth of Ecclesiastes is the truth of human
experience, larger and deeper than the truth of any
text. Let the self-seeker try how he may to get
satisfaction out of life, he is sure to fail — that is
the lesson of Ecclesiastes — and a lesson the more
eloquent because wrought out of a living experi
ence. Try to get satisfaction out of things ; ware
houses ten, twelve, fourteen stories high ; railroads
binding together the borders of a continent ; great
palaces ; hundred thousand dollar balls : what is

302 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
the end ? " Vanity of vanities, all is vanity." We
are as children who build their houses on the sand
and the tide comes and sweeps them away. Try to
get satisfaction out of philosophy ; we do not need
God, nor conscience, nor churches, nor religion ;
these are for women and children ; we will have a
public school system ; great universities ; know
ledge ; culture. What comes of that experiment ?
The end is the same. Cultivate the brain and leave
the heart to be atrophied ; cultivate the intellect and
leave the conscience to die ; teach men how to be
shrewd, but not how to be honest, just, true, pure,
and the end of that Mr. Huxley thus describes :
" Undoubtedly your gutter child may be converted
by mere intellectual drill into ' the subtlest of all the
beasts of the field ; ' but we know what has become
of the original of that description, and there is no
need to increase the number of those who imitate
him successfully without being aided by the rates." x
This also is " vanity of vanities." Try, then, to
accomplish great achievements ; but still for our
selves, not for others ; not great service of love,
but great service of self ; not great houses, not
great wisdom, but great ambitions shall be our aim ;
shall we find our soul satisfied in this ? The end of
this, too, is "vanity of vanities." Self-indulgent
pleasure ends in pessimism ; self-indulgent ambi
tion in fatalism : " That which hath been is that
which shall be ; and that which hath been done is
that which shall be done ; and there is no new thing
1 Science and Education Essays ; The School Boards, p. 306.

A SCHOOL OF ETHICAL PHILOSOPHY 303
under the sun." That is, nothing can be done ; why
make the endeavor ? This fatalism of Ecclesiastes
is not more mournful than that of modern times,
that to be found, for example, in John Cotter Mor-
ison's " Service of Man." Even self-sacrificing ser
vice of man is in his estimate of but little value :
" A man with a criminal nature and education,
under given circumstances of temptation can no
more help committing crime than he can help hav
ing a headache under certain conditions of brain
and stomach." " No merit or demerit attaches to
the saint or the sinner in the metaphysical and
mystic sense of the word. Their good or evil qual
ities are none of their making." " The sooner the
idea of moral responsibility is got rid of the better
it will be for society and moral education." " Bad
men will be bad, do what we will ; " the most we
can do is to make them " less bad." This, the
necessarianism of its latest apostle, is as dismal and
depressing as that of Ecclesiastes. Let us then try
opportunism ; take life as it comes ; have a good
time, but not with abandon ; cooperate with others,
but to serve ourselves ; keep the golden mean ; be
a trimmer in politics and vote with the winning
party ; be a " safe man " in the church, and teach
not what we believe, but what others think we
ought to believe. And though the party may give
political rewards and the church ecclesiastical re
wards, when old age comes and death impends, and
the disgrace of a prosperous and useless life is
about to be bequeathed to our sons and our sons'

304 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
sons, posterity will write our biography in this
single phrase of this ancient poet, " Vanity of van
ities, all is vanity."
What then ? If there be no satisfaction in plea
sure, in wisdom, in ambition, in the golden mean,
where can it be found ? In duty. In doing right
because it is right. Not for reward here, nor for
reward hereafter, not for happiness on earth, not
for crowns in heaven, not for immortality of fame,
not for immortality of personal existence ; but be
cause duty is duty, and right is right, and God is
God. This seems to me the meaning of the con
fessedly enigmatical Book of Ecclesiastes.

CHAPTER XIII
A COLLECTION OF LTEICS
The Book of Psalms is a collection of Hebrew
lyrics. It is a mistake, though a common one, to
suppose that David wrote even a considerable num
ber of them. Ewald allows twelve of the one hun
dred and fifty Psalms to have been written by
David ; Cheyne and Driver appear to think that a
slight overestimate.1 If we suppose the earliest
Psalms were written in the time of David and the
last in the time of the Maccabees, — and that is
now the prevailing opinion, — then the Hebrew
Psalter represents about eight hundred and fifty
years of song in the Hebrew nation.
The authors of these Psalms and the date of
their composition are not known. The titles to cer
tain of the Psalms giving the names of the authors
and the occasions when they were composed were
added by an unknown editor, who made either the
collection as we now have it, or the prior col
lections, which are incorporated in and constitute
the present collection. There is very little reason
to suppose that this unknown editor had any better
1 The twelve are Psalms iii., iv., vii., viii., xi., xv., xviii., xix.
1-6, xxiv., xxix., xxxii., ci.

306 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
advantages for knowing who were the authors of
these Psalms than we have; there is reason to
think that he had not as great advantages. The
critical faculty was not as largely developed in
that age, and the grounds on which his opinion
seems to have been sometimes based would not be
regarded as adequate by any modern critic. There
fore, when we read the statement at the head of a
Psalm : " A Psalm of David," or " A Psalm of
Moses," or " A Psalm of Solomon," or " A Psalm
of David after his sin with Bathsheba," or "A
Psalm of David after his experience with Doeg,"
we take this as what some unknown editor, perhaps
two centuries before Christ, thought about the mat
ter. These titles are no part of the original record ;
they are not authoritative ; certainly they are not
conclusive to one who studies the Bible in the sci
entific or literary spirit.
The collection of Psalms, as we now possess it, is
composed of five collections which had been previ
ously made. This is so evident that in the Revised
Version we find the five collections put into five
distinct books ; each of which closes with a dox-
ology. At the end of the second book is the state
ment : " The prayers of David the son of Jesse are
ended." This was appended to that book to indi
cate that none of the subsequent Psalms belonged
to David, and perhaps to indicate that all the
Psalms in the previous two books were written by
him. But if that was the intention, it certainly
was a mistake. There are Psalms in the subse-

A COLLECTION OF LYRICS 307
quent books which are, by their titles, attributed
to David, and there are Psalms in the first and
second books which history shows very clearly were
not written by him. In my youth we sang out of
a hymn book entitled " Watts and Select," Watts
comprising the larger part of the collection. The
Hebrew hymnal is "David and Select," though
David is the composer of only a minority of the
Psalms ; the " select " includes an overwhelming
majority of them.
The Hebrew Book of Psalms contains all the
extant lyric poetry of the ancient Hebrews. The
word "lyric" is derived from the word "lyre;" in its
original significance a lyric poem is one intended to
be sung with accompaniment on the lyre. Substan
tially all the Hebrew poetry intended to serve thus
as a vehicle for song is included in the Book of
Psalms. Their most notable characteristic is that
they are all — with possibly two or three exceptions
— religious. This will at first perhaps seem to the
casual reader a truism, since this collection of Psalms
is in the Bible; but it is in fact very significant that
all the lyrics of the Hebrew people which have been .
preserved are of one spirit. Imagine that all the
extant lyrics of an ancient people were amatory, or
all were martial, should we not draw some conclu
sions respecting the people from this fact ? In say
ing that all the lyrics of the ancient Hebrews are
religious, I mean that they all are expressions of
some phase of the divine life. Is there sorrow?
it is because of separation from God ; joy ? it is

308 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
because of the presence of God ; confession ? it is
of sin against God ; praise ? it is praise of God. No
songs of lovers to their mistresses, or of maidens
to victors in war or athletic contests ; no dirges
over the bodies of the dead ; no marriage songs ;
no glorification of nature : all is sacred, all divine.
And if we may believe that these collections are
simply relics selected from a much greater mass of
Hebrew lyrical poetry which has now perished,1
then we must either suppose that substantially all
the lyrics of the Hebrew people were religious in
their character, or else that only those which were
religious found such a place in popular esteem that
they were preserved from oblivion. The former
is probably the case. The Hebrew people were per
meated by the spirit of religion. Their laws, their
customs, their festivals, their dramas, their fiction,
their folk-lore, their proverbs, their popular songs,
all were pervaded by their faith in Jehovah as the
God, the King, the Father of their nation. This is
the first and most notable fact which confronts us
at every turn in our study of Hebrew literature ;
the spiritual significance of this fact I leave to be
considered in the closing chapter of this volume.
Poetry is difficult, perhaps impossible to define.
It may be said, however, to have two characteris
tics, — one an artificial beauty in form, the other a
vital beauty in spirit. The most exquisite figures
of imagination, the greatest intensity of emotion,
1 As is doubtless the case with the Greek lyrics. Symonds,
Greek Poets, i. p. 293.

A COLLECTION OF LYRICS 309
unaccompanied by the peculiar beauty of form
which belongs to poetry may constitute poetical
prose, but not poetry : it is prose, though it may
be poetical prose ; the most perfect beauty of
form, if it clothes unpoetical ideas, is not poetry.
In English literature the form consists of one of
two elements, — rhyme or rhythm. Hebrew poetry
contained neither. The formal characteristic of He
brew poetry consisted in certain artificial arrange
ments of the lines, in parallelism, as : —
" Bless the Lord, O my soul,
And all that is within me bless his holy name : ''
or in antithesis, as : —
" Thou openest thine hand, they are satisfied with good ;
Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled ; "
or in the repetition of a certain refrain at the end
of each verse or paragraph, such as in Psalm
cxxxvi., " His mercy endureth forever," or as in
Psalms xiii. and xlviii., really one Psalm, acci
dentally or erroneously divided, the refrain : —
" Why art thou cast down, 0 my soul,
And why art thou disquieted within me ?
Hope thou in God : for I shall yet praise him
For the health of his countenance."
or a dramatic interplay of characters as between
the soul, the prophet, and Jehovah in Psalm
xci. : —
The Soul. " He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most
high
Shall abide under the shadow of the almighty.
I will say to Jehovah, my refuge and my fortress,
My God in whom I trust.

310 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
The Prophet. " For he shall deliver thee from the snare of the
fowler
And from the noisome pestilence.
He shall cover thee with his pinions,
And under his wings shalt thou take refuge.
. . . Jehovah. " Because he hath set his love upon me therefore
will I deliver him :
I will set him on high because he hath known my name.
He shall call upon me and I will answer him ;
I will be with him in trouble ;
I will deliver him and honor him.
With long life will I satisfy him,
And show him my salvation."
All these forms are illustrated by Psalm xxiv.,
as sung by a procession of priests and people on
some great festal day. The reader must imagine
Jerusalem full of pilgrims gathered from all parts
of Palestine ; a great procession formed in the city ;
priests leading the way ; a band of music composed
of lyres, viols, reeds, cymbals, tambourines, casta
nets, drums, trumpets, accompanying it. The pro
cession reaches the Temple gates, which are closed ;
and the following musical colloquy takes place : —
Chorus in procession. " The earth is the Lord's and the fullness
thereof ;
The world, and they that dwell therein.
For he hath founded it upon the seas,
And established it upon the floods.
Priest ; a solo. " Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord ?
And who shall stand in his holy place ?
Another Priest, responding. " He that hath clean hands, and a
pure heart ;
Who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity,
And hath not sworn deceitfully.
He shall receive a blessing from the Lord,
And righteousness from the God of his salvation.

A COLLECTION OF LYRICS 311
Chorus, in procession. " This is the generation of them that
seek after him,
That seek thy face, O God of Jacob.
Chorus, at Temple gate. " Lift up your heads, O ye gates ;
And be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors :
And the King of glory shall come in.
Response from within. " Who is the King of glory ?
Chorus, without. " The Lord strong and mighty,
The Lord mighty in battle.
Lift up your heads, 0 ye gates ;
Yea, lift them up, ye everlasting doors :
And the King of glory shall come in. "
Then the gates are thrown open, and the proces
sion enters while the priestly doorkeeper repeats
the question : —
" Who is this King of glory ? "
and the procession chants the reply : —
" The Lord of hosts,
He is the King of glory."
The spirit of poetry it is much more difficult to
define. Without attempting anything so ambitious,
I will venture to assume that the spirit of true
poetry includes at least two elements : truth and
beauty. There are two worlds, an outer and an
inner ; a world of sense and a world supersensu-
ous ; a world which we enter through the eye and
the ear, and a world which we enter through the
emotion and the imagination. To see clearly this
inner, this invisible, this real and eternal world,
and so to translate it into outward form that men
with less power of vision can see it also, this is the
function of the artist, the musician, and the poet.

312 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Their end is the same, their instruments are differ
ent. No man is a true poet unless he first of all
sees what other men of less poetic genius have
failed to see, and then through literary forms inter
prets this vision to others. " The function of the
imagination," says Hamilton W. Mabie, " is two
fold: to see things in their essential nature and
their universal relations, and to give them concrete
form." 2 This is the function of the poet ; and what
we have to ask ourselves about the Hebrew lyric
poets is, What did they see or think they saw
respecting the essential nature of God and his rela
tion to nature and to men ? We are not to ask,
What is their theology ? Strictly speaking, the
poet has no theology. He is an observer, not
a philosopher ; but an observer of the invisible
world ; he tells us what he has seen, and leaves us
to correlate the visions with each other, and with
the visions of other poets, and with the facts of the
outer world, and out of all this material construct
a philosophy. The poet precedes the philosopher
as the observer precedes the scientist. Our ques
tion is not, What was the theology of the Hebrew
poets ? though out of their poems we can construct
a quasi theology ; but, How did they see God ? how
did he seem to them in his essential character and
in his relations to Nature and to men ?
For this much is evident concerning these He
brew lyrics, that they are expressions of experience.
They are not works of art, that is, they were not
1 Essays on Nature and Culture, p. 85.

A COLLECTION OF LYRICS 313
written for artistic effect ; they are not dramatic,
that is, they are not the imagined experiences of
others. They have sprung out of the heart of the
poets, that is, out of the heart of the nation, and
are artless expressions of the experiences of their
authors. In them, therefore, are varied experi
ences: love and hate, joy and sorrow, faith and
doubt, hope and despair ; experiences in victory and
in defeat, in temptation, in repentance, and in
restoration ; at home and in exile ; surrounded by
friends and environed by enemies. They include,
therefore, songs of praise and songs of penitence ;
songs national and songs individual ; songs eccle
siastical and songs for the household ; songs of
ebullient joy and songs that are one long plaint
of sorrow ; songs of triumphant victory and songs
of spiritual struggle. It is hardly too much to say
that every phase of reUgious opinion which has
ever found voice in sacred poetry is to be found
expressed in some form in this collection of Hebrew
lyrics. They are not aU expressions of saintly
faith and hope and love ; sometimes the weakness
of the soul is fully recognized and frankly con
fessed : —
" Will the Lord cast off forever ?
And will he be favorable no more ?
Is his mercy clean gone forever ?
Doth his promise fail for evermore ?
Hath God forgotten to be gracious ?
Hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies ?
And I said, This is my infirmity ;
But I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most
High.

314 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
I will make mention of the deeds of the Lord ;
For I will remember thy wonders of old." 1
Sometimes impassioned emotions, natural but
not saintly, find expression in them. This is the
case in the so-called imprecatory Psalms,2 which
have been in all times a source of great ethical per
plexity to Bible students. Imagine the people of
Israel prisoners in Babylon ; their holy city de
stroyed ; the sacred Temple razed to the ground ;
many of their feUows put to the sword ; their chil
dren kiUed, their women ravished before their eyes.
Their captors deride their religion, taunting them
with the question, Where is now thy God ? and
derisively calling on them to sing their temple
songs to him who has abandoned them to desola
tion ; and this is the answer of one of their poets :
" By the rivers of Babylon
There we sat down, yea, we wept,
When we remembered Zion.
Upon the willows in the midst thereof
We hanged up our harps.
For there they that led us captive required of us songs,
And they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying,
Sing us one of the songs of Zion.
How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land ?
O daughter of Babylon, that art to be destroyed ;
Happy shall he be that rewardeth thee
As thou hast served us.
1 Psalm lxxvii. 7-11.
2 Such as Psalms lix., lxix., cix., cxxxvii. Observe that Psalm
cxxxix. 21, 22, indicates that these are imprecations not on per
sonal enemies but on enemies of God.

A COLLECTION OF LYRICS 315
Happy shall he be that taketh and dasheth thy little ones
Against the rock." 1
How, it is asked, can such a Psalm be reconciled
with Christ's command, " Love your enemies, and
pray for them that persecute you " ? It cannot be
reconciled with that command. It is not a divinely
inspired example to be imitated ; it is a very human
experience to be shunned. It indicates the mean
ing of Christ's command and iUustrates his ex
ample by setting in contrast with it the natural
feeling of a truly devout soul under persecution.
And yet in one respect the Psalm is inspiring and
worthy of imitation. Devout people need to be
inspired with hatred of cant — of the spirit which
incites us to say to God not what we think, but
what we think he thinks we ought to think. To
be sincere, simple, genuine, transparent with God,
to dare to show him our worst as well as our best,
to dare to ask him to search us and see if there be
any evil way in us, to treat him as we treat the
physician, pointing out to him everything in us
that he may teach us what is evil and what is good,
and how to abhor the evil and to cleave to the
good, to treat him as our best and most intimate
friend, from whom we wish to conceal nothing —
this is one of the lessons which the unreserved
candor of these ancient lyrics teaches, and which
the church stiU has need to learn.
We are not, then, to regard the Book of Psalms
as a collection of lyrics written by artists " for art's
1 Psalm cxxxvii. 1-4, 8, 9.

316 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
sake ; " nor as dramatic interpretations of experi
ences imagined by the writer to be acceptable to
God ; nor as embodying a system of divine truth or
even the contents of such a system ; nor as inspired
revelations of experiences which being divinely
created are to be blindly imitated. We are to re
gard it as the actual expression of the experiences
of a devout people to be studied that we may es
cape their doubts, their despair, their hate, their
tumultuous trouble, and may secure their faith,
their hope, their love, their peace ; the better guide
for us in our times of doubt and fear, because writ
ten by those who had like experiences and out of
them were conducted, as Israel out of the Red Sea,
by their God. The experience of these writers is
not always congruous ; but there are certain funda
mental elements common to their experiences ; and
from them we may deduce, not indeed a coherent
system of theology, but a united testimony respect
ing certain aspects of the divine life.
Conceiving, then, this book as an anthology of
sacred lyrics respecting the deeper religious experi
ences of this Hebrew people during eight centu
ries of their national life, we ask ourselves what
are the distinguishing characteristics of the experi
ences which it interprets.
The most fundamental fact is that God is
throughout these lyrics felt as a universal Pre
sence. Long before the doctrine of divine im
manence was thought out in theology, long be
fore Herbert Spencer had formulated the result of

A COLLECTION OF LYRICS 317
philosophy in the phrase, " Amid aU the mysteries
by which we are surrounded nothing is more certain
than that we are ever in the presence of an Infinite
and Eternal Energy from which all things pro
ceed," these ancient poets had realized this fact as
an experience. It is sometimes said that the He
brew conception of the deity was anthropomorphic.
If by this is meant that the ancient Hebrews con
ceived of God as having experiences interpreted
to us by human experiences, — joy and sorrow,
hope and regret, love and wrath, — it is true ; if
by it is meant that they conceived of him as em
bodied as a man, it certainly is not true of these
Hebrew singers. They sometimes conceived of
him as in his holy temple, sometimes as on his
throne in the heavens, but at the same time as on
the earth beholding and trying the children of
men.1 He was to them a Universal Presence. I
know not where in literature, ancient or modern,
can be found a sublimer expression of faith in a
divine Spirit who transcends aU space relations,
than in the one hundred and thirty-ninth Psalm : —
" Whither shall I go from thy spirit ?
Or whither shall I flee from thy presence ?
K I ascend up into heaven, thou art there :
If I make my bed in Sheol, behold, thou art there.
H I take the wings of the morning,
And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea ;
Even there shall thy hand lead me,
And thy right hand shall hold me.
If I say, Surely the darkness shall overwhelm me,
1 Psalm xi. 4.

318 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
And the light about me shall be night ;
Even the darkness hideth not from thee,
But the night shineth as the day :
The darkness and the light are both alike to thee."
Yet the reader will observe that this is not a
theory of divine immanence ; it is not, like Her
bert Spencer's formula, a deduction from an exami
nation of the mysteries by which we are surrounded.
The Presence is felt, realized, experienced; the
Psalm is a testimony ; wheresoever the writer goes
he finds his God. The scientist might conclude
that God is everywhere and yet never be person-
aUy conscious of his presence. This writer draws
no conclusion, makes no generic scientific state
ment ; he simply says, God is everywhere present
with me ; I am conscious of him.
No other Psalm states this as clearly, as defi
nitely, as the one hundred and thirty-ninth, but
this experience of God as a universal presence
underlies, pervades, characterizes, all these lyrics.
They are illuminated by this God-consciousness.
It is this realization of a divine presence which
gives peculiar sublimity to the Nature Psalms.
These are not praises of nature ; they are not glow
ing nor picturesque, nor awe-inspiring portrayals
of natural phenomena. They have no resemblance
to Lord Byron's description of the thunderstorm
in the Alps or John Keats' ode to Ben Nevis.
They do not personify these phenomena and re
present them as in themselves living entities.
There is in them no hint of local deities, or sprites,

A COLLECTION OF LYRICS 319
or fairies, or dragons, malicious, mischievous, or
beneficent. Nature is alive ; but the life is that of
Jehovah, and what inspires the poet is not the
phenomenon but the God who is behind the phe
nomenon. In the thunderstorm Jehovah bows
the heavens and comes down ; the darkness is his
hiding place ; the clouds are his pavilion ; the
lightnings are his arrows.1 He is no less in the
milder phases of nature's Ufe. " He sends forth
the springs into the valleys ; " " he causeth grass
to grow for cattle and herbs for the service of
man ; " he makes the darkness and it is night when
all the beasts of the forest do creep forth ; the
young lions seek their meat from him ; aU living
things wait on him ; what they gather he gives ;
when he hides his face they are troubled.2 Every
thing, therefore, in nature gives praise to Jehovah.
All phenomena constitute a great orchestra ranged
together and in harmony ; at the command of
the leader they glorify him. The heavens rejoice ;
the earth is glad ; the sea roars ; the fields are
joyful ; the trees of the wood rejoice.3 The whole
World is one vast cathedral, and all things in it
are a great chorus, " and in his temple everything
saith, Glory." 4 The poet recognizes no difference
in this respect between different phenomena ; the
terrible things in nature as well as the beautiful
declare Jehovah's praise. There is reverence for
Jehovah, awe in his presence, but no dread of him.
1 Psalm xviii. 7-17. 2 See Psalm civ.
8 See Psalm xcvi. 4 Psalm xxix. 9, Kev. Vers.

320 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
That he is king and reigneth; that he is to be
feared above all gods •, that he is a righteous judge
and is coming to judge the people with his truth,
are causes not for fear but for rejoicing.1 Plu
tarch in an eloquent passage has described the im
pression produced on the pagan mind by belief in
the universal presence of the deity : " He fears not
the sea who never goes to sea ; nor a battle who
foUows not the camp ; nor robbers that stirs not
abroad ; nor malicious informers that is a poor
man ; nor earthquakes that dweUs in Gaul ; nor
thunderbolts that dwells in Ethiopia ; but he that
dreads the divine powers dreads everything ; the
land, the sea, the air, the sky, the dark, the light,
a sound, a silence, a dream." 2 Of such dread of the
universal presence of Jehovah there is no hint in
these lyrics. That presence inspires to joy, a joy
that often breaks out in exultant shouts, — halle
lujahs in spirit not unlike our huzzahs. In this
joy, not in what Jehovah has done or given, but in
Jehovah himself, in his mere presence, everything
is called on to unite. Like a healthy boy whose
spirits must find vent, the . poet caUs for noise, " a
joyful noise," unto Jehovah. AU instruments are
caUed into play to express this rejoicing : the harp,
the timbrel, the psaltery, the trumpet, the cornet,
the pipe, the stringed instruments, the loud-sound
ing cymbals.3 Nor is this enough. Like the lover
1 See Psalms xcv., xcvi. 2 Plutarch's Morals, i. 169.
8 Psalms lxxxi. 1-3 ; xcv. 1, 2 ; xcviii. 4-6 ; c. 1 ; cxlix. 3 ; cl.
3-5.

A COLLECTION OF LYRICS 321
he calls on nature to join in his rejoicing, the high
and the low, the awful and the beautiful, the old
and the young : —
" Praise the Lord from the earth,
Ye dragons and all deeps :
Fire and hail, snow and vapor :
Stormy wind, fulfilling his word :
Mountains and all hills ;
Fruitful trees and all cedars :
Beasts and all cattle ;
Creeping things and flying fowl ;
Kings of the earth and all peoples ;
Princes and all judges of the earth :
Both young men and maidens ;
Old men and children :
Let them praise the name of the Lord ;
For his name alone is exalted :
His glory is above the earth and heaven." 1
This presence of Jehovah is seen not alone in
nature ; it is the secret of the nation's greatness.
The great national lyrics are not praises to the
nation's great men : there are no odes to Moses or
Joshua or David or Solomon,2 none to the great
prophets or leaders of Israel ; these are aU forgot
ten in the absorbing brilliance of Jehovah's glory.
It is not Moses who delivered Israel from Egypt,
it is Jehovah : Jehovah who " brought them forth
with silver and gold," Jehovah who rebuked the
Red Sea and led his people through the depths " as
through a pasture land," Jehovah who " spread a
1 Psalm cxlviii. 7-13.
2 Unless Psalms xiv. and lxxii. are exceptions : the former is
a royal wedding hymn ; the latter I regard as Messianic, indirectly
if not directly.

322 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
cloud for a covering and a fire to give light in the
night ; " it was not Joshua who conquered Canaan,
it was Jehovah who " smote many nations and slew
mighty kings," and gave their land for an heritage
to Israel his servant.1 Let the reader compare
with these Hebrew national hymns our own " Amer
ica." In ours the voice is one of praise to the land
where our fathers died, land of the noble free, land
of the woods and templed hills, land vocal with
freedom's song ; only in the last verse is there any
recognition of God as the " author of liberty ; "
the Hebrew national lyrics are vehicles of the one
theme, Praise to Jehovah, who made the fruitful
land and gave it to his people, whom he delivered,
counseled, guided, ruled, forgave, redeemed, with
a mercy which endureth forever. Even when the
topic of the Psalm is a longing in exile for the sing
ers' native land, the heart-longing is expressed as
for Mount Zion, the Temple, and the Holy City,
made holy because it is the city whither the tribes
go up to give thanks unto the name of Jehovah.2
But in the experience of these Hebrew lyrical
poets Jehovah is not only the God of nature and
the God of the nation ; he is not only present in
nature and in national history ; he is a personal
friend ever present in the individual life. He is
the poet's companion : a shepherd who causes him
to lie down in green pastures, leads him beside stiU
1 Psalms cv., cvi., cxxxv., cxxxvi. See, also, Ixxvi., lxxviii., cxiv.,
cxviii. 9 Psalms cxxii., cxxv., cxxvi.

A COLLECTION OF LYRICS 323
waters, restores him when wandering, leads him in
right paths, is his fellow traveler in the valley of
the shadow of death, and spreads for him a table
while his enemies look on amazed and unable to
disturb his meal. Jehovah knew the poet before
he was born ; was at his birth and brought him
forth into the light of life ; taught him the right
way in which to walk ; in the time of danger pro
tected him as the mother bird protects her young
from the hawk ; is a very present help to him in
trouble ; is ever at his right hand so that he has no
fear ; in times of great anxiety puts him to sleep
as a nurse a wearied, worried child ; is his rock
and his fortress delivering him from his enemies ;
and when he transgresses, accepts his confession
and forgives his sin.1 It is impossible to conceive
these poets as considering it a question whether
there is a God. To their thinking it is only a fool
who saith, " There is no God." 2 To them Jehovah
is personally known ; he is my king, my refuge,
my God. An ownership of love and loyalty like
the ownership of the citizen in his king, the child
in his father, the wife in her husband, is estab
lished, recognized, maintained. God is in the poet's
experience. To be separated from his God is the
sorest evil in his captivity; to hear his God in
sulted with the cry, " Where is now thy God ? " is
of aU taunts the hardest to bear ; to realize that he
1 Psalms xxiii. ; cxxxix. 15, 16 ; xxii. 9 ; xxv. 8 ; xxvii. 11 ;
lvii. 1 ; xlvi. 1 ; xvi. 8 ; iii. 5 ; xxxi. 3 ; li. 1, 2.
2 Psalm xiv. 1.

324 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
has sinned against his God brings on him a re
morse which for the time obliterates all sense of
sin against himself and against his neighbor:
" Against thee, thee only, have I sinned," he cries.
Jehovah is with him in aU the commonplace ex
periences of life : makes his feet nimble to run
through the troop of his enemies, to leap the wall
and escape when they pursue him ; makes his foot
ing sure as he climbs the dangerous cliffs ; makes
his arm strong to bend the bow of brass.1 Sorrow
only drives him to God as his refuge; through
doubts and despair he struggles on toward hope —
toward hope in Jehovah his God ; the gentleness
of Jehovah makes him great, the loving kindness of
Jehovah fiUs his cup to overflowing, the mercy
of Jehovah forgives his sins and restores his soul.2
For not even the poet's sins can separate him from
his God ; his God is a healer, a redeemer, a physi
cian of souls. This is the final, the transcendent
fact in the experience of the Hebrew singer.
" Bless Jehovah, 0 my soul ;
And all that is within me, bless his holy name.
Bless Jehovah, 0 my soul,
And forget not all his benefits :
Who f orgiveth all thine iniquities ;
Who healeth all thy diseases ;
Who redeemeth thy life from destruction ;
Who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies ;
Who satisfieth thy years with good ;
So that thy youth is renewed like the eagle." 8
1 Psalm xviii. 28-35.
2 Psalm xviii. 35; see also Psalm xxiii. 3, 5 ; lxxxvi. 5.
3 Psalm ciii. 1-5.

A COLLECTION OF LYRICS 325
"All thine iniquities" — the adultery and cruel
treachery of David not too great to be forgiven ;
"aU thy diseases " — the pride and sensuaUty of
Solomon not too deep-seated to be cured ; " re-
deemeth thy life from destruction " — he that
would destroy himself is redeemed from his self-
destruction by Jehovah ; " crowneth thee with lov-
ingkindness and tender mercies " — with kindness
that comes from personal love, with tending mer
cies that nurse the sick back into life again ; " sat-
isfieth thy years with good so that thy youth is
renewed like the eagle's " — making old age more
full of a serener hope than youth with aU its eager
and sometimes exasperating expectations.
Modern theology might well go back to this lyric
of an ancient and unknown past to learn some les
sons about God. Here is no hint of some one to
pay the debt, to satisfy the law, to appease the
wrath. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit ;
for his own name's sake he pardons the penitent's
iniquities ; according to his lovingkindness, accord
ing to the multitude. of his tender mercies, he blots
out the repentant's transgressions ; and their great
ness does not prevent ; on the contrary, he pardons
them because they are great.1 Christ's parable of
the Prodigal Son he borrowed and elaborated from
the Hebrew poet's declaration, " Like as a father
pitietb his children, so Jehovah pitieth them that
fear him." Christ's picture of himself longing to
gather Jerusalem under his protection as a hen
1 Psalms li. 11, 17 ; xxv. 11 ; lxxix. 9.

326 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
gathers her chickens under her wings he borrowed
from the same source : " Under his pinions will I
trust." 1
One truth the Hebrew poet did not know, for
Christ had not yet brought life and immortality to
light : he did not know of the future life. He had
hope in God, and on that hope he built great ex
pectations ; but they were for his nation and on
this earth. But he was sure that in his own time
and in his own way Jehovah in whom he trusted
would at last come for the redemption of Israel,
and would bring deliverance not to Israel only, but
to all the nations of the earth.
" For he shall deliver the needy when he crieth ;
And the poor that hath no helper.
He shall have pity on the poor and needy,
And the souls of the needy shall he save.
His name shall endure forever ;
His name shall be continued as long as the sun ;
And men shall be blessed in him ;
All nations shall call him happy." 2
It would be strange if one man had wrought all
this out in his own experience ; strange if it had
been all supernaturaUy revealed in one man's ex
perience ; but it is not less strange, looking back
across the intervening centuries into a barbaric age
and upon a barbaric nation, to find in eight centu
ries and a half of song aU the ripened fruit of
Christian experience suggested, except only the
assurance of immortality. A God who is a uni-
1 Psalm ciii. 13 ; xci. 4. 2 Psalm lxxii. 12-17.

A COLLECTION OF LYRICS 327
versal presence ; a God who is in aU nature and
with the nations of the earth ; a God who cares
for the children of men ; a God who cares for the
beasts of the forest ; a God who is gentle, patient,
pitying, rendering an unbought mercy out of his
own free love, forgiving iniquities because they are
great and man cannot deliver himself from them ;
a God who saves men even from their own self-
willed destruction and who crowns them with a
kindness that is fuU of love and a mercy that is
full of nursing ; a God who gives promise of One
who shall come in time, to make clearer revelations
of his judgment, of his deliverance, of his power,
and of his grace — something such as this seems to
me to be the religious teaching of eight centuries
and a half of the unparaUeled lyric song contained
in the Hebrew psalter.

CHAPTER XIV
PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS
In Bagster's edition, the Old Testament occupies
five hundred and eighty-five pages ; of these, one
hundred and fifty-four are occupied by the Books
of the Prophets ; that is, more than one quarter of
the entire literature of the ancient Hebrews, as it
is preserved in our Protestant Bibles, is prophetic
literature. This fact roughly indicates the impor
tance which public opinion attached to the work of
the prophets, and the extent of their influence upon
their nation and their share in interpreting its
life. What was the function of the prophet among
the ancient Hebrews ? Says George Adam Smith :
" In vulgar use the name ' prophet ' has degene
rated to the meaning of ' one who foreteUs the
future.' Of this meaning it is, perhaps, the first
duty of every student of prophecy earnestly and
stubbornly to rid himself. In its native Greek
tongue ' prophet ' meant, not ' one who speaks be
fore,' but ' one who speaks for, or on behalf of,
another.' It is in this sense that we must think
of the ' prophet ' of the Old Testament. He is a
speaker for God. The sharer of God's counsels, as
Amos caUs him, he becomes the bearer and preacher

PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS 329
of God's word. Prediction of the future is only a
part, and often a subordinate and accidental part,
of an office whose full function is to declare the
character and the will of God." J
I ask the reader of this volume to comply with
this counsel, and earnestly and stubbornly to rid
himself of the idea that a prophet means one who
foreteUs events. That the prophets did not regard
themselves as primarily foretellers is clear from
the character of their writings, only a very insig
nificant part of which is taken up with predictions
of any kind. In those predictions they did not
always agree with one another, and the events do
not always occur as the prophets expected. When
Jonah told the people of Nineveh, " In forty days
Nineveh shaU be destroyed," he foretold what did
not come to pass. " God," says the sacred writer,
" repented of the evil that he had said he would do
unto them," and, as an historic fact, Nineveh was
not destroyed for many years after the date at
which, according to the story, the prophecy pur
ported to be delivered.
Nor did the prophets themselves regard accuracy
of prediction as the test of their prophecy. On the
contrary, they distinctly repudiated this test. One
of the greatest of the prophets, the author of the
book of Deuteronomy, written six or seven centu
ries before Christ, by an unknown author,2 declares
that though the prophet has accurately foretold
1 The Book of the Twelve Prophets, vol. i. p. 12.
2 See chapter v.

330 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
future events, and his witness is historically sus
tained, if his teaching does not sustain loyalty to
Jehovah, not only is it to be counted of no value,
but he himself is to be counted worthy of death.
He says : —
" If there arise in the midst of thee a prophet, or a
dreamer of dreams, and he give thee a sign or a won
der, and the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof
he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go after other gods,
which thou hast not known, and let us serve them ; thou
shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or unto
that dreamer of dreams : for the Lord your God proveth
you, to know whether ye love the Lord your God with
all your heart and with all your soul. Ye shall walk
after the Lord your God, and fear him, and keep his
commandments, and obey his voice, and ye shall serve
him, and cleave unto him. And that prophet, or that
dreamer of dreams, shall be put to death ; because he
hath spoken rebellion against the Lord your God, which
brought you out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed
thee out of the house of bondage, to draw thee aside out
of the way which the Lord thy God commanded thee
to walk in. So shalt thou put away the evil from the
midst of thee." x
If the prophet's message is luminous with truth,
if it is inspiring, if it presents to the people a
grander conception of God than they have before
entertained and calls them back to a more right
eous life in his service, then, and only then, is the
messenger to be accepted. Not by any miraculous
1 Deut. xiii. 1-5.

PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS 331
quality, but by its religious spirit and character, is
the teaching of the prophet to be measured. Such
is the standard which the prophets themselves recog
nized as that by which aU prophetic writings are to
be judged.
It is not difficult to see how the other conception,
that the prophet is primarily a foreteUer, became
prevalent. In the first place, he was in some sense
a foreteller. There are two ways in which men are
accustomed to decide on their course of action in a
time of doubt. He who is charged with the respon
sibility of decision may endeavor to peer into the
future, judge what wiU be the probable results of
the alternative courses, and by the anticipated re
sults determine the wisdom or the righteousness of
the courses proposed. I say the righteousness, not
merely the wisdom ; for he who is accustomed to
determine the righteousness of conduct by its re
sults will naturally employ this method in deter
mining the righteousness as well as the wisdom of
any prospective course of action. Thus while this
method is always the one pursued by the man of
expediency it is not only pursued by him ; it is also
the method of the utilitarian. Such men serve a
useful purpose ; the immediate results of proposed
action ought always to be taken into account, and
such counselors compel us to take account of im
mediate results ; they require the community to
count the cost, which it always ought to do. But
they are never far-sighted, for it is never possible
for even the most sagacious mortal to foresee more

332 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
than the immediate outcome of any path of life, and
this never with certainty. The other course of
reaching a conclusion in such a time of doubt starts
from a different premise and employs a different
process. He who adopts it assumes as his premise
that there are certain great principles, both of
practical wisdom and of practical righteousness.
On the irresistible force and immutable action of
these principles he bases his judgment. The only
problem is how to apply the principle, the truth of
which he assumes, to the circumstances before him.
If he is mistaken in his judgment of the principle
the mistake is fatal ; nothing can prevent inevitable
disaster from following the course of action he
advises. But if he is correct in his apprehension
of the principle, his errors in application can be
corrected from time to time as these errors are
made manifest. When Thomas Jefferson, long
before he or any man could have anticipated the
Civil War, said in view of slavery, " I tremble for
my country when I reflect that God is just,"
Thomas Jefferson was a true prophet, not because
a miraculous vision of future events was given to
him, but because the sense of divine justice and the
consciousness of human iniquity made him feel sure
that unless the nation rid itself of its iniquity it
would suffer the penalty threatened by divine jus
tice. He who is endowed with a keen sensitiveness
to moral principles, with intellectual capacity to
apply those principles to national life, and with
the insight which enables him to understand the

PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS 333
inward and real life of the nation, will be equipped
with the foresight which will enable him to see —
not in detail, but in a large way — what will be the
future of the nation.
Thus the Hebrew prophets, because they per
ceived that God was just, because they perceived
the divine principles which rule in the world
though the world understands them not, because
they understood the relation of the national events
in the midst of which they lived to the divine law
and the divine Lawgiver, were able to forecast the
future. They did this, not generally, if ever, by
listening to some message whispered into their ears,
as, according to the Mohammedan legend, the dove
whispered the message into the ears of Mohammed,
but by their knowledge that national well-being
follows national righteousness and national death
foUows national iniquity, and by their further per
ception that, in a few faithful men willing to suffer
for truth and righteousness in an epoch seemingly
given over to the corruption of covetousness, there
is a salt which will save the corrupt nation, a light
which will lead it through its gloom to the day of
the Lord. Because the prophet's predictions seemed
marvelous to those who do not understand the inex
orable operation of divine principles in national
history, attention has been diverted from those
principles which formed the real subject matter of
the prophet's message to those apparently more
marvelous predictions which were incidental to it.
Hence, too often the students of prophecy have

334 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
read the books of the Hebrew prophets, not to see
what great fundamental principles they inculcate,
what are the laws of national life which they make
clear, and which may be justly applied in our time
and to our nation, but to see how strangely their
predictions correspond with events long posterior
to them.
This habit of dweUing on the marvelous has
been strengthened by the rabbinical habit of read
ing into the Old Testament books what was not in
the mind of their original writers. This rabbinical
habit affected to some extent the writers of the
New Testament books themselves. Thus, for ex
ample, Hosea, pleading with Israel, and setting
before it the mercy and love of God, illustrated by
the historical fact that God loved Israel when it
was weak, feeble, good-for-naught, says, " When
Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my
son out of Egypt." x It is as if the prophet said,
speaking in the name of Jehovah, I knew you while
you were stiU in bondage, and I chose you as the
nation to bear the message of religious truth that
God is and that he is a just God ; for this purpose
I chose, not the Phoenician race, mother of litera
ture, not the Egyptian race, at once cradle and
grave of civilization, not the Babylonian or Chal
dean or Persian race with its wealth of territory
and its concentration of power — I called you out
of your bondage, a set of weak, willful, worthless
slaves. When, centuries after Hosea has uttered
1 Hosea xi. 1.

PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS 335
these words, the boy Jesus is taken down into
Egypt by Joseph and Mary, and brought back
again, Matthew seizes this phrase, " Out of Egypt
I called my son," and applies it to the return of
Jesus from Egypt to Galilee.1 It is a rabbinical
use of a prophetic writing. It is quite clear from
the reading of the Book of Hosea itself that
Hosea's reference was historical purely, that it
referred to the past, not to the future.
A still more striking Ulustration is afforded by
one of the prophecies of Isaiah. Ahaz was a weak
king, wicked in his weakness, and the nation was
sinking under the weight of corruption which he
had not the resolution to resist. Isaiah protests in
vain against the policy of Ahaz, which is bringing
ruin upon the nation. " Ask," says Isaiah, " any
sign you please, and it shall be granted to you as a
witness that I am speaking for Jehovah." Ahaz,
self-wiUed and determined to pursue his own course,
replies, " I will ask no sign," and, piously veiling
his self-will, adds, " Neither wiU I tempt Jehovah."
Then to him Isaiah replies with indignation,
" Therefore the Lord himself will give you a
sign: behold a young woman wiU conceive and
bear a son, and will call his name God-with-us;
because before the boy knows how to refuse the
evU and choose the good, the land of whose two
kings thou art sore afraid will be unpeopled, and
the Lord shall bring upon thee, and thy father's
house, days that have not come from the day that
1 Matt. ii. 15.

336 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Ephraim departed from Judah [that is, since the
division of the kingdom] ; even the king of As
syria." * Here, again, the primary meaning of the
prophet is plain : on the one hand, the kings of
Syria and Israel shaU be defeated and their lands
overrun and desolated ; on the other, Ahaz shall
see the result of his policy in the desolation which
it will bring to his land. Seven centuries later
Jesus is born, the promised Messiah, the true Im-
manuel for whom Israel had long been looking,
the God-with-us who was to bring salvation to the
race. So Matthew believed ; and he seized these
words of an ancient prophet and applied them to
the event of his own time.2 In fact, Jesus is not
called Immanuel, either by the angel who foretold
his birth, by his mother, by the people among whom
he lived, or by subsequent history ; nearly or quite
seven centuries elapsed between the desolations of
war which Isaiah had foretold and the birth of
Jesus ; nor is there any adequate reason to think
that Isaiah had, when he wrote, any anticipation of
the birth of Jesus of Nazareth, to occur so many
hundred years after his prophecy.
Let the reader, then, of this volume understand,
whether he agrees with it or not, the writer's point
of view. This is that, though a prophet does some
times predict, and though his prediction is some-
1 Isa. vii. 10-17. Polychrome translation. See, also, The Book
of Isaiah, vol. i. pp. 103-118, by George Adam Smith, who thinks
there is in this passage an indirect reference to the Messiah.
2 Matt. i. 22, 23.

PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS 337
times wonder fuUy fulfilled, his prediction and its
fulfillment constitute neither the measure nor the
value of his prophecy. The prophet speaks to fear,
warning men of danger ; he speaks to hope, inspir
ing them to life ; but he does not to any great
extent give detailed information respecting events
to come. This is not his function ; for no such
purpose was he sent into the world. He is not a
foreteller, but a forth-teller. He speaks not of the
future, but for another ; and that other, God.
" Just as a dumb or retired person," says Ewald,
" must have a speaker to speak for him and declare
his thought, so must God, who is dumb in respect to
the mass of men, have his messenger or speaker;
and hence the word ' prophet,' in its sacred sense,
denotes him who speaks, not of himself, but is com
missioned by God." J In this sense prophets have
lived from the time of Moses to the present time.
Every true Christian teacher ought to be in some
sense a prophet, not forecasting future events, not
foretelling what is to occur, but communing with
his God, and getting direct from the Father the
message which he presents to those who listen to
him, because he is the interpreter of another ; and
that other, God.
The prophets of the Old Testament, then, were
first of all men of God. Not men who had reached
the conclusion, by philosophical investigation, that
there is a God, but men who had talked with him,
walked with him, Uved with him, and received their
1 Prophets of the Old Testament, vol. i. p. 8.

338 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
message from him. This at least was their faith,
and in this faith they spoke. Because of this Jaith
they were accustomed to say, " Thus saith the
Lord." " Hear the word of the Lord, ye rulers
of Sodom," cries Isaiah.1 " The Lord God hath
spoken, who can but prophesy ? " says Amos.2 The
extent to which this consciousness of the divine
presence underlies the speech of the Hebrew pro
phets is indicated by the fact that the single phrase
" Thus saith the Lord " occurs more than two hun
dred times in the Old Testament. Several of them
give definite accounts of the commission which they
received from God to be the bearer of his message.
They generally were reluctant to accept it, felt their
inability to fulfiU it, begged to be excused. To
Isaiah Jehovah appears in the Temple in a vision,
and a seraph with a live coal from the altar touches
his lips and takes away the uncleanness which un
fits him to be Jehovah's messenger ; to Jeremiah in
his youth Jehovah appears, overrules his objection
that he is but a child, and touches his mouth as a
sign that his words shall not be his own, but Jeho
vah's ; to Ezekiel Jehovah appears upon the plains
of Chaldea by the river Chebar, and when the pro
phet falls upon his face in fear, bids him stand
upon his feet and be not afraid to speak the words
that are given to him, whether Israel will hear
or whether they wiU forbear ; Zechariah receives
by night from the angel of Jehovah the strange
symbolic visions which constitute the theme of his
1 Isa. i. 10. 2 Amos iii. 8.

PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS 339
mystical prophecies. This is the first and most dis
tinguishing characteristic of these prophets; they
believe themselves peculiarly commissioned by Jeho
vah to speak in his name.1
And yet we are not to forget that this message
which came forth from God came into, not merely
unto, the prophet. It became a part of his nature,
and came forth from him mixed with his own
thoughts. These prophets were no machines, no
amanuenses writing at dictation. They were men
inspired with God's spirit, conscious of God's
presence, possessing some thought or feeling or
passion which they believed was God-given, and
bringing their message to their people in their own
language, and colored by their own personahty.
The differences in the form and even the spirit of
their utterances is quite as great as is to be found
in the utterances of any other class of writers.
The sternness of a Carlyle is in Amos ; the gentle
ness of a Whittier is in Hosea ; the popular en
thusiasm of a Wyckliffe is in Micah ; the states
manlike quality of a Cranmer is in Isaiah ; the
pathos of a Tennyson in his most pathetic moods
is in Jeremiah ; the radiant hopefulness of a
Browning in his most optimistic moods is in the
Great Unknown. God speaks in these prophets,
but if we would understand their message we must
understand the men.
And we must understand the age in which they
lived, and the conditions under which they wrote,
1 Isa. vi. ; Jer. i. 4-10 ; Ezek. i. ii. ; Zech. i. 1-4, 7 ff.

340 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
for they are preeminently men of their age. Con
cerning the events of their age they speak ; to the
men moved by those events they bring their mes
sages; by those events they are themselves edu
cated. It is, therefore, necessary to study them in
connection with the events in the midst of which
they live, and concerning which they speak.
Without some knowledge of their times, their ut
terances are liable to be misunderstood, and not
infrequently are almost unintelligible. As it would
be impossible clearly to comprehend Jeremy Tay
lor's " Liberty of Prophesying " without any know
ledge of the life of England in the seventeenth
century, Dr. Eliphalet Nott's famous sermon
against dueling without knowing the story of Ham
ilton and Burr, the anti-slavery poems of John
Greenleaf Whittier and the anti-slavery addresses
of Theodore Parker and Henry Ward Beecher
without knowing that slavery existed in republi
can America, so it is impossible to understand the
scathing denunciations of Amos, the tender plead
ings of Hosea, the manly and virile pathos of Jere
miah, the hopeful visions of the Great Unknown,
the Puritanism of Malachi, and the ecclesiasticism
of Zechariah, without knowing the history of Israel
from the days of Jehoshaphat to those of the Re
storation after the exile.
Something more, however, than an understand
ing of great religious principles and the great
national events to which the prophets apply them
is necessary to a comprehension of the prophetic

PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS 341
teaching. Spiritual sympathy with them in their
struggle against the vicious tendencies of their
times is necessary to a comprehension of their
spirit, and, except as their spirit is comprehended,
their teaching cannot be comprehended. Each of
them might have said to their auditors, as Paul to
the throng at Lystra, " We also are men of like
passions with you." They were men, and into
their human life the reader must enter, sharing it
with them. Patriots were they, loving their coun
try with devotion ; but they loved righteousness
even more, and when they saw their country grow
ing corrupt, they denounced the corruptionist,
however high in station, with the fiery indignation
of men who, because they love Jehovah, hate that
which is evil. They shared the fears and hopes
of the men of their time, and yet had an experi
ence both of fear and of hope which transcended
that of the commonplace auditors to whom they
addressed their warnings and their encourage
ments. Men of great courage of conviction were
they — none braver in human history than these
ancient Hebrew prophets : Elijah denouncing King
Ahab, and challenging him to conflict before the
people ; Nathan going to King David with his
parable and saying to his face, " Thou art the
man ; " Amos breaking in upon the high festivi
ties of the people with his message of stinging re
buke ; Micah denouncing the rich for their oppres
sions of the poor. Great men were they — among
the greatest of the world's leaders ; sometimes

341! LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
statesmen, yet never politicians ; sometimes poets,
yet never sentimentalists ; great thinkers, but
never mere scholastic philosophers ; reformers, yet
not impracticables ; historians, but neither parti
sans nor opportunists.
We can better understand the characteristics
which these prophets had in common, if we con
trast them with the other three great types of re
ligious teachers among the Hebrews, — the law
givers, the wise men, and the poets.
There are three great lawgivers whose legislation
remains in the religious literature of the Hebrews,
— Moses, Nehemiah, and Ezra ; perhaps to these
should be added the unknown authors of the Deu
teronomic and Levitical codes, although they were
rather codifiers of existing laws than lawgivers;
and this may also probably be said of Ezekiel, who
like Moses was both prophet and lawgiver. The
message of the prophets is generically and in
spirit identical with that contained in the Book of
the Covenant, and in the common law which grew
out of the Book of the Covenant and finally was
codified in the Book of Deuteronomy. So identi
cal are they therewith that some scholars have re
garded the prophets rather than Moses as the
author of Mosaism, and Moses himself as a vague
and possibly even unhistorical character, to whom
the law was attributed in order to give it author
ity. It appears to me, however, that even the
casual reader can discover an important difference
between the laws of Moses as they are contained

PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS 343
in the Pentateuch, including both the Levitical and
the Deuteronomic codes, and the utterances of the
prophets. The former were statutory in their
tone. They appear to initiate law, to create obli
gations. Their spirit is fairly indicated in the
words with which the farewell speech of Moses in
the Book of Deuteronomy draws to its close : "See,
I have set before thee this day life and good, and
death and evil ; in that I command thee this day,
to love Jehovah thy God, to walk in his ways,
and to keep his commandments and his statutes
and his judgments." J This is rarely the language
of the prophets. They assume the law as some
thing known, recognized, familiar to the people.
They take it as a standard already established, as
part of a covenant already entered into ; and with
it they measure the life of the nation ; by it they
condemn the nation ; and, condemning, they call
on the nation to repent and return to its loyalty
and obedience. Their language therefore is that
of Isaiah, who refers his hearers " to the law and
to the testimony " as something well known ; that
of Jeremiah, who answers the self-excusing Jews,
" ye have not obeyed the voice of Jehovah, nor
walked in his laws, nor in his statutes, nor in his
testimonies ; " that of Hosea, who represents Je
hovah as saying to the people, " seeing thou hast
forgotten the law of thy God I will also forget thy
children ; " that of Amos, who foreteUs the im
pending doom of Judah because " they have re-
1 Deut. xxx. 15, 16.

344 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
jected the law of Jehovah and have not kept his
statutes." 1 Therefore is it that their message is a
summons not to begin a life never before known,
to enter into a covenant never before proposed to
them, but to return to the life which they have aban
doned, and to renew the covenant which they have
broken. Moses is represented as proposing a new
covenant to Israel : " If ye will obey my voice and
keep my covenant then ye shaU be a peculiar trea
sure unto me above all people ; " 2 even Joshua is
represented as calling on them to confirm this cove
nant almost as though it were now made for the
first time.3 But the summons of the prophets is
very different ; it is a summons to Israel to remem
ber the forgotten law, to repent of their violation
of it, and to return to Jehovah who has been aban
doned and to their covenant with him which has
been disregarded.4 Throughout, the prophets as
sume that the people have long possessed a divine
law, that their life is a flagrant violation of that
law, that they must repent and return to Jehovah
and renew their allegiance to his law. This is not
the language of the lawgiver. It would be as in
appropriate in the Book of the Covenant or even
in the Book of Deuteronomy as would be the Ten
Commandments in the Books of Isaiah, Amos, or
Hosea. 1 Isa. viii. 20 ; Jer. xliv. 23 ; Hosea iv. 6 ; Amos ii. 4.
2 Exod. xix. 5.
3 Josh. xxiv. 15-21.
" Isa. xliv. 22 ; Jer. iii. 22 ; iv. 1 ; xviii. 11 ; Ezek. xviii. 23 ;
Mai. iii. 7.

PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS 345
The difference between the prophets and the
wise men is equaUy marked. We have seen that
the characteristic of the wise men, as illustrated by
the books of Proverbs and of Ecclesiastes, is that
they inculcate ethical maxims based sometimes
upon conscience, but more generally upon pruden
tial considerations. There are few or no maxims
in the prophets. They rarely even quote a pro
verb, stiU more rarely employ the proverbial
method. Their appeal is not to experience ; their
theme is not the duty of man to man. It is true
that they have much to say of the sin of inhuman
ity, much of the duty of considering the poor and
the oppressed ; but the sin is almost invariably
treated as a sin against Jehovah, the punishment
as inflicted by Jehovah. To oppress the poor, keep
the debtor's pledge of clothing overnight in viola
tion of the law, live in sensuality and intemper
ance, is to transgress the law of Jehovah ; to seek
judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the father
less, plead for the widow, is to return to Jehovah
and be cleansed by him.1 The teachings of the
prophets are ethical, but the sanctions of those
teachings are divine ; sin is more than folly, more
than violation of law ; more than wrong inflicted
upon a neighbor ; it is disloyalty to God — who is
the king, the father, the husband, of his people,
disobedience to whom is treachery in the citizen, un-
filial conduct in the son, unfaithfulness in the wife.
1 Amos ii. 6-8 ; Micah ii. 1, 2 ; iii. 9-12 ; Isa. iii. 15 ; v. 8-20 ;
i. 16-18.

346 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
The difference between the prophets and the
poets is perhaps not so striking ; for the poet is
also a prophet and the prophet is also a poet.
There is reason to believe that the prophets some
times sang their utterances in a monotonous chant ;
some of them are poetic in form, more of them in
spirit.1 Yet there is a real difference between the
poets — whether lyric, epic, or dramatic — and the
prophets, in that the former describe experiences
either their own or dramatically that of others, and
leave the experience to convey its own lesson, while
the prophets are distinctly and directly didactic.
The poets are interpreters of life, generally of re
ligious life ; the prophets are teachers of truth,
always of religious truth. The conscious object of
the former is to express themselves, the conscious
object of the latter to impress their auditors ; the
former sing, the latter speak ; the former are poets
primarily, preachers secondarily ; the latter are
preachers primarily, poets secondarily. Speaking
broadly, we shall not be far wrong if we say that
the poets are didactic poets and the prophets are
poetical teachers ; the poetry of the first is imbued
with a religious purpose, the preaching of the sec
ond is imbued with a poetic spirit.
That Jehovah is a righteous Person, that his
laws are righteous laws, that obedience to them
requires sobriety, humanity, and reverence, that no
1 1 Sam. x. 5. For poetical forms see the translations in the
Polychrome Bible, or in The Book of Isaiah or The Book of the
Twelve Prophets, by George Adam Smith.

PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS 347
sacred ceremonial can serve as a substitute for such
obedience, that man's inhumanity to man is a sin
against God and that the only genuine repentance
is a return to Jehovah and to a life of righteous
ness, is the common teaching of aU these prophets :
and yet their messages are as various as their char
acters. Amos is a moral reformer, appears sud
denly in the midst of Israel's greatest apparent
prosperity but real corruption and hastening decay,
to denounce the nation's profligacy and inhuman
ity, expose the falsity of hopes built on a tradi
tional theology and a ceremonial religion, and fore
tell coming disaster and doom ; Hosea is a poet,
who has learned the deepest truths of human sin
fulness and divine love in the school of his own
bitter experience, — the infidelity of his wife has
brought home to him the guilt of Israel's disloyalty
to Jehovah, his own long-suffering love for his wife
has taught him the strong love of Jehovah, too
deep to be destroyed by human sin, however dam
nable ; Isaiah is a statesman, strong leader of the
people, wise counselor of kings, whose courage
sustains the heart of the people in dire disaster,
whose wisdom might have saved the kingdom from
destruction had the kings foUowed his counsels ;
Micah is the prophet of the poor, the religious
socialist of his age, who denounces the greed of the
rich and the vices of the capital, and for the na
tion's redemption looks not to the court or the city
but to the country village and the ranks of the
plain people ; Zephaniah, living in the superficial

348 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
and transient reforms of King Josiah, perceives
how superficial and transient they are, and utters
the one word of warning against the hopes which
are built upon them ; Nahum, with a fine scorn of
imperial greatness inspired by the spirit of cruelty,
foretells the siege and fall of Nineveh, city of
blood and of ceaseless rapine ; Habakkuk is a
skeptic with clinging faith, whose verse begins
with the skeptic's cry, " O Lord, how long shall
I cry and thou wilt not hear," and ends with the
answer of faith, " Though the fig tree shall not
blossom neither shaU fruit be in the vines, . . .
yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I wiU joy in the
God of my salvation ; " 2 Obadiah is an outraged
idealist, whose indignation in the hour of his na
tion's apparent ruin cries out against the apathy of
a kindred people gloating over his brother's mis
fortune ; Jeremiah is the first distinctive individual
ist among the Hebrew prophets, — a Huguenot in
an age ruled by the Medici, a Savonarola in an age
of Alexander VI., execrating himself, at times ex
ecrating his age and his people, at other times
pleading with them for Jehovah and with Jehovah
for them, with infinite pathos, and amidst the ruins
of the old covenant destroyed by Israel's sin and
Jehovah's consequent repudiation of it, prophesying
a new covenant with the elect individuals saved
from the nation's wreck, — strange, sad, self -con
tradictory, eloquent, pathetic, despairing, brave, a
Protestant before Protestantism, a Puritan before
1 Nah. iii. 1 ; Hab. i. 2 ; iii. 17, 18.

PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS 349
Puritanism ; Ezekiel is the prophet of the Exile,
endeavoring to preserve the faith of his people by
solidifying their religious institutions and codifying
their ecclesiastical laws, the first of the prophets
to prophesy in writing, the literary prophet, there
fore, churchman among prophets, prophet among
churchmen, unlike most churchmen of later history,
emphasizing the universal Presence where there is
neither Temple nor ritual, and the divine Imma
nence as the secret of all life and the hope of all the
future ; the Great Unknown is the most catholic of
all the prophets, — recognizes even in the pagan
Emperor Cyrus the Great a messenger and ser
vant of Jehovah, foresees the coming of pagan
peoples to share Israel's future glory, is the first of
Hebrew teachers to see that suffering is not a sign
of divine displeasure but a commission to divine
service, first to see that the suffering for sin is to
be cured by sinless suffering, first to foresee a Suf
fering Servant of Jehovah yet to come, out of the
travail of whose soul a new Israel will be born, — of
all the Hebrew prophets the one with the widest
horizon and the deepest insight; Haggai, Zecha
riah, and Malachi are prophets of the restoration :
Haggai, a churchman who urges on the rebuilding
of the Temple ; Zechariah, a contemporary of the
same school, whose mystic visions are as untrans
latable into prose as those of Percivale in Tenny
son's " Holy GraU ; " Malachi, a Puritan prophet
who protests against those corruptions of life and
doctrine which always accompany an ecclesiastical

350 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
revival : men of contrary temperament these, but
belonging to the same epoch and produced by the
same influences as Loyola and Luther by the Re
naissance, or Laud and Cartwright by the Puritan
revival ; Joel is a moral poet of uncertain date who
draws from so simple an incident as a devastating
flight of locusts a symbol of the judgment day of
Jehovah ; Jonah is a satire written by an unknown
author on the narrowness of Israel and a testimony
to the universality of Jehovah's lovingkindnesses
and tender mercies ; and Daniel is latest of aU the
prophets, and his apocalyptic visions, like those of
his antitype in the New Testament, are still a per
plexity to the spiritual and a peril to the literalist.
If we attempt to combine in a single sentence
the message of these prophets it will be something
like this : we learn from Amos that God is a just
God who wiU not spare the guilty; from Hosea
that he is a merciful God, tender, patient, and long-
suffering ; from Micah that he is the God of the
poor, and wiU punish those who wrong his poor ;
from Isaiah and Nahum that he is the God of na
tions, the real power in all history and behind all
powers ; from Zephaniah that he cannot be de
ceived by pretentious and superficial reforms ;
from Habakkuk that the soul can trust in him
when it cannot understand his ways ; from Jere
miah that he is the God of individuals and that no
nation can be righteous in his sight whose individ
ual members are unrighteous ; from Ezekiel that
he is the Universal Presence, in the desert as in

PREACHERS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS 351
the Temple ; from the Great Unknown that he is
the God of aU hope and will redeem the world
from sin and suffering by sinless suffering ; from
Jonah that he is a God of aU peoples, Jew and
Gentile ; from the prophets of the restoration,
Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, that the religion
of form and the religion without form are both ac
ceptable to God, if there be the real spirit of faith
and hope and love in either the one or the other ;
and last of all, from Joel that God will come to
judge the world with righteousness and the people
with his truth.
But the prophets have another function to per
form than to testify to the meaning of righteous
ness in God and in man ; the consideration of that
function must be reserved for another chapter.

CHAPTER XV
PREACHERS OF REDEMPTION
" By religion," says John Henry Newman, " I
mean the knowledge of God, of his will, and of our
duties toward him." 2 By religion the ancient He
brew included also the acceptance of reliance upon
God's promises. The relation of man to God is
one of dependency; but a relation of dependency
involves mutual obligations, those of the dependent
to his superior, those of the superior to the one who
is dependent upon him. It is the distinctive char
acteristic of the religious teachers of the ancient
Hebrews that they frankly recognize this mutuality
of obligation between God and man, between the
Creator and the creature ; between the divine Sov
ereign, Father, Husband, and the human citizen,
child, wife ; to speak more accurately, they repre
sent Jehovah himself as recognizing it. Jehovah
is a King : the citizens owe loyalty to the king, but
the king also owes protection to the citizens ; Jeho
vah is a Father : the child owes obedience to the
father, but the father also owes counsel and suste
nance to the child ; Jehovah is a Husband : the wife
owes fideUty to her husband, but the husband also
1 Grammar of Assent, p. 378.

PREACHERS OF REDEMPTION 353
owes love and guardianship to the wife. This
recognition of mutual obligation is implied in the
word used to designate the relation between God
and men, Covenant or Testament, and so identified
with the relation which the literature seeks to de
scribe that it is made the title of the entire coUec
tion. A covenant necessarily implies mutuality, .
and this mutuality is directly affirmed, and, what
is more important, tacitly assumed by Jehovah in
all his revelations of himself and in aU his deaUngs
with his people. Religion, in the thought of these
Hebrew writers, consists not merely of the obliga
tion which man owes to God, but also and equally
of the obligation which God has assumed toward
man, and it is not too much to say that scarcely
less stress is laid in the sacred writings on what
God will do for man, than on what man ought to
do in fulfillment of his duties toward God. In
short, these writings are not less promises of divine
counsel, comfort, protection, and support than they
are summons to human loyalty and obedience. In
this respect, as in some others, the religion of the
ancient Hebrews is unique. The gods of the
Greeks and Romans are represented as sometimes
rendering special favors to special favorites, but I
do not think any pagan religion represents the
deity as entering into a covenant with the human
race or even with a special people, and binding
himself by pledges to them, so that the history of
their national life consists of the history of his ful-
fiUment of this covenant and their fulfillment of

354 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
it, or faUure to fulfill. But this is in the Hebrew
history and the Hebrew literature the distinctive
characteristic of Jehovah : he is a covenant-making
and a covenant-keeping God.
This mutuality of obligation between Jehovah
and Israel is accompanied by explicit promises and
pledges on his part to Israel. And these promises
give to Israel's religion another distinctive pecul
iarity. Their religion is forelooking, it is antici
patory, it appeals to hope, it is an incentive to
progress. The golden age of the ancient Hebrews
was in the future; that of other ancient nations was
in the past. In general, pagan religion is essen
tially conservative if not reactionary. It recalls or
imagines a position of glory from which the nation
has faUen ; it turns the thoughts of the people
toward the past ; it rehearses their sins and de
mands of them some expiation ; it is so busy in
providing this expiation that it has no time or
thought to interpret present duties or inspire future
hopes. It is true that the Hebrew religion had in
its legends the story of a garden of innocence and
a fall. But that story once told was never repeated.
It is not referred to again in all the Hebrew litera
ture. Never does poet or prophet recall to the
people their Eden or caU on them to go back to it.
It is true that the sins of Israel are clearly depicted
and judiciaUy condemned, and the people are sum
moned to repentance. But they are told to show
their repentance by a new life ; Daniel's message
to Nebuchadnezzar summarizes the message of aU

PREACHERS OF REDEMPTION 355
the prophets to Israel: "Break off thy sins by
righteousness." The burden of the pagan priest
is atonement for past sin ; the burden of the He
brew prophet is performance of present duty and
pressing forward toward future ideals. And these
ideals are put before the people as possible because
they are the people of Jehovah, and Jehovah is a
covenant-keeping God, who recognizes mutuality
of obligation between himself and his people, and
will forgive and forget the past, and give them wis
dom and strength for the future.
This anticipatory quality, this forelooking based
on the promises of a God who is a covenant-maker
and a covenant-keeper, appears in the very earliest
legends of this peculiar people ; and it distinguishes
their earliest legends from the somewhat analogous
ones of other peoples. It is true that these legends
were probably reduced to writing at a later date in
Hebrew history ; but it is also true that the writing
probably represents the earliest legends, and so the
earliest faith. The creation hymn with which the
Book of Genesis opens declares that God has cre
ated the world for man, and has given it to him to
possess it, and bids him have dominion over it and
over all which it contains. Such a command accom
panying such a gift is itself a promise of wisdom
and power adequate to accomplish the so great
achievement. The legend of the FaU is accom
panied by a promise at once greater and more ex
plicit: the serpent which has brought disobedience
into the garden shaU bite man's heel, that is, shaU

356 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
poison the whole human race, but the seed of the
woman shall crush the serpent's head, that is, shall
at last destroy the sin which has poisoned .and
embittered human life. As the theme of a sym
phony is indicated in the opening movement, so in
those prehistoric legends appear the double task
given to man and the promise of its fulfillment :
he shaU struggle with nature, but he shall conquer
her and make her his servant ; he shaU struggle
with moral evil, and it shall embitter his life,
but he shaU utterly destroy it. With the com
mission and the warning is the promise of final
success. This note of promise is sounded throughout
the Hebrew literature ; this attitude of expectancy
characterizes the devout and faithful in Israel in
aU stages of the national history. In the prehis
toric legends the Flood is followed with the bow set
in the clouds as a sign of God's covenant with
Noah and with aU flesh; Abraham the father of
Israel is called out of the land of idolatry by the
promise that he shall be made the father of a great
nation in a land which shaU be shown to him ;
Moses is commissioned in the desert to caU Israel
out of bondage to a promised land to be given to
them ; at Mount Sinai not the law only is given,
but the promise is also given that if they keep
their covenant, God wiU make of them a kingdom
of priests, a holy nation ; to Joshua Jehovah re
peats the promise that he will give the land to
Israel, if their leader is strong and courageous and

PREACHERS OF REDEMPTION 357
obedient.1 The land once possessed, the promises
take on a new form. They are now of a king and
a kingdom ; a king to sit on the throne of David,
to rule in righteousness, over a peaceful kingdom
with extensive domain, chastened if he falls into
iniquity, but not deserted by his God.2 When
troubles gather about the kingdom, the promise
changes again ; it is no longer of a land, — the
land has been given ; nor of a kingdom, — the
kingdom has been organized ; it is of deliverance.
The nation is in darkness, but it shall see a great
light ; the rod of the oppressor shall be broken ;
the armor of the armed man and the garments
rolled in blood shall be fuel for the fire ; a Prince
shall be born who shall be caUed Wonderful, Coun
sellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince
of Peace; of the increase of his government and of
peace there shaU be no end.3 The promises of
Jehovah are all conditional ; they are parts of a
mutual covenant. The conditions are not fulfilled
by Israel, and therefore the rod of the oppressor is
not broken ; Jerusalem is destroyed and Judah is
carried into captivity ; but the promise stiU abides,
though its form changes. It is now a promise of
restoration ; a remnant shall be saved, and of this
remnant a new Israel shaU be created and a new
covenant made with them, and they shaU no longer
1 Gen. i. 28, 29 ; iii. 15 ; ix. 8-17 ; xii. 1-3 ; xiii. 14-17 ; xii.
1-7 ; Ex. iii. 7, 8 ; xix. 5, 6 ; Jos. i. 1-9.
2 2 Sam. vii. 11-16 ; Ps. lxxii.
8 Isa. vii. 10-17 ; ix. 2-7.

358 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
need priest to minister to them nor prophet to teach
them, for " they shaU aU know me from the least
unto the greatest." x Thus throughout this history
of the promises of Jehovah and the expectancy of
Israel there is a common theme : it is the establish
ment, or the deliverance, or the recovery and resto
ration, of the kingdom of Jehovah ; and is generally
accompanied by, centred around, and founded upon
a representative of Jehovah yet to appear. But
there are also great differences in the promises and
the anticipations. The promise is sometimes of
the establishment of a kingdom not yet existing,
sometimes the deliverance of a kingdom environed
by foes, sometimes the restoration of a kingdom
apparently utterly destroyed. Sometimes the cen
tral figure is a priest, sometimes a prophet, some
times a king, sometimes a Suffering Servant of
Jehovah ; 2 sometimes the kingdom is one of terres
trial glory, in which the implements of war will
become implements of peaceful agriculture and
even the wild beasts will be domesticated and the
poisonous creatures will lose their venom ; some
times it is purely spiritual, a kingdom without ark,
or temple, or ritual ; sometimes it involves the
building of a new temple, the reorganization of the
priesthood and the rehabilitation of the sacrifices ; 3
sometimes Israel is represented as conquering the
pagan nations which are destroyed, sometimes the
1 Jer. xxxi. 1-9, 31-34.
" Deut. xviii. 15-19 ; Num. xxv. 12, 13 ; Isa. liii.
8 Isa. ii. 2-4 ; xi. 6-9 ; Jer. iii. 16 ; Ezek. xi. 17-20, xl.-xlviii.

PREACHERS OF REDEMPTION 359
pagan nations enter into Jerusalem and share
Israel's glory with her ; sometimes the promise is
in form one to be fulfiUed in that generation,
sometimes it has in it a suggestion of a far-away
look down the ages, the hope in the midst of im
penetrable darkness of a distant dawn.1
It does not come within the province of this vol
ume to trace out these promises of the prophets
and hopes of Israel in detail. All I attempted to
do in treating of the law of Israel, whether civil
or ecclesiastical, was to indicate its general charac
ter ; this is all I can do in treating of Israel's
hopes.2 But I may indicate the nature of this
aspect of Hebrew religious teaching by the two
examples furnished by the ministry of the two
greatest of the prophets of redemption, — Hosea
and the Great Unknown.
Hosea lived in the closing years of Israel's
national existence, when the universal corruption
was beginning to bring forth its inevitable results
1 Compare Obadiah with Isaiah chap. liv. and lx.
2 For a more careful study of this aspect of prophecy as viewed
by the modern school the reader is referred to Messianic Prophecy,
by Charles A. Briggs, D. D. ; Messianic Prophecy, by Dr. Ed
ward Eiehm ; The Old Testament Prophecy of the Completion of the
Kingdom of God, by Dr. C. von Orelli ; Israel's Messianic Hope,
by G. S. Goodspeed ; The Hope of Israel, by F. H. Woods, D. D.
The Table of Prophecies or Allusions to Christ in the Appendix
to Bagster's Bible, or similar tables in any of the Teacher's Bibles,
may be examined to advantage ; but the student will need to ex
amine the Old Testament passages there referred to in connection
with the historical events with which they are directly connected,
— otherwise he will be liable to be misled.

360 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
in universal disorder and approaching dissolution.
In twelve years seven " puppet kings," as Hosea
contemptuously called them, reigned over Israel.
Of these seven kings four were assassinated. Re
volution followed revolution, but no change brought
reformation. " Shallum slew Zechariah ; Menahem
slew Shallum ; Pekah slew the son of Menahem ;
Hoshea slew Pekah. The whole kingdom of Israel
was a military despotism, and, as in the Roman
Empire, those in command came to the throne ;
Baasha, Zimri, Omri, Jehu, Menahem, Pekah, held
military office before they became kings." x
The public troubles would have been quite
enough to make sore the heart of so tender a man
as Hosea ; but he had personal troubles which might
have made, but did not make it bitter. His refer
ences to them are brief and enigmatical, but from
them it is not difficult to construct the tragic story
of his domestic life. He married. His wife was
unfaithful to him. His first child he recognized
as his own, and named him Jezreel, from the
famous battlefield of Israel. Then a daughter was
born, but not until he had discovered the infidelity
of his wife, although he had not put her away.
Two years later a son was born. He had as little
faith in the legitimacy of the son as in that of the
daughter. The one he called "Not knowing a
father's love," or " The unloved one ; " the other
he called " No kin of mine." Still he did not di
vorce his wife, nor send her away from him. He
1 The Minor Prophets, by E. B. Pusey, D. D., vol. i. pp. 9, 10.

PREACHERS OF REDEMPTION 361
was living in an age like that of the Stuarts in
England, when unchastity among men was re
garded as honorable rather than shameful, and
perhaps he thought a time in which man justified
unchastity in himself was not one in which man
should be vindictive toward an unchaste woman.
Certainly he did not turn his faithless wife away
from him. But she grew weary of him, — perhaps
of his very piety and love, — and abandoned him.
Prophets have rarely been rich men, either in olden
or in modern times. And she was ambitious ;
eager for wealth and what wealth could give her.
She abandoned her husband for some other lover,
whose name is unknown to us, who would give
her earrings and jewels and fine dresses. The re
sult was inevitable. She sank lower and lower ;
went from lover to lover ; and finally sold herself
into a life of public harlotry. But though Hosea
had never forgotten, he had always forgiven her ;
and when he finally found her a slave — by what
process he traced her and discovered her he does
not teU us — he brought her back, though she had
faUen so low that he paid for her less than would
be paid for one of the cheaper and poorer slaves.
Her beauty and her charm were gone; love for
her was impossible ; and when he took her he said
to her, No more wife of mine are you, no more
husband of yours am I, but I wiU be your guardian
and your protector. And there the story ends.
Wise is the man who knows how to extract
honey from the thistle ; wise the man who knows

362 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
how out of his profound sorrow to learn lessons of
God's love and God's truth. Such a wise man
was Hosea. He did not devote himself to a dis
cussion of the problem of moral evil. He did not
even consider the question, Does God send trouble ?
But he said to himself : This experience has not
been sent to me in vain ; it was a part of the
divine plan that I should have such a wife, and
such an experience with her, and that I should
learn some lesson from it : what is that lesson ?
And he learned it ; and this was the lesson that he
learned : That God is the faithful lover, and the
unrighteous nation is the unfaithful wife ; that
sin against God is a sin, not against law chiefly,
but against love ; and love is infinite and eternal
and cannot be destroyed. His hard experience
of bitter personal grief he accepted as a parable,
and out of this parable he learned for himself and
taught to others the lesson of Israel's sin and
Jehovah's mercy.
The story of Hosea illustrates the spirit and
method of the prophets. They were teachers of
their own time and to their own time ; they learned
the truth from their own experience and taught it
to their own generation. They were sometimes
mistaken in the immediate applications of that
truth, as Hosea was. He fondly hoped that Israel
would awake before it was too late, in response
to Jehovah's love, as perhaps he had hoped to
awaken conscience if not love in his unfaithful
wife by his own fidelity. In both cases his imme-

PREACHERS OF REDEMPTION 363
diate hope was but a dream. He thus conceives
God expressing his joy in the repentance and re
turn of his people to him : —
" I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely :
for mine anger is turned away from him. I will be as
the dew unto Israel : he shall blossom as the lily, and
cast forth his roots as Lebanon. His branches shall
spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive tree, and his
smell as Lebanon. They that dwell under his shadow
shall return ; they shall revive as the corn, and blossom
as the vine : the scent thereof shall be as the wine of
Lebanon. Ephraim shall say, What have I to do any
more with idols ? I have answered, and will regard
him : I am like a green fir tree ; from me is thy fruit
found." J
But the people of the Northern Kingdom, to
whom Hosea prophesied, never did return to Je
hovah ; they abandoned their religion when they
went into captivity, and in losing their religion lost
their nationality, and have forever disappeared from
the world's history. Looking for the Lost Tribes
of Israel is like looking for the drops of rain which
have faUen on the Great Desert, or for the cloud
which the sun has drunk up in a July sky.2 But
the love of God which Hosea experienced is eter-
1 Hosea xiv. 4-8.
2 It does not come within the scope of these articles to enter
into a discussion of any of the disputed questions of Biblical
history or Biblical criticism. It must suffice here to say that
the notion that the Lost Tribes of Israel have reappeared in the
Anglo-Saxon or any other race has no historical warrant, and
rests wholly upon a view of prophecy the literalism of which
history proves to be incorrect.

364 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
nal, and the power of that love and the joy of that
love in the return of the repentant are eternal,
and in this love, rejoicing to rescue from sin who
ever will accept rescue, Ues the secret of all resto
ration to life from apostasy, national or individual.
Hosea saw God truly ; for Israel he hoped beyond
measure. The prophecies of the Great Unknown are con
tained in the last chapters of Isaiah,^ — from the for
tieth to the sixty-sixth, — apparently one prophecy,
in which an unknown prophet gathers up the les
sons which God had taught to Judah through sev
enty years of captivity, and repeats them for the
instruction of the world in all time to come. He
is sometimes called the Second Isaiah ; he is more
properly designated as the Great Unknown. His
prophecies are bound up with those of an Isaiah
who lived a century before ; but the circumstances
and the messages of the two are widely different.1
One prophesied before the captivity, the other as
the captivity drew to its close. The preface to the
prophecies of the one is a vehement denunciation
1 All scholars of the modern or literary school agree that Isaiah
chapters xl.-lxvi. were written by a different writer than Isaiah
the son of Amoz, and at the close of the captivity. The inciden
tal references to Cyrus (Isa. xliv. 28 ; xiv. 1), who was not liv
ing in the time of the first Isaiah, the differences in style, the
differences in theme and spirit, and the different commissions, all
point to this conclusion. The only reason for regarding these
later chapters as by the author of the previous prophecies is that
this is the traditional view, and that the prophecies were bound
up together.

PREACHERS OF REDEMPTION 365
of the Jews as rulers of Sodom and the people of
Gomorrah, and the prophecies themselves are fuU
of warnings of the impending judgment of God
upon the nation ; the preface to the other begins
with " Comfort ye, comfort ye, my people ; " goes
on to declare that they have suffered the penalty
which had been threatened, and learned the lesson
which that penalty was meant to teach ; and the
theme of the subsequent prophecies is the approach
ing redemption of the nation and its restoration to
its land, its city, and its temple. Each of the two
prophets, Isaiah the son of Amoz, and the Great
Unknown, has given an account of his call to the
ministry. That of Isaiah is given in the sixth
chapter of the Book of Isaiah ; that of the Great
Unknown in the fortieth chapter. The latter's caU
is simpler and less dramatic than that of his pre
decessor, but his message is not less explicitly
given to him : —
" Comfort ye, comfort ye, my people, saith your God.
Speak ye tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her
That her hard service is accomplished, her debt of guilt is dis
charged,
That she has received from Jehovah's hand double for all her sins.
Hark ! there is a cry :
Voice. " Clear ye in the wilderness the way of Jehovah,
Make plain in the desert a highway for our God,
Let every mountain and hill sink down, and every valley be up
lifted,
And let the steep ground become level, and the rough country
plain !
And the glory of Jehovah will be revealed, and all flesh will see it
together, for the mouth of Jehovah has spoken it.
The Prophet. " Hark !

366 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
The Voice. " Cry I
The Prophet. " What shall I cry ?
All flesh is grass, and all the strength thereof like the flowers of
field;
The grass withers, the flowers fade, because the breath of Jehovah
has blown thereon.
The Voice. " The grass withers, the flowers fade ;
But the Word of our God stands for ever." 1
This is the fundamental message of the Great
Unknown : Men are like flowers of the field, liv
ing to-day, perishing to-morrow ; nations, institu
tions, political and religious, pass like shadows
across the mountains ; shadows we are and shadows
we pursue ; and yet, behind them all, manifesting
himself through them all, vocal in all history, re
vealing himself in aU phenomena, is God. The
grass withers, the flowers fade, but the manifesta
tion and utterance of the Eternal abides forever and
speaks through all transitory phenomena. This is
the fundamental message of the Great Unknown.
In some sense like that of Moses, like that of
Hosea, like that of the First Isaiah, like that of the
unknown writer of Deuteronomy, like that of later
prophets, even down to our own time, is this word
of prophecy : The Eternal abides forever, and aU
phenomena are but the ever-changing manifesta-
tions of his ever unchangeable Presence.
But if Isaiah shared this message with other and
previous prophets, he learned one lesson and taught
one truth which no prophet before his time had
seen and few even of Christianly instructed teach
ers have seen more clearly.
1 Isa. xl. 1-8. Polychrome translation, modified.

PREACHERS OF REDEMPTION 367
Great men give their message to the age in which
they live ; great men also grow out of the age in
which they live. If there could have been no Exo
dus without a Moses, there could have been no Moses
without an Exodus. If there could have been no Re
formation without a Luther, there could have been
no Luther without a Reformation. If there could
have been no Puritan revolt without a Cromwell,
there could have been no CromweU without a Puri
tan revolt. If Lincoln led us safely through the
Civil War, the Civil War led Lincoln safely from
the Illinois politician to the world statesman. It
is the distinctive characteristic of great men that
their hearts are open to the influences by which
they are surrounded, and hence open to hear the
voice of God in current events, and to learn the
lesson which passing history has for them. The
annalist simply narrates events ; the prophet sees
behind them the Word of God, and gives interpre
tation to the events. The Great Unknown was in
this sense the product of the age to which he spoke.
His lesson was learned in the school of experience ;
his message was taught to him by contemporaneous
history ; he was the child of the Exile ; — and in
this Exile he learned a lesson which could be
learned only in the school of suffering. Israel's
great teachers had been preeminently the sufferers
of the nation — just men suffering for the unjust:
Amos, the righteous, bearing the burden of a most
unrighteous people ; Hosea, the loyal, bearing the
burden of a most unloyal people ; Micah, the peas-

368 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
ant prophet, bearing the burdens of the peasant
poor; Isaiah, the strong-hearted hater of corrup
tion, living a lifelong martyrdom and dying a mar
tyr's death ; Jeremiah, weeping bitter tears for
sins that were not his own. And the Great Un
known dimly sees what even now the Church of
Christ sees not too clearly — that salvation comes
through sorrow, that the suffering ones are the
victorious ones, that the redemption of the nation
must come, not by a crowned king, but by a Suf
fering Servant. Sometimes this suffering servant
appears to the prophet to be the entire nation suf
fering for its own sins and for the sins of the world,
and working out its own redemption by its own
suffering; sometimes to be some one especially
chosen out of that nation, suffering with and
for them ; sometimes the prophet himself ; in one
notable ode the prophet seems to see dimly in the
vista of the future a single figure bearing in his
own person the burdens of humanity, a Sinless
Sufferer by his suffering bringing healing to
others : 2
" Who indeed can yet believe our revelation ?
And the arm of Jehovah — to whom has it disclosed itself ?
" He grew up as a sapling before us,
And as a sprout from a root in dry ground,
He had no form nor majesty,
And no beauty that we should delight in him.
" Despised was he, and forsaken of men,
A man of many pains, and familiar with sickness,
1 Isa. xliv. 1, 2, 21; xiii. 1-4; xlix. 5-10; Iii. 13-15.

PREACHERS OF REDEMPTION 369
Yea, like one from whom men hide the face,
Despised, and we esteemed him not.
" But our sicknesses, alone, he bore,
And our pains — he carried them,
Whilst we esteemed him stricken,
Smitten of God, and afflicted.
" But alone he was humiliated because of our rebellions,
Alone he was crushed because of our iniquities ;
A chastisement, all for our peace, was upon him,
And to us came healing through his stripes.
" All we, like sheep, had gone astray,
We had turned, every one to his own way,
While Jehovah made to light upon him
The guilt of us all.
" He was treated with rigor, but he resigned himself,
And opened not his mouth,
Like a lamb that is led to the slaughter,
And like a sheep that before her shearers is dumb.
" Through an oppressive doom was he taken away,
And as for his fate, who thought thereon,
That he had been cut off out of the land of the living,
That for my people's rebellion he had been stricken to death ?
" And his grave was appointed with the rebellious,
And with the wicked his tomb,
Although he had done no injustice,
Nor was there deceit in his mouth.
" But it had pleased Jehovah to crush and to humiliate him.
If he were to make himself an offering for guilt,
He would see a posterity, he would prolong his days,
And the pleasure of Jehovah would prosper in his hands.

" He would deliver from anguish his soul,
Would cause him to see light to the full.

370 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
" With knowledge thereof my Servant will interpose for many,
And take up the load of their iniquities.
Therefore shall he receive a possession among the great,
And with the strong shall he divide spoil.
" Forasmuch as he poured out his life-blood,
And let himself be reckoned with the rebellious,
While it was he who had borne the sin of many,
And for the rebellious had interposed." 1
Did the Great Unknown, looking through the
centuries, get a glimpse of Calvary, of the blood
stained face and the thorn-crowned brow, or did
he only learn from the anguish of the past that
all victory comes through battle and all salvation
through suffering ? Did he only see the great
generic truth, which too many men have failed to
see, even though it is focused and centralized in
the Passion of Jesus the Christ ? I do not know ;
only this I know : that nowhere, not even by Paul,
is that truth more splendidly illustrated in litera
ture than in this fifty-third chapter of Isaiah, and
nowhere has it such divine illustration in history
as in the suffering and death of Jesus of Nazareth.
Of the great men of Hebrew history — save only
Jesus of Nazareth, who can be classified with no
race and no epoch, since he belongs to all human
ity and aU time — the three greatest are Moses,
the Great Unknown, and Paul. The first is an
indistinct figure ; concerning his real relation to
the Hebrew people much more has been imagined
than is known; but history will always regard
1 Isa. liii., Polychrome Bible.

PREACHERS OF REDEMPTION 371
him as the great lawgiver, and always impute
to him the foundations of those free institutions
which the Jewish nation has given to the world.
The second is stiU more indistinct. His name
wiU never be known until God shall unroll the
records of his servants' histories in the luminous
glory of eternity. But he is of all the prophets
the most majestic in his style, as the most spiritual
in his message. The truth that God is one, and
is a righteous God, and demands righteousness of
his chUdren, and will accept nothing less and asks
for nothing more, he might have learned from
Amos and Hosea and Micah and Isaiah and Jere
miah and Ezekiel; but he added what none of
them saw, the truth that the sorrowing ones are
the triumphant ones, that suffering love is conquer
ing love, that sorrow is victor. Christ's life and
death wiU iUustrate and exemplify this truth.
Paul, the poet philosopher of the first century, wiU
expound and apply it. But neither literature nor
life has any higher message to give to the world
than the message of this prophet, who has exem
plified his own doctrine of self-abnegation by leav
ing his writings to be bound up with those of a
predecessor, whUe he himself remains forever un
known.

CHAPTER XVI
THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL
Most of us can remember, and some of us still
entertain, an opinion respecting the Bible some
thing like the following : That there were in past
history some thirty or forty men who were specially
inspired of God to make known to the human race
the truth respecting his nature and his law — truth
which was undiscoverable by human reason, but
which it was necessary to know in order to future
salvation ; x that these men wrote what God told
them to write, and what they thus wrote constitutes
the Bible. Sometimes it was contended that they
were simply amanuenses and wrote by dictation,
word for word, what God directed them; some
times, and in later times more generaUy, it was
believed that a certain human element entered into
their writing, but it was supposed that they had
what is called plenary inspiration, that is, that they
were inspired upon aU topics on which they wrote,
and that on all topics on which they wrote they
were infalhbly accurate. Some of a more liberal
or lax faith held that this inspiration did not
extend to all the topics on which they wrote, but
only to the moral and religious topics ; that they
1 See, for example, Westminster Confession of Faith, chap. i. § 1.

THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL 373
might be in error in their figures, historical dates,
or even scientific statements ; but that in every
thing they said concerning the nature of God, the
duties of man toward God, and the duties of men
toward one another, they were infallibly accurate.
Whichever of these views was taken, it was assumed
that, so far as morals and religion are concerned,
the Bible is an infallible standard of faith and
practice, that whatever errors may have crept into
it have been due to transmission, and not to ori
ginal mistake on the part of the writers. The argu
ment for this conclusion was very simple. The
Bible, it is said, is the Word of God, and God is a
God of truth, not of error. Into the Word of God,
therefore, no errors can have crept ; or if they have,
it has been through human transmission, — in the
original autographs there could be no error.
This view of the Bible leads into many intellec
tual and moral difficulties, so that to many of us it
has become both intellectually and spiritually un
thinkable. I do not propose to indicate those dif
ficulties ; there are enough engaged in that work ;
it is not necessary to duplicate their endeavors.
My object in this closing chapter is to state the
other and modern view, and in doing this, frankly
to reaffirm that, in my judgment, between the
ancient and the modern view there is a radical dif
ference ; that those of us who hold the modern view
do not merely hold that there are some errors in
the Bible which have crept in by transmission, nor
that there are some errors in the Bible in scientific

374 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
and historical statements which are of no special
consequence, nor even that here and there some
errors may have crept in respecting moral and
reUgious truth. We hold an entirely different con
ception of the origin, the nature, and the growth of
the Bible.
In the new library building at Washington, the
artist has undertaken to interpret by symbolic fig
ures upon the interior of the dome the several func
tions of the great nations in the world's history.
Each nation is represented by an allegorical picture
with a legend underneath. The legend for Judea
is " Religion ; " for Greece, " Philosophy ; " for
Rome, " Administration ; " for Germany, " Print
ing ; " for America, " Science." The artist has
perceived and interpreted a great fundamental
spiritual truth — that to every nation God gives a
special mission ; that as the Washington Monument
was built, every State contributing a stone to its
erection, so the kingdom of God is bmlt in the his
tory of the world, every nation contributing some
thing ; that in that great development of the human
race, which the scientists caU evolution and the
Christian caUs redemption, each nation has had
some part to fulfiU; that in that great progress
toward what political economy caUs democracy and
religious faith perceives to be the kingdom of God,
every nation has some share.
The message of the Hebrew people appears and
reappears in the Hebrew writers. The Bible is not
merely an anthology of Hebrew literature. It is

THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL 375
not merely a coUection of various messages from
prophets and apostles to the church of the olden
time — the Jewish — or the church of the more
modern time — the Christian. It is true, these pro
phets were messengers to the people of Israel, but
they were more than that. They were interpreters
of Israel to itself. It was their function to do
what is the work of the prophet in aU ages, to
pierce beneath the mere temporary experience, the
mere mask of humanity, and discern the innermost
Ught of the soul, which is itself the life of God, and
bring it to consciousness. There was a message of
Moses, and of David, and of Isaiah, and of Paul ;
but in aU these messages, uniting them aU and
making them one great message, there was a mes
sage of Israel to the world, and this message of
Israel to the world the Bible interprets to us.
In reading the history and literature of the
Hebrew race as they are contained in the Bible the
omissions appear to the thoughtful student as strik
ing as the contributions. There is nothing indi
cating that the Hebrew people contributed anything
whatever to art. Sculpture and painting were ap
parently forbidden to them, lest the paintings and
the statues should become the objects of idolatrous
veneration. They contributed nothing to architec
ture, save in the structure of a temple devoted to
their religion, and that appears, from the accounts
of it which have come down to us, to have been
imitated from the Temple of the Egyptians. They
contributed nothing to the world's music. In liter-

376 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
ature they did nothing for literature's sake, — all
their literature is a vehicle for the conveyance of
ethical or spiritual life. All the great controver
sies in the nation were religious controversies ; —
they fought no battles for civil liberty, they had
no Kossuth, — their controversies all turned upon
questions respecting the nature of God and the
obligations of man toward God. They were not
preeminently a spiritual people ; but their life had
to do almost exclusively with ethical and spiritual
problems. This people, thus dealing with religion,
existed as a nation for about twelve centuries,
beginning with the time of Moses and ending with
the time of Christ, when the organic existence of
the nation came to an end, and the people were
dispersed. During this time their life found its
expression in their literature, as the Ufe of aU peo
ples finds its expression in literature. It is their
life thus expressed which I have endeavored to
interpret in this volume. Literature, however, does
not represent primarily the common thoughts of
the common people ; it is the expression of the
highest and best thoughts of the leaders of the
people. Goethe is essentially German, but not aU
Germans could have written " Faust." Shakespeare
is essentiaUy English, but not aU Englishmen could
have written " Hamlet." The character of the peo
ple appears in their great leaders ; the life of the
people is represented by their great minds. What
ever may be said of the ancient Hebrews as a race,
the leaders of the Hebrew people were essentially

THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL Zll
religious. What interested them were the religious
questions ; and their literature, so far as it has been
preserved to us, deals almost exclusively with the
great religious problems — the nature of God, the
nature of man, the relationship between God and
man, and the way in which man can be brought
into right relationships with his God. This litera
ture constitutes the Old Testament.
The Old Testament, then, according to that mod
ern conception which underlies this volume, is the
record of the message of Israel to the world ; it is
the literature of a people commissioned by God to
search out, receive, and communicate to the world
the answer to these four questions : —
Who is God ?
What is man ?
What is the right relationship between God and
man? How can that right relationship be brought
about ?
This literature is, however, not primarily the ex
pression of the common thought of the nation on
these subjects ; it is the expression of the thought
of their great spiritual leaders. Often that thought
is expressed in antagonism to the public sentiment ;
but the errors against which their leaders inveigh
are not primarily political or social errors, but re
ligious errors. Their errors and their right judg
ments, their beliefs and their disbeliefs, their vir
tues and their vices, aU mark this nation as one
pondering the problems of religion.

378 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
The Old Testament is the selected literature of
an elect people. I say the selected literature, be
cause there are some books written during these
twelve or thirteen centuries and still extant, which
are not in our Protestant Bible, and others referred
to or quoted from in the Bible which have perished,
and doubtless still others which have so absolutely
perished that there is no reference to them what
ever. What we have in the Old Testament is
what in scientific terms would be called the sur
vival of the fittest ; it is those words of the great
leaders of a great people on the problems of reli
gion which had such a quality that they could sur
vive the sifting of the centuries.
This literature is pervaded by a religious spirit.
There are myths ; they are the vehicle of religious
truth. There are legends ; they show how far back
in the patriarchal age this people was pondering
the problem of religion ; how its very progenitor,
Abraham, centuries before the nation was born,
was puzzled by the question of God, and left his
native land and turned his back upon all the un
satisfying idolatries that surrounded him, to see if
he could find some better knowledge and some
better feUowship with God than any which those
idolatries furnished to him. It has folk-lore ; the
folk-lore shows us that the stories which the mo
thers told their children were pervaded by the
same spirit of faith in God and of humanity to
man. It has lyrics ; with possibly two or three
exceptions they are not love songs, nor patriotic

THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL 379
songs, but songs of praise to God, or of penitence
because of sin against him, or of sorrow because of
exile from him, or of gratitude upon return to him.
It has a drama of love ; this drama is for the pur
pose of illustrating that loyalty of love which is
the foundation of the family. It has a great epic
drama ; this drama deals with the relation of the
soul to God in time of sorrow and of doubt. It
has a romantic history ; not that of a great nation,
not that of the heroes of a great nation, but that
of the way in which God dealt with his people and
the way in which his people dealt with their God.
It has eloquent though fragmentary orations ; they
are not political or literary ; they aU deal with
the problems of the religious life, social or individ
ual. There is law ; its foundation is in the pre
amble to the Hebrew constitution : " God spake all
these words, saying." From the opening verse in
the coUection, " In the beginning God created the
heavens and the earth," to the closing verse, " God
shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children,"
these writings — law, history, legend, folk-lore,
drama, lyrics, proverbs, oratory — have but one
object, to give the answer of a divinely illuminated
consciousness to the questions, Who is God ? What
is man? What is the right relationship between
God and man ? How can that right relationship
be brought about ?
According to one conception of the Old Testa
ment, thirty or forty men, unique in character,
aud separated from aU their feUow men by their

380 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
extraordinary gifts or their extraordinary privi
leges, from some high and unscalable mountain top
hand down to us a message, as the angel Gabriel
was supposed to have handed down to Mohammed
the message of God written upon sheets of silk.
According to the other conception, we see a great
people climbing the mountain toward God. We
see them sometimes in the light, sometimes strug
gling through the mists and the darkness ; at times
wandering to the right hand or to the left, at times
halting altogether or falling back discouraged ;
now stumbling and falling, now getting upon their
feet again and pushing on ; we hear the voices of
their leaders, rebuking, counseling, entreating, com
manding, encouraging them ; their voices rebuke,
counsel, entreat, command, encourage us also ; and
we dare to believe that where this people have
climbed we too can climb, and that the God with
whom they have talked on the mountain top will
talk to us also, though we, too, stumble, and turn
aside, and fall, and sometimes forget ourselves and
our God. These are the two conceptions of the
Bible. It is idle to ignore the radical difference
between the two. I accept, frankly and unreserv
edly, the second.
The message of Israel in answer to the four
great religious questions is first of all that God is
one. This now seems alphabetic ; but for centu
ries after the prophet declared, " Hear, O Israel,
the Lord our God is one Lord ! " l no other people
1 Deut. vi. 4.

THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL 381
believed it. Philosophers occasionally held mono
theism as an esoteric doctrine, but polytheism was
the popular and dominant faith. Next was the
message, God is Spirit. And since only spirit
meets spirit, only through the spiritual can man
have communion with the Eternal, therefore deity
is not to be worshiped by images or pictures or
physical devices of any description. This too is
quite plain to those who, brought up in a Christian
atmosphere, regard the worship of idols as a curi
ous folly of the past ; but it was radical, extraordi
nary, revolutionary in the time when the law was
first proclaimed, " Thou shalt not make unto thee
any graven image." The third element in the
message of Israel was its declaration that God is a
righteous God. The difference between the God
of Judaism and the gods of the surrounding pagan
ism was not a difference of names ; it was not that
one God was called Jehovah and the other god was
called Baal. It was this : that the other religions
of the world worshiped force because of fear, and
this one religion worshiped righteousness because
of conscience. Hence throughout the Old Testa
ment history, until the very latest literature, there
is scarcely a hint either of punishment or of reward
in the life to come, scarcely so much suggestion of
immortality as is to be found in the Egyptian the
ology, because it was the message of Israel that
God is not to be worshiped for wages here or
hereafter, nor to escape punishment in this life or
the next ; that he is a righteous God, and because

382 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
he is righteous Israel owes him reverence. The
fourth element in this message was that this right
eous God demands righteousness of his children.
Even now Christendom has scarcely learned this
lesson ; when Hebrew prophets first proclaimed it
the world was very slow to receive it. The object
of pagan religion is rarely, I think never, to make
men better ; it is to show men how they can escape
the wrath of the gods or how they can win the
favor of the gods. But in Israel's law, with the
commands " Thou shalt have no other gods before
me," and " Thou shalt not make unto thee any
graven image " are combined the great ethical
principles which are the foundation of social order
— respect for parents, regard for the rights of per
son, for the purity of the family, for property, for
reputation. The religion of Israel is built on a
religio-ethical basis ; it is the message of Israel
that righteousness is the foundation of religion and
that religion is impossible dissociated from moral
ity. And then, next in this message is an element
still more radical : that this righteous God, who
demands righteousness of his children, demands no
thing else. Sacrifices, temple services, public and
private worship, Sabbath observances, are regarded
simply as the means by which we are equipped by
God for practical righteousness, or by which we
express our reverence for our God. The whole
ceremonial system of Judaism, therefore, is a vol
untary system ; every sacrifice is the expression of
an experience, — of gratitude, of consecration, of

THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL 383
penitence, of communion. This is the answer
which Israel in the Old Testament makes to the
question, Who is God ? He is a person, a spiritual
person, a righteous person, demanding righteous
ness of his children and demanding nothing else.
To the second question, What is man ? the answer
of Israel is equally explicit. " God made man in
his own image : " into man God breathed his own
spirit : J this is the fundamental faith of Israel in
man, and it colors all Israel's religious experience.
And this, too, was radical ; for when the Hebrew
nation began to learn, and as it learned to impart,
its message, the image of God was looked for in the
clouds, in the thunder, in the lightning, in the sea,
in the land, in the mountains, in the beasts —
everywhere but in men. The message of Israel
transferred man's search for God from the outer
world of force to the inner world of thought and
feeling. " The word," that is, the speech or revela
tion of God, said one of the ancient prophets, " is
very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy
heart, that thou mayest do it." 2 The portraitures
of God in the Old Testament are based on this
assumption : he is a Man of War, a Shepherd, a
Husband, a Father. 3 The Old Testament is often
criticised for its anthropomorphic representations
of God. Its anthropomorphism is its glory. For
1 Gen. i. 27 ; ii. 7.
2 Deut. xxx. 14. Compare Rom. x. 6-9.
8 Ps. xxiv. 8 ; Exod. xv. 3 ; Ps. xxiii. ; Isa. liv. 5 ; Jer. iii. 14 ;
Ps. cui. 13.

384 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
nothing that God has made is so splendid as man.
The ocean ? man rides the ocean. The lightning ?
man catches the lightning. The forest ? man f eUs
the forests. It is man with his hand on the rudder
of the world, with his thoughts reaching out into
the great universe beyond, with his heart of love,
daring to do, to suffer, to die — it is man that is
in the image of God ; even in ruin he is a divine
ruin. Through man God is to be seen ; and God
is liker to man than to anything else he has ever
made :
" Thou hast made him but little lower than God,
And crownest him with glory and honor.
Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands j
Thou hast put all things under his feet." 1
This is the answer of Israel's message to the
question, What is man ?
To the third question, What is the relationship
between God and man, the message of Israel replies :
" God is the great companion, the loving, yet terri
ble friend of his inmost soul, with whom he holds
communion in the inmost sanctuary of his heart, to
whom he turns or should turn in any hour of his
adversity or happiness." 2 To Israel God is not an
hypothesis to account for the phenomena of crea
tion ; not an absentee God who occasionally inter
feres with the world on the petition of his children.
1 Ps. viii. 5, 6.
2 John Cotter Morison : The Service of Man, page 181. The
quotation is the more significant because it comes from one who
is a disbeliever in revelation of any description and an agnostic as
regards God.

THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL 385
This notion of God belongs to Baalism; Elijah
overwhelms its devotees with his sarcasm : " Cry
aloud, for he is a god : either he is musing, or he
has gone aside, or he is on a journey, or peradven-
ture he sleepeth and must be awaked." 2 Israel
believes in a living God ; a God who is in his
world of nature and his world of men — a law
giver with Moses, an architect with Bezaleel, a
soldier with Joshua, a singer with David, a preacher
with Amos, a statesman with Isaiah : — in all men,
not merely in these thirty or forty men ; in aU time,
not merely in these twelve or fourteen centuries ; in
aU the world, not merely in this little province. It
is not the message of Israel that God was once in
his world, once gave law to Moses, once inspired
Joshua with courage, once brooded David with
song, once visited Isaiah in the temple and Ezekiel
in the desert ; it is that God is in his world, new
creating in every spring, ruling over every storm,
giving his law to all consciences, inspiring aU
heroic souls to valiant deeds, singing in every singer
of pure and lofty verse, revealing himself to every
prophet of his righteousness and his love.
To the fourth question, How can the right rela
tionship be brought about between God and men,
the Hebrew message is not less explicit. It is
terribly clear in its enunciation that such right
relationship does not now exist. It declares that
God is of purer eyes than to see iniquity ; that he
cannot and wiU not suffer it ; and that man is
1 1 Kings xviii. 27.

386 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
iniquitous, deliberately, wiUfully, continuously, ha
bitually so.1 But it also plainly shows what is
necessary to deliver man from this sin, to remove
and destroy this obstacle between the soul and God,
and to make them truly one in the unity of a mutual
love. It declares that God can never accept a lower
standard than that of perfect, divine righteousness,
but that if man accepts this standard and sincerely
and earnestly endeavors to make it his own, no
other condition of comradeship is required; that
God desires this comradeship with man, longs for
it, is eager for it, but that it is possible only as
man reconcUes himself with God by abandoning
his sin, by accepting God's law and loyally obey
ing it, by accepting God's love and loyally respond
ing to it. He has simply to seek God, to caU upon
him, to forsake his wicked ways and his unright
eous thoughts and return to the Lord, and the
Lord wiU have mercy upon him and will abun
dantly pardon. His past sins need not prevent ;
for God wiU blot them out as a thick cloud is
blotted out by the sun ; he will cast them into the
depths of the sea ; though they were as scarlet,
they shaU be white as snow ; though they were red
as crimson, they shall be as wool.2 No sacrifice is
necessary to propitiate God, or to turn away his
wrath or win his favor. Sacrifice is only the human
1 For a summary of the Old Testament indictment of man see
Paul's quotations gathered from various Old Testament writings
and contained in Romans iii. 10-18.
2 Isa. xliv. 22 ; Micah vii. 19 ; Isa. i. 18.

THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL 387
expression of penitence, consecration, thanksgiving
It is only a symbolical witness that to destroy sin
costs much ; that sin is not a light matter to be
easily dismissed and readily forgotten. But God,
though he accepts sacrifice as man's expression
of loyalty and love, does not require it. He re
quires only that the penitent cease to do evil and
learn to do weU, that he begin forthwith to do
justly, love mercy, and walk humbly in feUowship
with his God.1 For God is more than a righteous
God ; he is a pitying God ; he is " great in mercy ; "
he is " long-suffering ; " he not only demands right
eousness, he helps to righteousness aU who wish to
be righteous ; he not only forgives sin, he destroys
it, and he leads the forgiven sinner in the paths of
righteousness.2 This is the message of Israel to the world : that
God is a righteous person, who demands righteous
ness of his people and demands nothing else ; that
man is of kin with God ; that the relationship
between God and man is one of comradeship ; that
to enter into that comradeship man must desire it
and endeavor to conform his life to it ; and that if
he does so desire and so endeavor he may be assured
of God's readiness to receive and to help him. But
Israel does not understand his message at first. In
the Old Testament we see him gradually learning
the message which in time he is to give to the
1 Micah vi. 6-8.
" Exod. xxxiv. 6, 7; Num. xiv. 18; 2 Chron. xxx. 9; Ps. xxiii. 3;
v. 2 ; lxxxvi. 5, 15 ; ciii. 8 ; cxlv. 8, 9.

388 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
world. First he conceives of Jehovah as one God
among many gods, but superior to them aU, — " no
other god like unto thee ; " as a provincial God who
dweUs in Jerusalem and rules in Palestine, but not
in Egypt or in Babylon ; only graduaUy does Israel
learn that Jehovah is God alone, and aU the gods
of the heathen are what Jeremiah calls them, —
" not-gods." At first Israel thinks of him as a
just Judge who cannot endure the wicked, who
wiU destroy them, and who commissions Israel to
destroy them. Only very gradually does Israel
learn that there is a higher justice than that which
destroys, that mercy is not incongruous with jus
tice, that the highest righteousness is not that
which destroys men, but that which transforms
them. At first he thinks of God's love as confined
to Israel ; Israel alone is of kin to God ; the hea
then are outcasts, of a different blood, of a differ
ent spirit ; not until the captivity does he learn
that God cares for pagans also, that he will have
mercy on Nineveh if it repents, that he wiU call
Cyrus the Persian to be his minister. At first hu
manity appears to Israel to be required only toward
Israelites ; the Jew must not permanently enslave
a Jew, but may so enslave a pagan ; he must not
take usury of a Jew, but may of a pagan ; he must
not eat unclean meats, but may reserve them for
the stranger in the land ; x not until later does he
learn that he is to do justly toward all men, and
1 Exod. xx. 1, 2; Deut. xv. 12-18; Lev. xxv. 45, 46; Deut.
xxiii. 19,20; xiv. 21.

THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL 389
exercise mercy for aU. At first he conceives of his
relationship to God as that of a soldier to his com
mander-in-chief, or that of a subject to his king ;
obedience by a dogged resolution to an external
law is his highest conception of religion ; not until
later does religion grow to be divine comradeship,
and obedience the conformity of character to char
acter, not of conduct to statute laws. At first he
imagines that Jehovah must be propitiated by sac
rifices ; for a long time the two conceptions, that
of the pagans that God must be appeased by sacri
fices, and that of the prophets that God is himself
self-sacrificing, struggle for the mastery ; it is not
until the time of the Great Unknown that the idea
becomes clear, even to the mind of the most spirit
ual, that it is by his own suffering the Servant of
Jehovah will redeem Israel; that the sacrifice is
not for God, but for the people ; that God him
self takes the burdens, the sorrows, and the sins of
his people on himself. This is the Old Testament ;
the literature of an ancient people commissioned
first to learn, then by the very process of their
learning to teach the world, that God is a righteous
person, that man is his child, that the relationship
between the two is one of comradeship, that to
enter into this comradeship nothing is necessary
but to accept God's love and loyally give him our
love in return.
And yet in all his history Israel is seen expec
tant of a clearer understanding : he is seen in quest
of his message ; he is seen with his face toward the

390 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
future looking for a clearer disclosure of the light
and a larger endowment of the life. The pro
phets prophesy in part ; the message is given in
fragments, — "by divers portions and in divers
manners," as says one of the New Testament
interpreters of this message.1 Moses is reported as
asking to see the glory of God ; Gideon as doubt
ing if Jehovah is indeed with his people ; Job as
questioning if he is a righteous God, and if so why
life is so full of undeserved and seemingly unjust
suffering ; the Psalmist as seeking for him as the
thirsty hart panteth for the water brooks ; even
the Great Unknown as longing for him to rend the
heavens and come down and manifest himself.2 In
the earliest traditions of this people their God is
represented as putting enmity between man and
the powers of evil ; as warning man that those
powers wiU poison humanity, but also as promising
man that humanity will at last utterly destroy
them. In the successive caUs to Israel to engage
in this battle of the ages, Israel has the pledge and
the promise of his Father's help and the assurance
through his Father's help of final victory. In the
first revelation of himself to Moses he appears as a
Deliverer, as one who has seen the burdens of his
people, has made them his own, and is coming to
them to set them free.3 From this birthday of
1 Heb. i. 1, Rev. Ver.
2 Exod. xxxiii. 18 ; Judg. vi. 13 ; Job ix. 21-24 ; Ps. xiii. 1 ; Isa.
briv. 1, 2.
8 "The Mosaic conception of God ... is a conception of God

THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL 391
the nation it is the constant burden of the prophets
that is intimated to him that One is coming to
Israel, — described sometimes as a prophet, some
times as a king, sometimes as a shepherd, sometimes
as a princely priest, sometimes as a suffering ser
vant of the Lord, — who will as a prophet interpret
God to them, as a king show them the full mean
ing of the divine law, as a priest bring them back
to the God they have forsaken, as a shepherd enfold
and feed and protect them, and as a suffering ser
vant of the Lord bear the burdens of their sins
with them and for them.1 Those who accept his
message, are loyal to his law, and share both his
burdens and their own with him, he wiU lead to
victory. And when that victory is won, the evils
which sin has brought into the world will disappear
from the world : wars wiU cease ; pestilence and
disease wiU abate ; death itself wiU be conquered ;
love and life will reign.2
the Deliverer." Ancient Ideals, by H. O. Taylor, vol. ii. 102. " The
fundamental thought (of Mosaism) should rather be said to centra
exclusively in the knowledge of the true Deliverer. ... In this
sense that ancient Mosaic age includes within it the Messianic, that
is, the Christian, not as comprehended by distinct consciousness or
direct effort, but as realized through the inherent germinating
force of the fundamental idea, which here arose, and in its own
time necessarily led to it." History of Israel, by Heinrich Ewald,
vol. ii. pp. 109, 113. The whole section (ii.) on the Develop
ment and Maturity of the Theocracy under Moses and Joshua is
of the highest interpretative value.
1 Deut. xviii. 15 ; Ps. lxxii. ; ex. 4 ; Ezek. xxxiv. 23 ; Zech. vi.
12 ; Isa. liii.
2 Isa. ii. 1-4 ix. 1-7 ; xi. 1-9 ; lx. ; lxi. ; Hos. xiii. 14 ; Zech.
xiv. 11.

392 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Two or three centuries passed away after the
last contribution of any note had been made to
the unique literature of this Hebrew people. Dur
ing those two or three centuries no new lawgiver
interpreted the divine law, no new poet sang of the
divine love, no new prophet spoke of man's duty or
God's grace. Then a new prophet appeared in
Palestine. His life was brief and uneventful ; his
message was a continuation of the message of
Israel, but to it he gave a new significance. He
taught that God is righteous and demands right
eousness of his children, and demands nothing else ;
but to righteousness he gave a clearer meaning, if
not a new interpretation. He taught that God is a
Father who cares for men, cares for the little chil
dren, cares even for the insignificant sparrows. He
taught that righteousness in man must be more
than obedience to a righteous law; it must be
spontaneous ; must spring from the heart ; must
include reverence in spirit, chastity in thought,
meekness and lowliness of mind, the peace-loving
and peace-making disposition, the nature which
loves and prays for one's enemies. He taught that
God will help men to this spirit if they desire it,
that he is more ready to give his own spirit of love
to those that ask for it than fathers are to give
bread to their children when they are hungry, that
the spirit of righteousness, that is, of love, can be
had by any who seek for it. He told his race that
the kingdom of heaven, long promised and long
expected, was not afar off, that it was close at

THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL 393
hand ; it was no other than the spirit of obedience
and fidelity, of loyalty and love to God, and service
of men, and that it could only grow graduaUy and
despite much opposition. His teaching was iUus-
trated by his life. He seemed utterly careless of
the things for which men generaUy are most eager,
— wealth, fame, social position, power. He lived
wholly for others. The contradictions of his char
acter constitute an enigma which the world has
never been weary of studying : his fearlessness in
defending others, and his meekness when assailed
himself ; his quiet assumption of authority over his
foUowers, and his absolute self-abnegation ; his pu
rity of life, and his understanding of and sympathy
with every form of sin ; his unassailable dignity
and his approachableness ; his disregard of the con
ventions and ceremonies of religion, and his trans
parent devoutness of spirit ; his humility and his
challenge to his enemies to search the record of his
life for a flaw ; his reverence and the familiarity of
his intercourse with God; his joyousness and his
participation in the sins and sorrows of the world.1
The leaders of his time arrayed themselves against
him as an iconoclast ; the people regarded him with
admiration as a prophet ; his immediate followers
believed that he was the One of whom the ancient
prophets had spoken as he that was to come and
bring with him a new and divine life to the world.
1 See, for an admirable presentation of this contrariety of
character in Christ, chapter x. in Nature and the Supernatural,
by Horace Bushnell.

394 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
After his death they recaUed and recorded his first
sermon, in which he had declared that he had come
to f ulfiU those ancient prophecies ; his private con
versations with them, in which he had indicated still
more clearly this as his mission; the trial scene
before the Jewish Sanhedrim, in which, put upon
the stand and under oath, he had affirmed that he
was the expected Messiah; the trial scene before
the Roman procurator, in which he had affirmed
that he was a king, and had come to establish a
kingdom on the earth, not by force of arms, but
by force of truth. His death disheartened and
scattered his foUowers ; but their faith in his resur
rection gave them new courage and a new under
standing of him and his mission. Since that time,
and apparently due to his influence, a new life has
appeared in the world. He contributed nothing to
architecture, yet there are no such noble monu
ments as those built to his memory ; nothing to
song, yet his inspiration has created a new order
of music ; nothing to art, yet his spirit has per
meated most of modern art ; nothing to literature,
yet no one teacher has created so profound an influ
ence on literature as he has exerted ; he promul
gated no laws and instituted no reforms, yet where
the story of his life and death has gone, slavery has
been abolished, government has grown more just,
war has been ameliorated, education has become
general, and in some communities practicaUy uni
versal, and the home has been recreated ; he taught
no creed, formulated no ritual, and organized no

THE MESSAGE OF ISRAEL 395
church, but his influence on reUgious philosophy
has far transcended that of the greatest of an
cient philosophers, and his name is mingled with
that of his Father in the prayers and praises of the
great liturgies of Christendom, and scores of eccle
siastical organizations claim the authority of his
name. More than all, his influence has almost
created the virtues of meekness, gentleness, and
forbearance, and taught the world how to unite
them with those of sturdiness, courage, and energy.
If he is not the prophet whom Moses foretold, he
has done more than all other prophets to interpret
the divine nature to man; if he is not the king
whom the unknown author of the Seventy-second
Psalm anticipated, his spirit has done more than
that of all other lawgivers combined to imbue law
with a new and humane spirit; if he is not the
shepherd whom Ezekiel foresaw, he has done more
than all other shepherds to protect and enrich the
life of man ; if he is not the princely priest whom
Zechariah saw, he has done more than aU other
priests to bring humanity back to God ; if he is not
the suffering servant of whom the Great Unknown
had a mystical vision, his life and death have given
to suffering a new and glorious significance.
This is not the place to answer the questions here
barely suggested. Yet I cannot close this volume
in the life and literature of the ancient Hebrews
without saying that I do not see how any one
can accept the general interpretation of that life
and literature here given, and not see in Jesus of

396 LIFE AND LITERATURE OF THE HEBREWS
Nazareth the fulfillment of Israel's aspirations;
not see, at least, that he more than any other of
the sons of men, more, I wiU say, than aU the other
sons of men, gives answer to the four great ques
tions of religion: his god-like character answers the
question, Who is God ; his simple, spontaneous,
earnest and radiant life answers the question, What
should man be ; his unity with the Father inter
prets that ideal comradeship between the spirit of
man and the spirit of God which should be the goal
of all life ; his passion tells us what we who possess
any measure of that comradeship are to do that we
may impart the divine life to others.

INDEX

INDEX OF SCRIPTURE REFERENCES

Citations are usually to be found in the footnotes beginning on the pages
here referred to. A reference occurring twice in the note is thus indicated :
(2 ref.); three times, (3 ref.).

PAGE
1.27  383
i. 28,29  357
ii. 7  383
iii. 15  357
vi.20  7
vii. 2, 3, 9  7
ix. 8-17  357
xii. 1-3  357
xii. 1-7  357
xiii. 14-17  357
xxii.8  162
xxiv  169
xxviii. 16  138
Exodus.
iii. 7,8  357
xii  98
xiii. 14, 15  125
xv. 3  383
xviii. (19-26)  120
xix. 5  344
xix. 5, 6  357
xx. 1, 2  388
xx. 1-17  102
xx  102
xx. 1-xxiv. 7  17
xx-xxiv. 7  36
xx. 23-25  138
xx. 24  160
xx. 24-26  129
xxii. 1-14  125
xxii. 5, 6, 7  107
xxii. 21  124
xxii. 21,22  126
xxii. 29,30  129
xxiii. 14-19  129
xxxiii. 18  390
xxxiv. 6,7  387
Leviticus.
i.3  154
vi.2-7  158

xvi  159
xvii. 4, 8,9  160
xvii. 4, 8, 9, 11  145
xvii. 11  159
xix. 10, 15  126
xix. 15  124
xxiv. 22  124
xxiv. 22  126
xxv. 45,46  388
xxvii. 30-32  153
Numbers.
ix. 5  98
xi. 16, 17  124
xiv. 1-5, 10  124
xiv. 18  387
xxi. 14  36
xxv. 12, 13  358
xxvii. 18-23  124
xxxv. 19  252
Deuteronomy.
i.9-14  124
i. 17  124
i. 17  126
v  102
v. 6-11  108
vi. 4  380
vi.7  125
x. 19  126
xii-xxvi  36
xii. 6, 11,14, 26  145
xii. 12, 18f. (2 ref.).. 126
xiii. 1-5  830
xiv. 21  388
xiv. 22-28  153
xiv.27  126
xiv. 27,29  126
xiv. 28f  136
xiv. 29  126
xv. 7-11  126
xv. 12-18  388
xv. 13-15  126
xvi. 11, 14 (3 ref.) ...126

xvi. 19  124
xvi. 19  126
xvii. 14-20  124
xvii. 18  122
xviii. 15  391
xviii. 15-19  358
xviii. 21, 22  126
xxi. 1-9  125
xxii. 1-4  126
xxii. 8  125
xxiii. 19, 20  126
xxiii. 19,20  388
xxiv. 6, 12f  126
xxiv. 7  125
xxiv.7  126
xxiv. 14f  126
xxiv. 14. 15  126
xxiv. 16  125
xxiv. 17, 19, 20, 21 ..126
xxiv. 19-22  179
xxv. 7-9  181
xxvi. 11 (2 ref.)  126
xxvi. 11, 12f  126
xxvi. 12f  126
xxvii. 19  126
xxx. 14  383
xxx. 15, 16  343
xxxi. 9-13  125
xxxiii. 10  125
Joshua.
i. 1-9  357
v. 10, 11  98
viii. 2  .....8
ix. 18-21  124
x. 12, 13  7
x. 13  36
x. 13  37
x. 40  8
xxiv. 15-21  344
Judges.
ii. 11  143

400 INDEX OF SCRIPTURE REFERENCES

vi. 13  390
vi. 24  142
ix. 8-15  171
xv. 4  50
xv. 16  174
Ruth.
i. 16  179
ui. 9-13  252
iv. 1-8  252
iv.22  177
1 Samuel.
x.5  346
x. 25  36
xv. 21  142
xvi. 6  142
xx. 6  142

2 Samuel.

i. 17-27 .
i. 18 ....
i. 18 . . . .

vii. 11-16.
xii. 1-7
xviii. 1, 2 .
xxiv. 1 . . . .

..36..36 ..37
..33 .357.126

1 Kings.
iv. 32, 33  36
xi. 41  36
xii. 28,29  143
xvi. 31, 32  143
xvii. 4, 6  50
xviii. 27  385
xviii. 29-38  142

xxi. 1-16..
xxi. 17-24 .

.125.126

2 Kings.
vi. 1-7  50
xvii  118
xxi. 1-16  119
xxiii. 4  119
xxiii. 13  143
xxiii. 21-23  98
xxiv. 4  119
1 Chronicles.
xiii. 1-8  124
xviii  287
xxi. 1  7
xxi. 29  98
xxii. 13  98
xxiii. 14, 15  98
xxvii. 24  36
xxvii. 25, 34  48
xxix. 29  36
2 Chronicles.
vii. 12  145
xi. 29  36

xii. 15  36
xvii. 8,9  125
xx. 34  36
xxiii. 1-10  119
xxvi. 18-21  145
xxx. 1  98
xxx. 9  387
xxx. 22  125
xxxiii. 19  36
xxiv. 6,9  98
xxxiv. 14  98
xxxv. 1-19  98
xxxv. 2, 3  125
Ezra.
iv  38
iv. 6  183
v  38
vi  38
vi. 19, 20  98
ix. 11,12  178
x. 10-17  178
Nehemiah.
viii. 5-8  125
ix. 9-23  98
xiii. 23-27  178
Esther.
iti. 8-11  192
iv. 14, 16  187
v. 6-8  192
vi. 3, 7-10  192
vii. 3-6  192
Job.
ii. 9  242
iii. 20-23  244
iv. 7-9  245
vi. 2-4  248
vi. 28-30  249
vii. 9  245
vii. 20  253
viii. 3-7  245
ix. 2, 3  249
ix. 15-24  255
ix. 21-24  390
ix. 28-31  249
ix. 32, 33  254
x. 3-7  250
xiii. 7, 8  247
xiv. 7-14  252
xix. 25-27  252
xxi. 7-15  250
xxi. 17-20  250
xxii. 5-11  247
xxiii. 3-9  255
xxiii. 8, 9, 10  252
xxvii. 8-23  256
xxviii  256
xxviii. 1-28  257
xxix. 2-17  239
xxxi. 35-37  254
xxxii.-xxxvii  256

xxxviii. 3, 4, 18, 22, 24,258
xl. 8......!..'  258
xliii. 7  259
Psalms.
i  272
iii  305
iii. 5  323
iv  305
vii  305
viii  305
viii. 5,6  384
xi  305
xi. 4  317
xiv. 1  323
xv  305
xvi.8  323
xviii  305
xviii. 7-17  319
xviii. 28-35  324
xviii. 35  324
xix. 1-6  305
xxii. 9  323
xxiii  323
xxiii  383
xxiii. 3  387
xxiii. 3,5  324
xxiv  305
xxiv  310
xxiv.8  383
xxv. 8  323
xxv. 11  325
xxvii. 11  323
xxix  305
xxix. 9  319
xxxi.3  323
xxxii  305
xxxiii. 6-8  60
xiii. 1  390
xiii  309
xiv  321
xlvi. 1  323
xlviii  309
li. 1, 2  323
li. 11, 17  325
li. 16  152
lvii. 1  323
lix  314
lxix  314
lxxii  321
lxxii  357
lxxii  391
lxxii. 12-17  326
lxxvi  322
lxxvii. 7-11  314
lxxviii  322
lxxix.9  325
lxxxi. 1-3  320
lxxxv. 2  387
lxxxvi. 5  324
lxxxvi. 5, 15  387
lxxxviii. 5-8 (2 ref.).. 198
xci  309
xci. 4  326

INDEX OF SCRIPTURE REFERENCES 401

. 320
.32(1 .319.320.32(1.320

xcv 
xcv. 1, 2.....
xcvi 
xcvi 
xcviii. 4-6....
c. 1 
ci  305
ciii.1-5  324
ciii.7  98
ciii. 8  387
eiii. 13  326
ciii. 13  383
civ  319
cv  98
cv  322
cv.26  98
cvi (2 ref.)  98
cvi  322
cix  314
cx.4  391
cxiv  322
cxviii  322
cxxii  322
cxxv  322
cxxvi  322
cxxxv  98
cxxxv  322
cxxxvi  98
cxxxvi  309
cxxxvi  322
cxxxvii  314
cxxxvii. 8, 9  8
cxxxvii. 9  177
cxxxix  318
cxxxix. 15, 16  323
cxxxix. 21,22  314
cxlv.8,9  357
cxlviii. 7-13  321
cxlix.3  320
cl.3-5  320
Proverbs.
i.1-6  270
i. 22-28  '•  274
iv. 10-19  273
vii. 14  271
viii. 24-30  60
xv.8  271
xv. 13, 15  276
xvii.l  271
xvii. 22  276
xxi. 3, 27  271
xxiii. 24-35  278
xxiv. 30-34  279
xxv. 6,7  285
xxv. 19  276
xxv. 21, 22  285
xxvi. 17  277
xxvii. 15,16  277
xxvii. 23-27  278
xxx. 21-23  278
xxx. 24-28  278
xxxi. 10-31  278

Ecclesiastes.
i. 1  288
ii. 1-11  295
ii. 22, 23  295
iii. 19  290
iv. 9-12  297
vii. 16, 17  297
xi. 9-xii. 7  300
xii. 13, 14  300
Song of Songs.
i. 1  201
i.2-8  212
i. 4  201
i. 7  201
i. 9  201
i. 15  218
i. 9-ii. 7  213
ii. 7  211
ii. 8-17  215
ii. 16, 17  218
iii. 1-5  216
iii. 6-11  208
iii. 0-11  217
iv. 1-7  218
iv. 4  209
iv. 8-v. 1  208
iv. 8-v. 1  219
v.15  209
v. 2-vi. 3  221
vi. 4-10  223
vi. 11, 12  201
vi. 11-vii. 9  224
vi. 13  206
vii. 10-viii. 7  224
viii. 7  211
viii. 5, 6, 7  201
Isaiah.
i. 10  338
i. 10-17  146
i. 11-15  152
i. 16-18  345
i. 18  386
ii. 1-4  391
ii. 2-4  358
iii. 15  345
v. 8-20  345
vi  339
vii. 10-17  336
vii. 10-17  357
viii. 20  344
ix. 1-7  391
ix. 2-7  357
xi. 1-9  391
xi. 6-9  358
xl. 1-8  366
xl.-lxvi  361
xl. 25, 26  144
xiii. 1-4  368
xliv. 1,2, 21  368
xliv. 22  344
xliv. 22  386
xliv. 28  364

xiv. 1 
xlix. 5-10.
Iii. 13-15..
liii 
1111 
liii 
liv 
liv. 5.

....308 ....358....370
....391 ....359 ....383
lv. 6-9  275
lx  359
lx  391
lxi  391
lxiii. 11, 12  98
lxiv. 1,2  390
Ixv. 3  119
Jeremiah.
i. 4-10  339
ii. 11  144
iii. 11  118
iii. 14  383
iii. 16  358
iii. 22  344
iv. 1  344
vii. 17, 18, 31  119
vii. 21-23  147
viii. 2  119
viii. 7,9  46
xiv. 13  119
xvi. 20  144
xviii. 11  344
xxvi. 10-16  124
xxxi. 1-9,31-34  358
xxxiii. 18  147
xxxviii  126
xliv. 23  344
Ezekiel.

...144

...358
...344
Daniel.
391
...355
...183
Hosea.
...344
...334
...391
. . .363
Amos.
ii. 4  344
ii. 6-8  345
iii. 8  338
v. 21,22  152
v. 21-24  147
v.25  147
402 INDEX OF SCRIPTURE REFERENCES

1-21.

Obadiah.

.359

Jonah.
L17  198
ii. 1-9  198
iv. 2  199
iv. 9-11  200
Micah.
ii. 12  345
iii. 9-12  345
vi. 6-8  152
vi. 6-8  387
vii. 19  386

Nahum.

ill. 1.

.348

Habakkuk.
i.2  348
iii. 17  348
Zephaniah.
i.5  119
Haggai.
i.  145
Zechariah.
i- 1-4, 7ff  339
vi. 12  391
xiv. 11  391
Malachi.
iii. 7  344
Matthew.
L5  177
ii. 15  335
v.23,24  158
v.25  267

v.34,35  276
v.43-18  286
v. 44,45  267
viii. 4  54
xii. 39,40,41  194
xix. 7, 8  54
xxi. 42  1
xxii. 29  1
xxiii. 17  24
xxvi. 17, 19  98
xxvi. 54  1
Mark.
i. 44 (2 ref.)  54
vii. 13  24
x.3  54
x. 5  54
xii. 10  1
xii. 19 (2 ref.)  54
xii. 26 (3 ref.)  54
xv. 28  ...1
Luke.
i. 1-4  28
v. 14  54
xi. 29,30,31  194
xiv. 8-10  285
xvi. 29,31  54
xx. 37:  54
xxiv. 27  1
xxiv. 27  54
xxiv. 44  54
John.
i. 17  54
v.39  1
v. 46, 47  54
vii. 19  54
vii. 38  1
viii. 5  54
x.35  1
xvi. 33  261

Acts.
vii  93
viii. 32  1
xv. 21 (2 ref.)  54
xxviii. 23  54
Romans.
i.2  1
iii. 10-18  386
iv. 3  1
viii. 38,39  261
x. 5  54
x. 6-9  383
x.19  54
xii. 20  285
xv.4  1
1 Corinthians.
xiii. 9, 12  14
xiii. 12, 13  258
2 Corinthians.
iii. 15  24
iii. 15 (2 ref.)  54
Galatians.
iv. 30  1
Colossians.
ii. 21  3

v. 18.

2 Timothy.
iii. 16, 17  26
Hebrews.
i. 1  390
ix. 22  145

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

Included in this index are the names of books and authors cited.

Abbott, T. K., International Critical
Commentary, 3 n.
Adversary, in Job, not a demon of
malice, 240.
Agnosticism, and the Book of Job,
260.
Ahab, 49.
Ahasuerus. See JTerxes.
Ahijah the Shilonite, Book of, 36.
Alford, Greek Testament, 3 n.
Amos, 347, 350, 367.
Anthropomorphism, 317, 383, cf. 352.
Apocrypha, 26 n.
Arnold, Matthew, Dover Beach,
quoted, 262.
Atonement, Day of, 159.
Austin, John, quoted, 107.
Bacon, B. W., Genesis of Genesis, 53 n.,
66 n. Triple Tradition of Exodus,
53 n.
Bakewelfs Geology, 61 n.
Banks, E. J., Jonah in Fact and
Fancy, 192 n.
Baring-Gould, S., Legends of the Pa
triarchs and Prophets, 92 n.
Bartlett, E. T., Scriptures Hebrew
and Christian, 38 n.
Bartlett, S. C, Veracity of the Hexa
teuch, 53 n.
Beecher, W. J., in Bible as Literature,
quoted, 276.
Behrends, A. J. F., Old Testament
Under Fire, 22 n. See also, 53 n.
Belief, primitive religious, 237.
Bible, significance of the term, 1 ;
older attitude toward, 2 ff., 372,
379 ; inconsistencies in, 7 ff. ; new
view of, 8ff., 374, 380; Higher and
Lower Criticism of, 9ff. ; God and,
11 ; human and divine in, 13 ; mate
rials used by writers of, 18; traditions
concerning writings of, 21 ; Christ
and traditions concerning, 24 ; his
tory in, 29 ff., 42 ff. ; documents in,
34 ff., 66 ff., lost books referred to
in, 36 ; folk-lore in, 38, 171, 378 If. ;
epic in, 60, 231 ; myth in, 63, 76,

378 ff.; legend in, 74, 378 ff. ; laws
in, 81 ff., 378 ff. ; ritual and sacri
fices in, 129 ff . ; fiction in, 164 ff. ;
parables in, 170 ff. ; idyl in, 177 ;
historical romance iu, 183 ff.; satiri
cal romance in, 192 ff. ; drama in,
206, 378 ff . ; symbolism in, 208 ff. ;
Wisdom Literature of, 230, 263 ff . ;
proverbs in, 263 ff., 378 ff.; poetry
(lyrics) in, 305 ff., 378 ff.; orations
in, 378 ff. ; old and new views of,
contrasted, 372, 379, cf. iv. 2, 8, 11 ;
omissions in, 375.
Bible, literary study of, methods of,
16 ; results of, 17 ff . ; objection to,
21.
Bible, message of, 372 ff. ; concerning
God, 380 ff . ; concerning man, 383 ff . ;
concerning relationship of God and
man, 384 ff. ; and Christ, 392.
Bible Commentary, 7n., 34 n., 37 n.,
147 n., 183 n., 201 n.
Books, lost, referred to in Old Testa*
ment, 36.
Briggs, C. A., Higher Criticism of the
Hexateuch, quoted, 130 n. ; Mes
sianic Prophecy, 359 n. ; Study of
the Holy Scripture, quoted, 10 n.,
102 n.
Browning, R., Clive, quoted, 204.
Bruce, A. B. , Apologetics, 102 n.,
129 n.
Buckle, History of Civilization, 43.
Budde, K., Religion of Israel, 49 n. ;
quoted, 102 n.
Bushnell, H., Nature and the Super'
natural, 393 n.
Byron, Childe Harold, quoted, 295.
Calvin, Commentary, quoted, 266 n. ;
Institutes, quoted, 90 n.
Cambridge Bible, quoted, 3 n.( 7n.,
33 n.
Captivity, date of. 30.
Caverno, C, A Narrow Ax in Biblical
Criticism, 192 n.
Century Dictionary, quoted, 10, 205,
206, 229.

404

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

Cheyne, T. K., on authorship of
Psalms, 305.
Christ, and traditions concerning the
Bible, 24 ; and the authorship of
the Pentateuch, 54 n. ; attitude to
ward sacrifice, 158 ; and the story
of Jonah, 194 ; combines teaching of
empiricist, legalist, and prophet,
266 ; his counsel compared with
Proverbs, 284; his teaching con
trasted with imprecatory psalms,
315 ; relation of his teaching to the
Book of Psalms, 325 ff . ; relation to
the prophecy of the Great Unknown,
370 ; and the message of Israel,
392 ff. ; and the prophets, 395. See
also, Jesus.
Chronicles, Book of, 32.
Code, Hebrew, growth of, 129 ff. ; le
galistic, 268. See also, Law, Levit
ical Code, and Levitical System.
Commonwealth, Hebrew, departments
in, 123 ; free speech in, 125.
Conant, T. J., Bookof Genesis, quoted,
60 n.
Cook, F. C, Bible Commentary, 34 n.
Cornill, C. H., The Rise of the People
of Israel^ quoted, 40. See also,
49 n.
Covenant, Book of the, oldest book in
the Bible, 17, 102 and n. ; included
in Exodus, 36, 102 ; character and
contents of, 103 tf . ; simplicity of,
105 ; primitive religion in, 137 ff.
Covenant, larger Book of the, in Deu
teronomy, 36.
Cox, S., Ecclesiastes, 17 n., 287 n.
Crane, F., Religion of To-morrow,
12 n.
Creation, account of, in Genesis, 59 ff.
Crime, treatment by Hebrews of, 125.
Criticism, Higher, meaning of, 9 ff.
Cyclopedia Biblica, 120 n.
Daland, "W. C, Song of Songs, 201 n.
Daniel, 350.
Darius, letter to, and edict of, 37 .
David, date of, 29 ; regarding his au
thorship of psalms, 305 ff .
David, Chronicles of, 36.
Decalogue, Mosaic authorship of,
102 n. ; original form of, 106.
Declaration of Independence, quoted,
108.
DeUtzsch, on Genesis, 25 n. ; quoted,
54 n.
Deluge, account of, in Genesis, 66 ff. ;
two accounts of, 66 and 68 ; Assyrian
story of, 72.
De Tocqueville, Democracy in Amer
ica, 109 n.
Deuteronomic Code. See Code; and
Law.
Deuteronomy, date of, 83 ; authorship

and date of, 119 ff. ; character of;
121 ff.
Development. See Growth.
Divine Armory, 4 and n.
Documents in Old Testament, 34 ff.;
in Pentateuch, 66 ff., 70 ff.
Drama in the Bible, 206, 379 ; not di
dactic, 210 ; philosophical, 231.
Driver, S. R., on Deuteronomy, 120 n.,
126 n. , 129 n. ; Introduction to the
Literature of the Old Testament,
53n., 102n., 178n. ; quoted, 201 n. ;
quoted, 208 n. ; quoted, 234 n.,
287 n. ; on authorship of psalms, 305.
Ecclesiastes, empirical, 268, various
interpretations of, 287 n. ; character
of 287 ff . ; authorship of, 288 ; a
dramatic monologue, 291 ; teachings
of, for the present day, 301 ff.
Edersheim, Life and Times of Jesu$9
24 n.
Egypt in time of Moses, 94 ff.
Eliot, George, Silas Marner, quoted.
236.
Elohist narrative, 35.
Emerson, R. W., Essays, quoted, 204.
Empiricist, 263.
Encyclopedia Britannica, 6n., 53 n.,
90 n., 108 n., 178 n.
Epic in the Bible, 231. See also, His
tory.
Esther, Story of, 183 ff.
Evolution. See Growth.
Ewald, History of Israel, quoted,
92n.,102n.,and390n. Prophetsof
the Old Testament, quoted, 192 n.,
and 337 ; on the authorship of
psalms, 305.
Exodus, date of the, 27 ; witness to,
98 ff.
Expositor's Bible, 17 n.
Ezekiel, 349, 350.
Faber, F. W., quoted, 265.
Fact, truth and, 41.
Fall of man, 61 ff., 136, 353, 355.
Fairar, F. W., The Bible and its Su
premacy, 38 n., quoted, 164 n.
Fiction, in the Bible, 164 ff . ; nature
of, 165 ; prejudice against, 166 ; pur
poses of, 167.
Fisher, G. P., quoted, 123 n.
Fitzgerald, E., quoted, 296.
Flood. See Deluge.
Folk-lore in the Bible, 38, 171 ff., 378.
Free speech in Hebrew Common
wealth, 125.
Froude, J. A., Life of Erasmus, 43;
Short Studies in Great Subjects,
quoted, 232, 256 n.
Genesis, Book of, 53 ff. ; authorship
of, 54 ff. ; narratives in, 59 ff.

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

405

Genung, J. F-, Epic of the Inner Life,
17 n. ; quoted, 229, 239 n. ; quoted,
252 n. and 256 n.
Ginsburg, C. D., on Proverbs, 287 n.
Gladden, "W., Seven Puzzling Books,
quoted, 231 n.
God, and the Bible, 11 ff. ; transcen
dence and immanence of, 11, 12 ; in
Hebrew history, 47 ; conception of,
in Psalms, 316 ; in the prophets, 350 ;
recognizing obligation, 352 ; message
of Israel concerning, 380 ff. ; mes
sage of Israel concerning relation
ship of man to, 384 ff. See also, An
thropomorphism .
Goodspeed, G. S., IsraeVs Messianic
Hope, 359 n.
" Great Unknown," 349, 351, 364,368.
Green, W. H., in Anti-Higher Criti
cism, 70 n. ; Higher Criticism of the
Pentateuch, 53 n. ; quoted, 54 n. ;
Unity of the Book of Genesis, 54 n.
Griffls, W. E., Lily Among Thorns,
17 ; 201 n. ; 218 n.
Growth, process of national and eccle
siastical, 87 ff. ; of Hebrew Code,
129 ff.
Guyon, Mme., Song of Songs, quoted,
201n.
Habakkuk, 348, 350.
Haggai, 349, 351.
Haley, J. W., Alleged Discrepancies of
the Bible, 8 n. ; Book of Esther,
quoted, 191 n.
Hallam, Constitutional History, 153 n.
Happiness, significance of, 237 ff.
Harper, H. A., Bible and Modern Dis
coveries, quoted, 99 n.
Hastings, Bible Dictionary, 49 n.
Hebrew people, message of, 374 ff. ;
Christ and message of, 392 ; con
trasted with pagan nations, 381. See
also, Bible.
Henderson, E., Minor Prophets, 192 n.
Henley, W. E., Life and Death,
quoted, 261.
Herodotus, 44 ; quoted, 104.
Hexateuch, authorship of, 54 n.
Hilprecht, H. V-, Recent Research in
Bible Lands, 99 n.
Historian, frankness of Hebrew, 47 ;
method of Oriental, 28.
History, three classes of, 42 ff. ; and
legend, 78.
History, Hebrew, beginnings of, 27 ;
the two narratives of, 29 ff . ; date of
the editing of books of, 39 ; charac
terized, 45 ; principles of, 52 ; out
lines of, 116 ff.
Homer, historicity of the Hiad of, 44.
Hooker, quoted, 111.
Hosea, 347, 350, 359, 367.

Houghton, Mrs. L. S., Studies in the
Old Testament, 171 n.
Humanity of Hebrew laws, 125.
Huxley, T. H., Science and Hebrew
Tradition, 61 n. ; Science and Edu
cation Essays, quoted, 302.
Iddo, Vision of, 36.
Idyl, in the Bible, 177.
Imagination, language of, as compared
with symbolism, 208. See also, Fic
tion.
Ingersoll, R., on Hebrew death pen
alty, 125.
Inspiration, old and new views con
cerning, 5 ff., 12, 372. See Bible.
Isaiah, protests against policy of
Ahaz, 335 ; his character and mes
sage, 347, 350, 368; cf. 335, 336 n. ;
the call of, 365.
Isaiah, the Second. See Great Un
known.
Israel. See Hebrew People.
Jahvist narrative, 35.
James, "William, The Will to Believe,
quoted, 102 n.
Jameson, Mrs., History of Our Lord
in Art, 61 n.
Jasher, Book of, 7n., 36.
Jehovah, subject of Hebrew history,
47. See also, God.
Jehu, Book of, 36.
Jeremiah, 348, 350, 368.
Jesus, birthplace of, 42. See also,
Christ.
Job, Book of, characterized, 6 ; inter
preted, 229 ff. ; date of, 233 ; genius
of the author of, 236 ; story of,
240 ff. ; and agnosticism, 260; con
clusion of, 262 ; prophetic, 267.
Joel, 350, 351.
Jonah, the story of, 192 ; the teaching
of, 350, 351.
Josephus, Antiquities, 92 n., 192 n.
"Judges," Hebrew, 116.
Kellogg, S. H., Book of Leviticus,
quoted, 132 n.
Kent, C. F., Wise Men, 231 n., 268 n.
King, Hebrew, limited power of,
124 ff.
Kings, Book of, 32.
Kitto, Bible lllus., 50 n.
Koran, contrasted with Pentateuch,
83 ; source for legends concerning
Moses, 93 n.
Lane , E . W . , Selections from the
Kur-an, 93 n.
Lange, Commentary, 60 n.
Law, and national life, 83 ff. ; ground
for authority of, 107 ; belief concern ¦
ing divine origin of, 81, 379u

406

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

Law, Hebrew, elements in growth of,
91 ; Deuteronomic code of, 116 ff ;
provisions of, 124 ff . ; canon law, 129
ff. ; spirit of, 343.
Laws of nature, Biblical writers igno
rant of, 15.
Lawgivers, compared with prophets,
342. See also, 263.
Legalist, 263.
Legend, in the Bible, 64 ff., 378; in
other literatures, 70 ff. ; compared
with myth, 75 ff. See also, Folk
lore.
Lenormant, Beginnings of History,
53 n. ; quoted, 58 n.
Levitical code, 130 ff. ; unlike pagan
code, 152 ff. ; support voluntary,
152 ; services voluntary, 154 ; inex
pensive, 155; not to pacify God,
158 ; self -destructive, 160. See Rit
ual.
Levitical system, date of, 148.
Leviticus, date of, 83.
Lilly, W. S., Century of Revolution,
109 n.
Literature, forms of, 201 ff. See also,
Bible.
Lyric, meaning of term, 307 ; in the
Bible, 378.
Mabie, H. W., Essays on Nature and
Culture, quoted, 312.
McCurdy, J. F., History, Prophecy,
and the Monuments, 99 n.
McGiffert, A. C, Apostolic Age, 17 n.
Magruder, A. B., John Marshall, 85.
Maine, Sir H., Ancient Law, quoted,
88 n., 108 n. Popular Government,
109 n.
Malachi, 349,351.
Man, message of Israel concerning,
383 ff . ; relationship of God and,
384 ff.
Messiah. See Promise.
Micah, 347, 350, 367.
Miller, H., Testimony of the Rocks,
56 n.
Miller, J., on Proverbs, 270 n.
Miracles. See Laws of Nature.
Moore, G. F., on Deuteronomy, 120 n. ;
on Judges, quoted, 173 n., 175 n.
Moral teachers, three classes of, 263 ff.
Morison, Service of Man, quoted,
303, 384, and n.
Morley, J., Rousseau, 109 n.
Moses, reputed author of Genesis, 54,
81, 82 ; life and character of, 91 ff . ;
and the prophets, 342.
Moulton, R. G., Modern Readers
Bible, 17 n. ; quoted, 201 n., 256 n.,
270 n., 287 n.
Munhall, L. W., Anti-Higher Criti
cism, 53 n.
Myth, 76 ff., 378.

Nahum, 348, 350.
Narratives, priestly and prophetic, 34.
Nathan, Samuel and God, Acts of, 36.
Nation, conception of, in Psalms, 36.
Nature in the Psalms, 318 ff.
Newman, J. H-, Apologia pro Vita
Sua, 298 ; Grammar of Assent,
quoted, 352.
Obadiah, 348, 350.
Omar Khayyam, quoted, 296.
Old Testament. See Bible.
Oort, Dr. H., Bible for Learners,
quoted, 92 n.
Orelli, C. von, Old Testament Pro
phecies, 359 n. ; Prophecies of Jere
miah, 147 n.
Owen, J., Five Great Sceptical Dra
mas, 230; quoted, 258 n.
Pagan nations compared with Hebrew
people, 381. See also, Egypt.
Palmer, E. H., Desert of the Exodus,
quoted, 101 n.
Parable in the Bible, 170,
Parable of the Trees, 170.
Paul, teaching of, compared with Wis
dom Literature, 258 ; compared with
Proverbs, 285. See also, 342.
Pentateuch, authorship of, 54 n.
Peters, J. P., Scriptures Hebrew and
Christian, 38 n.
Philosophy and myth, 78 ; dramatic,
23; Hebrew, 363 ff.
Plato, quoted, 76, 77.
Plumptre, on Ecclesiastes, 287 n.,
291 n.
Plutarch, Morals, quoted, 320.
Poetry, essentials of, 308. See also,
Lyric.
Poets compared with prophets, 342 ff .
Polychrome Bible, quoted, 7n,, 36 n.,
346 n. ; translations from, 335, 365,
368.
Priest. See Levitical Code.
Promise, note of, in Hebrew litera
ture, 356, 389.
Prophecy, interpretation of Hebrew,
328 ff., 352 ff.; Messianic, 356 ff.
Prophet, Hebrew, view of the, 264 ;
contrasted with Wise Men, 272 ;
function of, 328 ; interpretation of,
328 ff . ; as foreteller, 331 ; rabbini
cal conception of the work of, 334 ;
commissioned by Jehovah, 338 ; the
timeB of, 339 ; the personality of,
341 ; compared with other Hebrew
teachers, 342 ff. ; conception of God
expressed by, 350, 351.
Proverbs, Book of, empirical, 268 ;
authorship of, 269 ; collection of
aphorisms, 270 ; no references to
Mosaic or Levitical code in, 271 ;
no theology in, 271 ; contrast with

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

407

prophetic method, 272 ; wisdom as
presented in, 274; aphorisms in,
276; odes, riddles, etc., in, 277 ; no
system of ethics in, 279 ; not distinc
tive by Hebraic, 282; not cynical,
283 ; compared with counsel of
Christ and Paul, 284 ff.
Proverbs, national, characterized and
cited, 280 ff.
Psalms, Hebrew, interpretation of,
305 ff- ; authors of, 305 tf . ; the five
books of, 306 ; religious character
of, 307 ff . ; expressions of experience,
312 ff . ; Christ and the imprecatory,
315 ; conception of God in, 316 ;
conception of the nation in, 318 ff . ,
321 ; Christ and the, 325 ff.
Punishment, divine, 237 ff .
Pusey, E. B., Minor Prophets, 192 n.,
quoted, 360.
Rawlinson, History of Egypt,95, 99 n.,
104 n., 105n., 141 n., 153 n.
Raymond, R. W., Book of Job, 234n.
Religion, in other than Hebrew na
tions, 139 ; primitive, 237 ; Hebrew
conception of, 352 ; forelooking
character of Hebrew, 353.
Renan, E., History of Israel, 29 n. ;
quoted, 92 n. ; translation in Job,
253 n.
Revelation, old and new view concern
ing, 12. See Inspiration.
Rewards, divine, 237 ff .
Rhys, E. , Book of Ruth, quoted, 182 n.
Riehm, Messianic Prophecy, 359 n.
Ritual, Hebrew, growth of, 141. See
also, Levitical Code.
Romance, in the Bible, historical,
183 ; satirical, 192.
Ruskin, Modern Painters, 60 n.
Ruth, story of, 177.
Ruth, Book of, date of, 178 and n.
Sacrifices, Hebrew and pagan con
trasted, 162 ; use of, 387 ; not regu
lated by Moses, 147.
Samson, story of, 172 ff.
Samuel concerning the Kingdom, Book
of, 36.
Satan. See Adversary.
Sayings of the Seers, 36.
Schaff, P., General Introduction in
Lange's Commentary on Job,
quoted, 60 n.
Schaff-Herzog, Religious Encyclope
dia, quoted, 6n.
Scriptures, use of term, 1. See also,
Bible.
Shakespeare, quoted, 291 n.
Shemaiah the Prophet, Book of, 36.
" Shulamite," meaning of, 206 n.
Silliman, Outline of Geological Lec
tures, quoted, 61 n.

Smith, George, Chaldean Account of
Genesis, 53 n.
Smith, G. A., Book of Isaiah, 17 n.,
336 n., 346 n. ; Book of the Twelve
Prophets, 147 n. ; quoted, 192 n.,
quoted, 328, 346 n.
Smith, William, Dictionary of the
Bible, 125 n., I92n.
Smith, W. R., Encyclopedia Britan-
nica, 178n., Old Testament in Jew
ish Church, 102 n.
Stowe, C. E., on Jonah, 192 n.
Solomon, one of the makers of pro-
verbB, 269 ; not author of Ecclesi-
asteB, 288 ; character of, 289 ff .
Solomon, Acts of, 36.
Solomon, Book of, 36.
Songs, ancient, 36.
Song of Songs, conceptions of, 201 n. ;
dramatic story of, 206 ; lesson of,
for present time, 227 ; an allegory,
228.
Spinoza, on Mosaic authorship of Pen
tateuch, 54 n.
Stanley, A. P., History of the Jewish
Church, quoted, 8 n., 19 u., 93 n.,
102 n., 287 n. ; quoted, 291 n.
State. See Nation.
Stevens, G. B., Theology of the New
Testament, quoted, 25 n.
Strabo, quoted, 96.
Suffering, significance of, 237 ff .
"Suffering Servant," 358, 368. See
also, Great Unknown.
Symbolism, language of, 208, 218, 222.
Symonds, J. A., Renaissance in Italy,
39; Greek Poets, 308 n.
Taine, French Revolution, 109 n.
Tatian, Diatesseron, 34.
Taylor, H. O., Ancient Ideals, quoted,
390 n.
Temple, rebuilding of, 27. See also,
Levitical Code.
Tennyson, In Memoriam, quoted, 262.
Thackeray, The Newcomes, quoted,
204.
Theology, Old and New contrasted, 11,
cf. iv. See Bible and Inspiration.
Townsend, G., Old Testament Ar
ranged, quoted, 233 n.
Toy, C. H., on Proverbs, 279 n.
Tradition, in Hebrew literature, 38.
See also, Folk-lore, Legend, and
Myth.
Traditions regarding authorship of
Biblical books, 22 ff.
Tribes, the Lost, 363 n.
Trumbull, H. C, Light on the Story of
Jonah, 192 n.
Truth, fact and, 41.
Tuck, R., Handbook of Biblical Diffi
culties, 8 n., 50 n.

408

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

Wars of the Lord, Book of the, 36.
Wellhausen, on the Pentateuch, 53 n. ;
History of Israel, 102 n. and ff. ;
quoted, 116 n., quoted, 129 n.
Wescott, History of Religious Thought,
77n.,78n.
Westminster Confession of Faith, 4
and n. ; quoted, 6 n., 372.
Wilkinson, Sir J. G., Ancient Egyp
tians, 99 n.
Wisdom, as presented in Proverbs,
274.

Wisdom Literature, interpreted, 229,
263 ; conclusion of, 258.
Wise Men, constituting a school of
thought, 268 ; compared with pro
phets, 342.
Woods, F. H., Hope of Israel, 359 n.
Xerxes, character of, 183.
Zechariah, 349, 351.
Zephaniah, 347, 350-