Long before the Hebrew tribes were united into one politi cal community,
Wellhausen
tells us, they had a certain internal unity, going back to the time of Moses, and apparently due to Moses himself.
Pleiderer - Development of Theology in Germany since Kant
Schrijten Allen Testaments.
Preface, p.
ix.
2JJ
? ? ? ? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS.
253
pearance of the book, the table of contents, with its Hegelian
formulae, of itself terrified me to such an extent that I re
mained at the time unacquainted with A speculative treatment of history trust no further than can see. Since then indeed have seen that theory and formula in this book were really only an addition which might be dispensed with, and that my inquiries might have been materially assisted
had not let myself be deterred by them. " Since one of the pleasantest duties of the historian to place misjudged merit its proper light, will here give a short account of Vatke's little known book, not of its philosophical super fluities, but of its valuable, historical, and critical essence.
Vatke starts from the indisputable fact that the sources for the earlier history of the Old Testament religion are derived from later legends, and are therefore incomplete and un certain. Accordingly he not only passes over the whole history of the patriarchs as prehistoric legend, as others had done before him, but he also subjects the traditional account of Moses to a more searching criticism than any one had pre viously ventured to do. He finds that the notion of Moses having given the people its civil law and pure belief in God irreconcilable with later history. For he holds to be impossible that whole nation should suddenly sink from a high stage of religious development to a lower one, as asserted to have been so often the case in the times of the
judges and kings and equally impossible for an individual to rise all at once from lower to a higher stage, and raise a whole nation with him with the same rapidity. We must not separate individuals from the general life around them, and must therefore often supply connecting links omitted in the legend, or reduce our conception" of the individuals question to the standard of their age. This particularly the case with Moses, since on the assumption of the truth even of only the greater part of this tradition as to his work, both his own person and the whole course of Hebrew history become inexplicable he would have come when the time was not fulfilled, and would thus be far more miraculous than Christ himself. The profound idea of the New Testament, that the law was introduced between the promises and their fulfil ment, may after aH be justified, since the Pentateuch its completed form truth later than the promises of most of the prophets. " From indications in later history, and
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it
it is
;
is ; in
is
in
a a
I
is
if
is
in
I
a
I
it.
I
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? >>54 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
from isolated statements of the prophets (Amos v. 25 sq. \ Vatke infers that the Hebrews in the time of Moses shared the universal worship of the stars. With regard to the work of Moses, a critical examination of the tradition, in conjunction with the condition of the country under the judges, makes it certain in the first place that Moses did not found a state, since the main condition of this was wanting, viz. the estab lishment of a legislative and executive authority, which did not exist in Israel until the times of the kings. With the conception of actual sovereignty the Mosaic state lacked also all higher unity and all that belongs to the sphere of public justice. The legislation of the Pentateuch did not found a
constitution, and was not intended to do so ; its object was the partial development of certain relations of the community, and it must therefore have originated within a state already constituted, and may be compared to canon law.
With regard to the sacrificial and sacerdotal ordinances of the Pentateuch, the history of the times of the judges and earlier kings proves that the simple patriarchal method of worship was then in force, --a plurality of sacred places, the priesthood not confined to a single tribe, the forms of worship still very simple. Only in the later kingdom of Judah did the system of the Pentateuch become possible ; it was then by degrees actually realised, and became the fixed ritual after the Babylonian exile. Composite ceremonies, such as those of the " Mosaic " ritual, are in general only comprehensible as the products of a lengthy development, and become, in their stereotyped permanence, the dead shells of a previous or a parallel spiritual growth ; the rigid mechanism of form is never the original and direct product. That the laws con cerning ritual in the Pentateuch are not derived from Moses, and do not belong to the early pre-prophetic period at all, is confirmed by the protests of the prophets against the ceremonial worship, which they regard as not a revelation from God, but an invention of godless and deceitful men ; which would have been quite impossible if the Pentateuch had existed. But if Moses was thus neither a political nor ecclesiastical legislator, nor a sage speculating on the nature
of God, he was still a true prophet, who came forward in consequence of direct inspiration as an ambassador from God, and hallowed the judicial and moral life of the nation by bringing it into relation with the divine will ; he concluded
political
? ? ? ? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS.
255
a "covenant" between the people and Jehovah, and thus maintained the dependence of the historical and natural ex istence of the nation upon the sphere of justice and morality ; this indicates that he beheld in Jehovah a holy power, and that he deduced the other attributes of the divine nature from this central idea. We must not however attribute to Moses all the consequences involved in this principle ; for like the con ception of the ideal unity of God, the attributes of his nature were realised in their fulness only in the course of time. The divine holiness was regarded partly as an exclusive principle on the side of natural existence and the service of nature, partly as the standard of a legal and moral life ; in order therefore to separate the elements of the sensible and the higher order of things, and to arouse the moral sentiment from the dream of nature-life, this Power had to appear to men as severity, as a consuming fire and a jealous power ; its instruments had to be full of a like holy zeal, while the abstract nature of their message only increased the necessity for stern ness. For the question at issue was still the recognition of the Lord, of a holy Will, of law and morality in general ; the first abstract stages of a great process of purification were still being passed through, which afterwards the earlier prophets, especially Elijah, similarly fought their way through. The
? principle of mercy and grace could scarcely be represented even in an infinitesimal degree in such a development. Although Moses received the idea of the holy national God, whose will was to guide the whole political and moral life of his people as an original intuition, i. e. as a revelation, we still must not disconnect his appearance and work from its historical conditions. For since natural
religion produces some legal and moral institutions, we must not draw a hard and fast line between the two forms of religion ; it only needed a distinguished personality, in whom were focussed
the various rays of a better spirit, to find and announce the solution of the problem of the national mind, and thus give its development a new direction. But although part of the nation sided with the prophet of the higher spirit and carried on his work, still he was far from being able to lift the whole people up to his higher point of view. The mass of the nation still clung to the old Semitic worship of nature. Later tradition was therefore wrong in representing the people under and after Moses as repeatedly sinking to a lower stage
? ? ? 256
BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
from a higher one already attained ; on the contrary, the development was a gradual one in an upward direction amid a constant struggle between the two parties. " Hence the later religion of the Hebrew nation had the Sabaic religion of nature, and particularly the worship of Saturn, as its
and the revelation of the divine ideality and holiness as its higher principle. "
This description of its Mosaic beginnings gives the key to Vatke's whole view of the history of the Hebrew religion. This view, as may be seen, is the outcome of an acute com parative examination of the traditions, and of general ideas on the philosophy of history. The latter indeed will not be a recommendation in the eyes of the public of to-day ; but to me this appears an instructive example of the intuition of a philosophically trained mind showing empirical research the road to its most fruitful discoveries.
A curious contrast to Vatke's book is presented by Ewald's great work on the History of Israel (1st ed. 1843-52, 3 vols. ; 3rd ed. 1864-68, 7 vols. ). In the former the decisive points are noted with the penetrative glance of genius, and the out lines of an actual historical development are brought clearly before us, with the omission of unimportant particulars ; while in the latter the reader's mind is confused amid an endless mass of details which prevent his ever arriving at a distinct idea of the history as a whole. His criticism of authorities exhibits
Ewald's critical sagacity in its strength and weakness -- keen-
sighted in little things, shortsighted in great. Ewald distin guishes as the main sources of the Pentateuch, the Book of Covenants, the Book of Origins, three Prophetical Narrators, and lastly the Deuteronomist. But though he has much to say about the character of these sources and the determin ation of their date, he pays no attention to those serious objections which Vatke had already urged against the early pre-prophetic origin of the ritualistic and priestly legislation of
Leviticus and Numbers; Ewald does not attribute this legis lation to Moses himself, but he has no difficulty whatever in
dating it (as the Book of Origins) from the time of Solomon.
empirical starting-point,
? Ewald, moreover,
has scarcely the faintest idea of the
development of the religious consciousness, of which Vatke
with so much insight gives a probably true description. He
considers the revelation of the purely spiritual God, in whom love is superior to punitive justice, had been so completely
? ? ? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS.
257
given in Moses, that we can understand neither how such a phenomenon was possible at the time, nor what fresh and higher truth the subsequent prophetical, or even Christian, revelation could add. This is connected with one of Ewald's characteristic peculiarities. He lacked the primary qualifica tion of an historian, the ability to sink his own personality
and mode of thought and identify himself with other and alien
modes of thought and feeling. When any historical figure impresses him (and all impress him which tradition in any respect represents as heroes), he is immediately carried away by his feelings, and ascribes to his heroes, forgetting the re quirements of sober criticism, all the noble moral thoughts and feelings which he, the historian, entertains at the mo ment. We might call his history a didactic romance. His method of treating the Hebrew legends of miracles is more
suitable to the edifying romance than to an historical inquiry. He does not actually believe the miracles, but does not openly
deny them and explain the origin of the legends ; he mani pulates the individual traits of these Biblical narratives in so artificial a manner, and casts over the whole such a cloud of edifying phrases, that each reader may make what he likes out of them, --one a real miracle, another a natural and insignificant event, a third a moral allegory. But this was just what the public wanted in the middle of the century ; the bright light of Tubingen criticism had given pain to weak eyes only just waking from the dreams of centuries ; so it was comforting to have the Biblical history of the Old and New Testaments interpreted by so great a scholar and set in a dim, soft twilight, such as could not hurt the weakest eyes, while at the same time it flattered the cultivated mind with a considerable
degree of Aufkldrung. Thus this excellent philologian, but bad historian and worse theologian, was able to retard by his authority the healthy advance of Biblical criticism for a whole generation. The light of the two stars, Hengstenberg and Ewald, quite eclipsed that of Vatke ; but at last Vatke's bril liant theory has been brought to the front by the labours of more recent inquirers, and made the centre of the Old Testa ment researches of the present day. Not for men only, but
also for books, die Weltgeschichte ist das Weltgericht !
the decades of Ewald's supremacy, when Vatke
? During g. t.
appeared to be forgotten, Reuss in his lecture room at Strass-
burg had given his auditors an account of the Old Testament
s
? ? ? 258
BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
literature and religion different from the prevalent one and very similar to that of Vatke. Two of his hearers, while the master himself cautiously deferred the publication of his views, made the theory, by their independent researches, the subject of a controversy which since then has never ceased. H. Graf, in his book, Die geschichtlichen Bilcher des A. Testaments (1866), by an investigation of the history of the Israelite ritual, as given in the more ancient sources (not in Chronicles, which is much later and is coloured by a marked Tendenz), arrived at the result that the priestly legislation in the middle books of the Pentateuch was later than Deuteronomy, and only after the Babylonian exile incorporated as a great interpola tion with the earlier work of the Deuteronomist. He still, how ever, kept to the then usual view, that the Elohistic narratives, in spite of their close connection with the priestly legislation, were part of the " Grundschrift" and regarded them ac
cordingly as the oldest part of the Pentateuch. He had thus divided this Grundschrift into two parts, which, although
perfectly similar in language and thought, were supposed to differ in date by more than 500 years, the one being the oldest and the other the most recent portion of the whole
Pentateuch. It was of course not a difficult task for criticism
to prove the impossibility of such an hypothesis. But while the representatives of the older point of view believed them selves to have thus refuted the whole theory, and to have vindicated the antiquity of the whole Grundschrift, including the priestly code, keener critics considered Grafs error to
consist in want of thoroughness in working out his own theory, and not extending it also to the narrative portions of the Grundschrift. Graf himself recognised this error, and in an essay published shortly before his death on "die soge- nannte Grundschrift des Pentateuchs" drew the necessary in ferences. Still, in spite of the great impression produced by his arguments, German theologians continued to reject the " Grafsche Hypothese" through inability to get rid of the prejudice, supported by the authority of Ewald, that his
theory was contradicted by the ascertained history of the literature of the Old Testament. In these circumstances it was again a former pupil and later colleague of Reuss, Professor Kayser, of Strassburg, who by his book, Das vorexilische Buch der Urgeschichte Israels und seine Erweiterungen ( 1 874),
gave the death blow to this prejudice by proving, by an in
? ? ? ? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS. 259i
vestigation of the literary interdependence of the books, that the Jahvistic book of history, with its naive epic style, is the oldest, that then follows the Deuteronomist, and that lastly the Elohistic legislation was added, with its appropriate framework of narrative ; the order of sequence inferred from the history of the ritual being thus confirmed by the literary evidence. Two years after Kayser's book, appeared Well- hausen's essays on the composition of the Hexateueh (Joshua being taken with the Pentateuch), and then his Geschichte
Israels (1878), in which the arguments for the new hypothe sis, derived from the parallel development of law, ritual, and literature, were exhibited with such cogency that the impres sion produced on German theologians (especially of the
? was almost irresistible ; thenceforward " Graf's hypothesis," the resuscitation of the long-ignored theory of Vatke, was universally regarded as a question de
serving most serious consideration, and by many as an ascer tained fact. It was a special merit in Wellhausen's book to have excited interest in these questions outside the narrow circle of specialists by its skilful handling of the materials and its almost perfect combination of wide historical considerations with the careful investigation of details, and to have thus re moved Old Testament criticism from the rank of a subordinate question to the centre of theological discussion. Personally I welcomed this book of Wellhausen's more than almost any other, for the pressing problem of the history of the religion of the Old Testament appeared to me to have been at last solved
in a manner consonant with the principle of human evolution,
which I am compelled to apply to the history of all religion. It is true, I was better prepared than the majority of German theologians to appreciate Wellhausen's book by my acquaint ance with Kuenen's work, Godsdienst van Israel.
The Dutch scholar, Abraham Kuenen had even before Graf come to doubt the early date of the priestly Grundschrift, from observing that the impossibilities which Colenso had proved in his criticism of Old Testament history occurred with the greatest frequency in it. When Graf's book ap peared, Kuenen saw at once that its separation of the Grund
into law and history was untenable ; but in consider Iing the further question, whether the historical portions should
follow after the laws, or vice versa, he decided unhesitatingly for the former alternative, perceiving that Graf's arguments
younger generation)
schrift
? ? ? 260 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
for the post-deuteronomic origin of the priestly laws were valid, while his supposition of the early date of the correspond ing historical narrative was neither proved nor to be proved.
Hence he arrived at the conviction that " not only is the priestly legislation chronologically later than the preaching of
the prophets, but the priestly historiography is later than the prophetic (Jahvistic). " From this point of view he composed his great work, masterly alike in form and matter, Godsdienst van Israel (1869-70), which in Holland met with deserved
appreciation, but in Germany, on account of its foreign lan guage, was less known beyond the narrowest circle of special ists than it deserved ; it is all the more a matter for congratu lation that an English translation has facilitated its circulation beyond the narrow limits of the Dutch tongue. The ability and originality of this history strike one at the outset. It had always hitherto been supposed that the history of a na tion or a religion must follow the chronological sequence of events, and therefore begin with the earliest time ; it was not remembered that the earliest history, since there exist no
? authorities for the most uncertain and least adapted to form the secure starting-point of historical inquiry, constituting as does at first only an obscure prob lem, the solution of which, so far as any solution possible, can only be approached from other ascertained facts. If our
historically clearly known (with the 8th century in Hebrew history, the time of the first prophets that left written records). The prophetic authorities for the history of this period directly supply only the conception of Israel's prehistoric life which was entertained in prophetic circles, they contain the national heroic legends as interpreted by the prophetic consciousness of the 8th century. Only by taking account of the alter ations in the form of the legend made by this later time, either by addition or subtraction, can the historical kernel be ap
proximately extracted from the legendary husk, its probability being greater in proportion to the extent to which serves
contemporary
of the earliest times to be more than an arbi
conception
trary hypothesis, to produce the impression of a well- considered conviction, we must first lay its grounds before the reader but since from the nature of the case these can only consist of inferences from later well-attested facts, we must begin with an account of the latter. Hence follows that the proper method to start from some period that
? ? it
it is
is
is
;
if it is
it
is
it, is
? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS. 26 1
to explain the later development. This method combines the most careful analysis and criticism of the sources with a secure synthesis of the results, thus analytically obtained, in the positive construction of the historical process of evolution. This splendid method of historical research was, so far as I am aware, first applied to the religion of Israel by Kuenen ; it however, exactly parallel to Baur's method of investigat ing the history of primitive Christianity. Baur started with the Apostle Paul, and used the indications as to the conditions of the apostolic age, as supplied by Paul, to explain the historical books produced in those conditions, and then only argued back to the state of Christianity before Paul and in exactly the same way Kuenen starts with the first literary prophets, seeks from the conditions of their time to explain and estimate the his torical books belonging to and thence draws inferences with regard to the previous period, which must be conceived such way as to account for the state of things in the pro phetic age as the natural development from This exact similarity of method in different departments the more
as there no doubt that Kuenen was uninflu enced by Baur's precedent, but worked out his method quite independently, led by his own sound historical instinct. Of the rareness of this fine historical instinct, and of the difficulty most people find in even following an inquiry into intricate questions in this way, we have evidence every day have myself been censured on all hands for beginning my account of Primitive Christianity with Paul and not with Jesus, who, everybody knows, preceded him But Abraham and Moses preceded Amos and Isaiah, and yet Kuenen had good reason to begin with the latter instead of the former. Real historical insight seems as rare as philosophical, and perhaps they are one and the same --an eye for the reality behind phenomena.
was not until after Kuenen and Wellhausen that the early teacher of Biblical criticism and originator of this new movement, Eduard Reuss, gave publicity to the results of half a century's labours in two extensive works, the one in
French (being the third part of his great undertaking, La Bible), Lhistoire sainte et la loi, and the other German, his Geschichte der heiligen Schriften Alten Testaments 88
In the preface to the latter he states that the idea and plan of the work were determined on at the time of his first course of lectures on the subject 1834, but only the shape of an
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it,
in
( 1
; I
1 ).
in
in
it. is
It
is,
!
is
a
;
? 262 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
intuition, for which he could not at the time produce sufficient arguments. " Those who remember the literature of that period, not the conservative merely, but particularly the criti cal, will be able to understand my unwillingness at once to challenge the learned world to look upon the Prophets as older than the Law, and the Psalms as later than both. For these propositions, which were the main pillars of my concep tion of Hebrew history, were as yet rather a distant vision than a solid fabric. " He tells us he hit upon this idea in his study of the legislation of Israel in hope of finding the thread of Ariadne, which might guide him out of the labyrinth of the current hypotheses into the daylight of a psychologically possible process of development of the people of Israel. While in his youth much effort was wasted in explaining miracles as natural occurrences, the most unnatural miracles were left unexplained, viz. the commencement of Israel's reli gious education with the developed Levitical ritual ; the
? unacquaintance with it displayed by the greatest prophets, such as Samuel and Elijah ; the censure pronounced by the Books of Kings on what those prophets approved by their example, and so on. Such difficulties as these, felt by Reuss when quite a young man, but which were overlooked by others, or explained away, led him to the bold solution which overthrew the whole mass of current hypotheses, and opened fresh channels for Old Testament criticism. On the other hand, he himself confesses that he was at first guilty of the same want of thoroughness as Graf (see above, p. 258), and that it was the works of others, especially of Kayser and Kuenen, which helped him logically to work out his present theory. The grounds of thisLtheory are most fully given in
the introduction to his book,
histoire sainte et la loi
(1879). He shows first negatively, by a thorough literary and historical
examination, the impossibility of regarding the Mosaic tradi tions as historical truth ; he then tries to find a secure starting-point for positive criticism, and discovers it in Deuter onomy. This book, discovered under Josiah, and no doubt composed not long before, is unacquainted with the most important regulations of the priestly (Sinaitic) legislation, and must therefore be earlier in date ; on the other hand, it shows an acquaintance with the Decalogue and the Book of Cove nants (Exod. xx. -xxiii. ), as well as with the Jahvistic historical narrative. This "national epic of Israel" is therefore the
? ? ? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS! 263
earliest portion of the Pentateuch, dating from the ninth cen tury B. C. With this was united, shortly before the Exile, the only book of laws then in existence, the so-called Deuter onomy, by the insertion of the introductory and closing chap ters. It was not till after the Exile that the priestly legislation was produced, by following out the indications given by Ezekiel ; it was codified by Ezra in Palestine, and at first promulgated as an independent book of laws. Finally, in Ezra's school, it was incorporated in the pre-exilic Deuteronomic work, and now forms the larger portion of the middle books of the Pentateuch. On the basis of this criti cism of the literature, Reuss has, in his Geschichte des Alien
Testaments, described the evolution of the religious and political life of the people of Israel, from its historical com mencement to the destruction of Jerusalem, in four sections, viz. the ages of the Heroes, the Prophets, the Priests, and the Scribes.
In order to give the reader a general idea of the history of Israel as it takes shape under these critical principles, it seems most suitable to take as my basis Wellhausen's short sketch,
first contributed to the Encyclopedia Britannica, and then published by him in a somewhat enlarged German edition (1884) in the first number of his Skizzen und Vorarbeiten. It seems to me to contain a good summary of the conclusions as to which critics of the school of Reuss and Graf are agreed, and which may now perhaps be regarded as the certain result of the most recent critical labours ; this of course does not exclude uncertainty on many questions of detail, and difference of opinion among critics even of this same school. This, however, rather affects unimportant questions, the solution of which may be interesting to specialists, but does not deeply concern the history of theology.
Long before the Hebrew tribes were united into one politi cal community, Wellhausen tells us, they had a certain internal unity, going back to the time of Moses, and apparently due to Moses himself. The basis on which Israel's sense of national unity at all times rested was the belief that Jahve was the God of Israel, and Israel the people of Jahve. Moses did not invent this belief, but he succeeded in making it the foun dation of the nation and its history. Necessity compelled a number of related families to quit their ordinary mode of life, and this gave him his opportunity. He undertook to lead
Jahvistic-
? ? ? ? 264 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
them ; he had faith in the result, and the result justified him. But the success of the undertaking, of which he was the
moving spirit, was no merit of his. A tremendous occurrence, independent of him, and not even capable of being foreseen in the darkness of the future, concurred in a startling manner with his purpose ; One whom wind and sea obey placed His power at his command. Behind him there stood a higher Power, whose spirit worked in him, and whose arm acted for him -- not for his own good, but for that of the people. It was Jahve. Jahve was the moving, provident force in the history which the elements of the nation, collected by neces sity, passed through together, and in which they gained the beginning of a real national consciousness. Moses was instru mental in producing this consciousness ; he also succeeded further in keeping it alive and developing The extra ordinary circumstances which had given the first impulse to the formation of the new nation still continued, and under their pressure the creation of Israel went on. The authority Moses had gained by his deeds naturally gave him the posi tion of the judge of the people. By giving his judicial sentences in the name of Jahve, and connecting this function with his sanctuary, he established fixed centre for traditions of justice,
? and began a thora Israel, which imparted to the sense of nationality and to the idea of God positive ideal content. Jahve was now not simply the God of Israel, but as such also the God of law and righteousness, the basis, motive, and unexpressed content of the national conscience. From that time forth Jahve continued to raise up men who were moved by the spirit to place themselves at the people's head them his own leadership took bodily shape. He marched among the warriors of the levy, and their enthusiasm marked his presence. Finally Jahve decided from heaven the strug gle carried on on earth. He was always on the side of Israel
his interest was limited to Israel, although his power--being God--extended far beyond its borders. Thus Jahve was truth a living God, but the tokens of his activity in the great crises of the history were separated by long pauses. His mode of working bore some resemblance to thunder was more suitable for extraordinary occasions than for daily domestic use. Still even in the intervals of quiet did not altogether cease. As human leaders do not altogether lose in peace the influence gained in war, so was with Jahve.
? ? it
it.
it
;
it
; in; in
a
in
a
? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS. 265
The ark of the covenant, an idol intended primarily for the life of soldiers in camps and on marches, continued also in peace, as the sign of Jahve's presence, to be the centre of his worship. And with the ritual was closely connected, both in the time of Moses and later, the sacred administration of justice, the thora. In all difficult cases inquiry was made of the mouth of Jahve, counsel being sought of the priests, who gave sentence in the name of Jahve,--either according to their own knowledge of his will, or according to a decision of the
lot, --and possessed simply moral authority. The priestly thora was an institution wholly unconnected with and prior to political arrangements ; it existed before the State, and con stituted one of its invisible fundamental pillars. War and law were religion before they were changed into compulsion and civil order; this is the real meaning of the so-called theocracy. A regular state, with specific sanctity, was by no means built up by Moses on the principle, "Jahve the God of Israel;" and after him the old patriarchal constitution of families and clans, the elders of which were leaders in war and judges in
? peace, continued to exist. Only when the whole nation had some great special work to perform was an appeal made to Jahve as the last and extraordinary resource. The theocracy may be said to have arisen to supply the defects of anarchy. Out of the religious consciousness of nationality grew the State, the sanctity of which depended precisely on the fact that it arose as an ideal of religion, to be realized in conflict with indolence and selfishness. "Jahve the God of Israel" accordingly meant that national duties, both internal and external, were conceived as sacred. It did not mean at all that the almighty Creator of heaven and earth had first made a covenant only with this single people, that they might know and worship him. Jahve was not at first the God of the whole world, who then became the God of Israel ; but he was
the God of Israel, and then became much later the God of the world. In an enlightened idea of God,
Moses would have given the Israelites a stone instead of bread ; most probably he left them to think as their fathers had thought about the nature of Jahve in itself, irrespective of his relation to men. With speculative truths, for which there was then no demand whatever, he did not concern himself, but only with practical questions, definitely and necessarily brought before him by the time. The religious starting-point
originally simply
? ? ? 266 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
of the history of Israel is distinguished, not by its marked novelty, but by its normal character. In all ancient nations we find the gods brought into relation with national officers, and religion used as a motive power of law and custom ; but in none with such purity and force as in the case of the
Israelites. Whatever Jahve's real nature may have been -- the God of thunder, or whatever he was, --it retreated more and more into the background as something secret and tran scendent, and no questions were asked concerning The whole emphasis was laid on his action in the world of men, whose aims he made his own. Religion did not call men to participate the life of God, but, on the contrary, God in the life of men but in this did not really fetter but free human life. The so-called particularism of the idea of God, the limitation of Jahve's interest to the affairs of Israel, was the real strength of this religion liberated from the fruitless play of mythology, and facilitated its application to moral duties, which are always first presented and fulfilled only in definite circles. As the God of the nation, Jahve became the God of law and righteousness, and as such grew to be the highest, and finally the sole power in heaven and earth. --After the settlement of the Hebrews in Canaan, the higher civiliza tion of settled life was accompanied by a gradual weakening of their national and religious consciousness. In proportion as Israel coalesced with the conquered country, the gods of the two nations coalesced also, and then arose a syncretism of Jahve with Baal, which lasted on into the time of the prophet
Hosea. But the course of national history fanned the smoul dering coals into blaze. The Philistines aroused Israel and Jahve from their slumber. In the struggle against them was founded Saul's kingdom and his more fortunate successor,
same time deepened the sense of its peculiarity. His intro duction of Phoenician and Egyptian institutions into the worship of Jahve might offend the true old Israelites of his time, but his temple became afterwards of great importance
? David, became the founder of the united Israelite
kingdom, whose military power remained always the proudest memory of the nation. Later Jewish tradition, however, was wrong in making him Levitical saint and pious psalmist. Under Solomon the floodgates were opened to Oriental culture in the wider and higher sense closer intercourse with foreign lands widened the people's intellectual horizon, and at the
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? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS.
267
to the religion. The division of the kingdom under Reho- boam was caused both by the discontent at the innovations and strict discipline of Solomon's government, and also by the jealousy of the tribe of Joseph, which had always been the natural rival of the tribe of Judah favoured by David.
Religion was at that time no obstacle to the separation, as the temple services in Jerusalem had not yet become exclusive, the worship instituted by Jeroboam at Bethel and Dan being equally legitimate ; there were images in both places, and indeed wherever there was a sanctuary. There was in general no difference in the religious and spiritual life of the two kingdoms, save that religious movements generally first originated in Israel. A new stage in the history of religion began with the appearance of the prophet Elijah, the most
striking heroic figure in the Bible, towering solitary above his time, and whose memory was preserved by legend and not
against the syncretism between Baal and Jahve, from which very few in Israel had kept free. For Elijah there were not several Powers with equal claims and equally worthy of worship, but everywhere only one holy and mighty Being, revealed, not like Baal in the life of nature, but like Jahve in the ethical demands of the spirit ; the idea of God began in individual men to rise above national limitation. -- In the flour ishing period of the Northern kingdom, under Jeroboam II. , Hebrew literature began. The religious lyrics, telling of the mighty deeds of God through and for Israel, which were
originally handed down by word of mouth, were now com mitted to writing and collected ; thus arose the " Book of the Wars of Jahve" and the " Book of the Upright," the oldest
Hebrew histories. The next step was to write history in prose, making use of documents or family recollections. The books of Judges, Samuel, and Kings contain a considerable part of these ancient historical writings. At the same time certain collections of judicial maxims and decisions of the priests were written down, of which we have an example in
? When Jahve had thus founded the nation and
by history.
kingdom, primarily by its struggle with external foes, he commenced an attack, within the nation and in the spiritual sphere, upon the foreign elements which had been hitherto admitted without much opposition. Ahab's erection of a temple for the Tyrian Baal in Samaria was the occasion of Elijah's contention against the Baal cultus generally, and
? ? ? 268 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
the so-called " Book of the Covenants " (Exod. xxi. , xxii. ). A little later, perhaps, were recorded the legends of the Patriarchs and of the earliest times, which cannot have had a very early origin. When in this way a literary age had arisen, the pro phets also began to write down their speeches. --With the growth of civilization and national prosperity, worship also became more stately than in the simple times of antiquity. This was also the channel by which heathenism could, and did again and again, make its way into the worship of Jahve ; especially was this the case with the private sanctuaries, so that kings and prophets emphatically insisted on the publicity of worship, which provided a corrective for the worst excesses. The priests, moreover, did not merely offer sacrifices, but were also the advisers and instructors of the people, although these more important duties were neglected in comparison with the more lucrative ones connected with the sacrifices. The belief of the nation was the simplest possible : Jahve is the God of
Israel, Israel's helper in need, the judge to secure him justice against his enemies. But Jahve's work was seen, not in the fate of individuals, but in that of clans and nations. Rarely has history so powerfully touched the chords of a nation's heart ; rarely has it been to this extent regarded as the effect of the divine action, to which human action can only inquir ingly adapt itself, or prayerfully submit. Events were mira cles and signs, chance the pointing finger of a higher hand. This way of looking at history was preserved from triviality because the history of a people, not of individuals, was the object of attention. The faith of men thus gained an emotional vividness, the conception of God a magnificent reality. Seers and prophets saw by second sight what Jahve
did, but there was no theology which coolly speculated about him. Men did not seek to know his principles of action, but his immediate intention, in order to act accordingly. The living proof of actual experience was compatible with great freedom of expression ; the reality of experience did not fear even contradictions. Jahve had incalculable moods ; he caused his face to shine, and he was wroth, it was not known why ; he created good and evil, punished sin and tempted to sin. Satan had not then robbed him of some of his attributes. In spite of all this, Israel did not doubt him. On the whole, times had hitherto been prosperous ; the disharmony between external experience and faith had not become so painful as to
? ? ? ? Ch. II] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS. 269
demand a reconciliation. The case was different when the great Assyrian power began to stretch out its arms towards Israel. -- In anticipation of the coming troubles, the prophet Amos made his appearance, the first and purest representative of a new phase of prophecy. While all the minor nations trembled before the approach of the eastern conqueror, the Israelite prophets alone were neither surprised nor dismayed, but in advance solved the terrible problem history presented. They enlarged religion so as to embrace the conception of the world, which had proved fatal to other religions, before it had
really become part of the profane consciousness of the people. Where others saw the ruin of what was most holy, they saw the triumph of Jahve over appearances and vain beliefs. Whatever might fall, what was valuable remained firm. The very time they lived in became for them the unfolding story of a divine drama, the course of which they watched with prophetic foresight and intelligence. Everywhere the same laws, everywhere the same goal of development. The nations are the actors, Israel the hero, and Jahve the poet of the tragedy. The prophets, of the line of whom Amos was the first, did not proclaim a new God, but they preached that the God of Israel was primarily and above all the God of righteousness, and Israel's God only in so far as Israel satisfied his righteous demands. They therefore reversed the traditional order of the two fundamental articles of faith. This delivered Jahve from the danger of coming into collision with the world, and suffering shipwreck ; the sovereignty of right extended further than the might of the Assyrians. Thus an historical contingency enabled moral convictions to
break through the limitations of the narrow faith in which they had grown to maturity, and so to bring about an advance in the knowledge of God. This is the so-called ethical monotheism of the prophets ; they believed in the moral order of the world, in the unfailing validity of righteous ness as the supreme law for the whole world. From this point of view Israel's prerogative seems to be annulled, and Amos, who states the new doctrine with the greatest abrupt ness and regardlessness of consequences, sometimes verges upon the denial of it ; he calls Jahve the God of hosts, i. e. of the world, but not the God of Israel. Still, the special relation of Jahve to Israel was not doubted by the prophets; they only made its condition a moral instead of a physical one. They
? ? ? ? 27O BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
emphasised the idea -- not as yet the name -- of the Covenant and the corresponding idea of the Law, and made these the basis of religion. Nevertheless, their attention was directed, not as yet to the righteousness of the individual and the heart, but to national uprightness and social action. The negative result of their ethical monotheism was their attack on ritual, so far as it was regarded as a means of purchasing the favour of God without moral worth. Above all, the prophets at tacked the sensuous rites connected with worship as a heathenish service of Baal. The prophets were taught by history to know the awful severity of the righteousness of Jahve ; they are the founders of the religion of the Law. This is what constitutes their importance, not their being the forerunners of the gospel. Least of all are they the latter on account of their Messianic prophecies. In them they really fall back upon the patriotic but illusive hopes of the common people, and the " false prophets," whom they on other grounds assail. This was the proof of the insufficiency of their princi ple. In view of the facts and necessities of history, the posi tion of the prophets inevitably led them to transcend the limits of their nation and the world. It was due to the prophets that the fall of Samaria did not injure but strengthened the religion of Jahve ; they saved the faith by destroying the illusion ; they also immortalised Israel by not involving Jahve in the ruin of the nation. --After the fall of Samaria, the king
dom of Judah, which had hitherto politically and religiously followed in the wake of the northern kingdom, succeeded to its position. The prophet Isaiah was the means of saving it from immediately sharing the fate of the northern kingdom, by being involved in the foreign politics of the time, and of securing for it a century of quiet and prosperous development. He despised politics, and yet understood them better than the short-sighted, practical politicians of his day ; he took in at a glance the confusion of the time, for he stood outside and above it. A magnificent faith in the victorious, universal sovereignty of Jahve gave him courage and discretion amid the storms of the time. While the great military powers of the world threatened to stamp out Jerusalem, he beheld in spirit the time when the great nations should come to pay homage in the city of Jahve, and truth go forth from Zion. Truth never expressed its confidence in itself with greater
assurance of victory. But this joyful confidence was mingled
? ? ? ? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS.
271
with tragic resignation. Isaiah recognised the inevitableness of heavy judgments, to which the greater part of the nation would succumb, and only a small remnant be spared as a sacred seed for the future. And to prepare this remnant to realise the ideal of a people of God, first on a small scale, he considered to be the most pressing duty of the age. The
prophets thus entered on the path of practical reform, begin ning with the purification of worship. Isaiah energetically resumed the attack on the worship of images, which Hosea had previously derided, and obtained its actual abolition under King Hezekiah. But the popular religion offered so stout a resistance to this reform that Hezekiah's son Manasseh had to comply with it in the restitution of ritualistic superstitions, and even permit its increase by the adoption of all kinds of heathen rites and forms. The counter-reformation aped in bloody fanaticism the sacred zeal of the prophets, children were sacri ficed in honour of J ah ve- Moloch in the valley of Gehenna. This period, in which the antithesis between ritualistic bigotry and pure morality reached its acutest form, witnessed the
origin of the powerful warnings of the prophet Micah, and perhaps also the commands of the Decalogue, which con cerned ritual only negatively by the command to abstain from idols, and constituted moral goodness the sole content of the divine Will, quite on the lines of Micah vi. 6-8. -- A short but very fruitful triumph was obtained by the prophetic efforts at reform under King Josiah. One of their results was the Book of Deuteronomy, supplementing the Decalogue by an actual national code of laws, based chiefly on a modification of ancient legal maxims. It was the first book of Law and Covenant, the comprehensive programme of a reorganisa tion of the theocracy according to the ideals of the prophets. Here is shown more plainly than anywhere else that Prophets
and Law are not opposed to each other, but are identical and
related as cause and effect. Nowhere is the fundamental
thought of the prophets expressed more clearly than in Deuteronomy, that Jahve demands nothing for himself, but regards and demands justice between man and man as the true religion, and that his Will is not hidden high above us or far off from us, but is to be found in the sphere of moral con
duct known and understood by all. The most important
? ritual in this code was the centralisation of the worship of Jahve in Jerusalem, and the abolition of all
regulation regarding
? ? ? 272 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
other sanctuaries. The motive of this radical innovation was the consistent carrying out of the pure monotheistic religion, and opposition to the heathenish naturalism, which had taken such firm root in the idolatry of the high-places that it could only be exterminated by the abolition of the latter. The limitation of the worship of Jahve to Jerusalem was the popu lar and practical form of the prophetic monotheism ; but the subsidiary consequence of this measure, and one not intended by the legislator, was to strengthen the hierarchy at Jeru salem. Thus the first practical consequence of the prophetic efforts at reform contained the germ of the subsequent de generation of their work.
? ? ? ? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS.
253
pearance of the book, the table of contents, with its Hegelian
formulae, of itself terrified me to such an extent that I re
mained at the time unacquainted with A speculative treatment of history trust no further than can see. Since then indeed have seen that theory and formula in this book were really only an addition which might be dispensed with, and that my inquiries might have been materially assisted
had not let myself be deterred by them. " Since one of the pleasantest duties of the historian to place misjudged merit its proper light, will here give a short account of Vatke's little known book, not of its philosophical super fluities, but of its valuable, historical, and critical essence.
Vatke starts from the indisputable fact that the sources for the earlier history of the Old Testament religion are derived from later legends, and are therefore incomplete and un certain. Accordingly he not only passes over the whole history of the patriarchs as prehistoric legend, as others had done before him, but he also subjects the traditional account of Moses to a more searching criticism than any one had pre viously ventured to do. He finds that the notion of Moses having given the people its civil law and pure belief in God irreconcilable with later history. For he holds to be impossible that whole nation should suddenly sink from a high stage of religious development to a lower one, as asserted to have been so often the case in the times of the
judges and kings and equally impossible for an individual to rise all at once from lower to a higher stage, and raise a whole nation with him with the same rapidity. We must not separate individuals from the general life around them, and must therefore often supply connecting links omitted in the legend, or reduce our conception" of the individuals question to the standard of their age. This particularly the case with Moses, since on the assumption of the truth even of only the greater part of this tradition as to his work, both his own person and the whole course of Hebrew history become inexplicable he would have come when the time was not fulfilled, and would thus be far more miraculous than Christ himself. The profound idea of the New Testament, that the law was introduced between the promises and their fulfil ment, may after aH be justified, since the Pentateuch its completed form truth later than the promises of most of the prophets. " From indications in later history, and
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is ; in
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? >>54 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
from isolated statements of the prophets (Amos v. 25 sq. \ Vatke infers that the Hebrews in the time of Moses shared the universal worship of the stars. With regard to the work of Moses, a critical examination of the tradition, in conjunction with the condition of the country under the judges, makes it certain in the first place that Moses did not found a state, since the main condition of this was wanting, viz. the estab lishment of a legislative and executive authority, which did not exist in Israel until the times of the kings. With the conception of actual sovereignty the Mosaic state lacked also all higher unity and all that belongs to the sphere of public justice. The legislation of the Pentateuch did not found a
constitution, and was not intended to do so ; its object was the partial development of certain relations of the community, and it must therefore have originated within a state already constituted, and may be compared to canon law.
With regard to the sacrificial and sacerdotal ordinances of the Pentateuch, the history of the times of the judges and earlier kings proves that the simple patriarchal method of worship was then in force, --a plurality of sacred places, the priesthood not confined to a single tribe, the forms of worship still very simple. Only in the later kingdom of Judah did the system of the Pentateuch become possible ; it was then by degrees actually realised, and became the fixed ritual after the Babylonian exile. Composite ceremonies, such as those of the " Mosaic " ritual, are in general only comprehensible as the products of a lengthy development, and become, in their stereotyped permanence, the dead shells of a previous or a parallel spiritual growth ; the rigid mechanism of form is never the original and direct product. That the laws con cerning ritual in the Pentateuch are not derived from Moses, and do not belong to the early pre-prophetic period at all, is confirmed by the protests of the prophets against the ceremonial worship, which they regard as not a revelation from God, but an invention of godless and deceitful men ; which would have been quite impossible if the Pentateuch had existed. But if Moses was thus neither a political nor ecclesiastical legislator, nor a sage speculating on the nature
of God, he was still a true prophet, who came forward in consequence of direct inspiration as an ambassador from God, and hallowed the judicial and moral life of the nation by bringing it into relation with the divine will ; he concluded
political
? ? ? ? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS.
255
a "covenant" between the people and Jehovah, and thus maintained the dependence of the historical and natural ex istence of the nation upon the sphere of justice and morality ; this indicates that he beheld in Jehovah a holy power, and that he deduced the other attributes of the divine nature from this central idea. We must not however attribute to Moses all the consequences involved in this principle ; for like the con ception of the ideal unity of God, the attributes of his nature were realised in their fulness only in the course of time. The divine holiness was regarded partly as an exclusive principle on the side of natural existence and the service of nature, partly as the standard of a legal and moral life ; in order therefore to separate the elements of the sensible and the higher order of things, and to arouse the moral sentiment from the dream of nature-life, this Power had to appear to men as severity, as a consuming fire and a jealous power ; its instruments had to be full of a like holy zeal, while the abstract nature of their message only increased the necessity for stern ness. For the question at issue was still the recognition of the Lord, of a holy Will, of law and morality in general ; the first abstract stages of a great process of purification were still being passed through, which afterwards the earlier prophets, especially Elijah, similarly fought their way through. The
? principle of mercy and grace could scarcely be represented even in an infinitesimal degree in such a development. Although Moses received the idea of the holy national God, whose will was to guide the whole political and moral life of his people as an original intuition, i. e. as a revelation, we still must not disconnect his appearance and work from its historical conditions. For since natural
religion produces some legal and moral institutions, we must not draw a hard and fast line between the two forms of religion ; it only needed a distinguished personality, in whom were focussed
the various rays of a better spirit, to find and announce the solution of the problem of the national mind, and thus give its development a new direction. But although part of the nation sided with the prophet of the higher spirit and carried on his work, still he was far from being able to lift the whole people up to his higher point of view. The mass of the nation still clung to the old Semitic worship of nature. Later tradition was therefore wrong in representing the people under and after Moses as repeatedly sinking to a lower stage
? ? ? 256
BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
from a higher one already attained ; on the contrary, the development was a gradual one in an upward direction amid a constant struggle between the two parties. " Hence the later religion of the Hebrew nation had the Sabaic religion of nature, and particularly the worship of Saturn, as its
and the revelation of the divine ideality and holiness as its higher principle. "
This description of its Mosaic beginnings gives the key to Vatke's whole view of the history of the Hebrew religion. This view, as may be seen, is the outcome of an acute com parative examination of the traditions, and of general ideas on the philosophy of history. The latter indeed will not be a recommendation in the eyes of the public of to-day ; but to me this appears an instructive example of the intuition of a philosophically trained mind showing empirical research the road to its most fruitful discoveries.
A curious contrast to Vatke's book is presented by Ewald's great work on the History of Israel (1st ed. 1843-52, 3 vols. ; 3rd ed. 1864-68, 7 vols. ). In the former the decisive points are noted with the penetrative glance of genius, and the out lines of an actual historical development are brought clearly before us, with the omission of unimportant particulars ; while in the latter the reader's mind is confused amid an endless mass of details which prevent his ever arriving at a distinct idea of the history as a whole. His criticism of authorities exhibits
Ewald's critical sagacity in its strength and weakness -- keen-
sighted in little things, shortsighted in great. Ewald distin guishes as the main sources of the Pentateuch, the Book of Covenants, the Book of Origins, three Prophetical Narrators, and lastly the Deuteronomist. But though he has much to say about the character of these sources and the determin ation of their date, he pays no attention to those serious objections which Vatke had already urged against the early pre-prophetic origin of the ritualistic and priestly legislation of
Leviticus and Numbers; Ewald does not attribute this legis lation to Moses himself, but he has no difficulty whatever in
dating it (as the Book of Origins) from the time of Solomon.
empirical starting-point,
? Ewald, moreover,
has scarcely the faintest idea of the
development of the religious consciousness, of which Vatke
with so much insight gives a probably true description. He
considers the revelation of the purely spiritual God, in whom love is superior to punitive justice, had been so completely
? ? ? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS.
257
given in Moses, that we can understand neither how such a phenomenon was possible at the time, nor what fresh and higher truth the subsequent prophetical, or even Christian, revelation could add. This is connected with one of Ewald's characteristic peculiarities. He lacked the primary qualifica tion of an historian, the ability to sink his own personality
and mode of thought and identify himself with other and alien
modes of thought and feeling. When any historical figure impresses him (and all impress him which tradition in any respect represents as heroes), he is immediately carried away by his feelings, and ascribes to his heroes, forgetting the re quirements of sober criticism, all the noble moral thoughts and feelings which he, the historian, entertains at the mo ment. We might call his history a didactic romance. His method of treating the Hebrew legends of miracles is more
suitable to the edifying romance than to an historical inquiry. He does not actually believe the miracles, but does not openly
deny them and explain the origin of the legends ; he mani pulates the individual traits of these Biblical narratives in so artificial a manner, and casts over the whole such a cloud of edifying phrases, that each reader may make what he likes out of them, --one a real miracle, another a natural and insignificant event, a third a moral allegory. But this was just what the public wanted in the middle of the century ; the bright light of Tubingen criticism had given pain to weak eyes only just waking from the dreams of centuries ; so it was comforting to have the Biblical history of the Old and New Testaments interpreted by so great a scholar and set in a dim, soft twilight, such as could not hurt the weakest eyes, while at the same time it flattered the cultivated mind with a considerable
degree of Aufkldrung. Thus this excellent philologian, but bad historian and worse theologian, was able to retard by his authority the healthy advance of Biblical criticism for a whole generation. The light of the two stars, Hengstenberg and Ewald, quite eclipsed that of Vatke ; but at last Vatke's bril liant theory has been brought to the front by the labours of more recent inquirers, and made the centre of the Old Testa ment researches of the present day. Not for men only, but
also for books, die Weltgeschichte ist das Weltgericht !
the decades of Ewald's supremacy, when Vatke
? During g. t.
appeared to be forgotten, Reuss in his lecture room at Strass-
burg had given his auditors an account of the Old Testament
s
? ? ? 258
BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
literature and religion different from the prevalent one and very similar to that of Vatke. Two of his hearers, while the master himself cautiously deferred the publication of his views, made the theory, by their independent researches, the subject of a controversy which since then has never ceased. H. Graf, in his book, Die geschichtlichen Bilcher des A. Testaments (1866), by an investigation of the history of the Israelite ritual, as given in the more ancient sources (not in Chronicles, which is much later and is coloured by a marked Tendenz), arrived at the result that the priestly legislation in the middle books of the Pentateuch was later than Deuteronomy, and only after the Babylonian exile incorporated as a great interpola tion with the earlier work of the Deuteronomist. He still, how ever, kept to the then usual view, that the Elohistic narratives, in spite of their close connection with the priestly legislation, were part of the " Grundschrift" and regarded them ac
cordingly as the oldest part of the Pentateuch. He had thus divided this Grundschrift into two parts, which, although
perfectly similar in language and thought, were supposed to differ in date by more than 500 years, the one being the oldest and the other the most recent portion of the whole
Pentateuch. It was of course not a difficult task for criticism
to prove the impossibility of such an hypothesis. But while the representatives of the older point of view believed them selves to have thus refuted the whole theory, and to have vindicated the antiquity of the whole Grundschrift, including the priestly code, keener critics considered Grafs error to
consist in want of thoroughness in working out his own theory, and not extending it also to the narrative portions of the Grundschrift. Graf himself recognised this error, and in an essay published shortly before his death on "die soge- nannte Grundschrift des Pentateuchs" drew the necessary in ferences. Still, in spite of the great impression produced by his arguments, German theologians continued to reject the " Grafsche Hypothese" through inability to get rid of the prejudice, supported by the authority of Ewald, that his
theory was contradicted by the ascertained history of the literature of the Old Testament. In these circumstances it was again a former pupil and later colleague of Reuss, Professor Kayser, of Strassburg, who by his book, Das vorexilische Buch der Urgeschichte Israels und seine Erweiterungen ( 1 874),
gave the death blow to this prejudice by proving, by an in
? ? ? ? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS. 259i
vestigation of the literary interdependence of the books, that the Jahvistic book of history, with its naive epic style, is the oldest, that then follows the Deuteronomist, and that lastly the Elohistic legislation was added, with its appropriate framework of narrative ; the order of sequence inferred from the history of the ritual being thus confirmed by the literary evidence. Two years after Kayser's book, appeared Well- hausen's essays on the composition of the Hexateueh (Joshua being taken with the Pentateuch), and then his Geschichte
Israels (1878), in which the arguments for the new hypothe sis, derived from the parallel development of law, ritual, and literature, were exhibited with such cogency that the impres sion produced on German theologians (especially of the
? was almost irresistible ; thenceforward " Graf's hypothesis," the resuscitation of the long-ignored theory of Vatke, was universally regarded as a question de
serving most serious consideration, and by many as an ascer tained fact. It was a special merit in Wellhausen's book to have excited interest in these questions outside the narrow circle of specialists by its skilful handling of the materials and its almost perfect combination of wide historical considerations with the careful investigation of details, and to have thus re moved Old Testament criticism from the rank of a subordinate question to the centre of theological discussion. Personally I welcomed this book of Wellhausen's more than almost any other, for the pressing problem of the history of the religion of the Old Testament appeared to me to have been at last solved
in a manner consonant with the principle of human evolution,
which I am compelled to apply to the history of all religion. It is true, I was better prepared than the majority of German theologians to appreciate Wellhausen's book by my acquaint ance with Kuenen's work, Godsdienst van Israel.
The Dutch scholar, Abraham Kuenen had even before Graf come to doubt the early date of the priestly Grundschrift, from observing that the impossibilities which Colenso had proved in his criticism of Old Testament history occurred with the greatest frequency in it. When Graf's book ap peared, Kuenen saw at once that its separation of the Grund
into law and history was untenable ; but in consider Iing the further question, whether the historical portions should
follow after the laws, or vice versa, he decided unhesitatingly for the former alternative, perceiving that Graf's arguments
younger generation)
schrift
? ? ? 260 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
for the post-deuteronomic origin of the priestly laws were valid, while his supposition of the early date of the correspond ing historical narrative was neither proved nor to be proved.
Hence he arrived at the conviction that " not only is the priestly legislation chronologically later than the preaching of
the prophets, but the priestly historiography is later than the prophetic (Jahvistic). " From this point of view he composed his great work, masterly alike in form and matter, Godsdienst van Israel (1869-70), which in Holland met with deserved
appreciation, but in Germany, on account of its foreign lan guage, was less known beyond the narrowest circle of special ists than it deserved ; it is all the more a matter for congratu lation that an English translation has facilitated its circulation beyond the narrow limits of the Dutch tongue. The ability and originality of this history strike one at the outset. It had always hitherto been supposed that the history of a na tion or a religion must follow the chronological sequence of events, and therefore begin with the earliest time ; it was not remembered that the earliest history, since there exist no
? authorities for the most uncertain and least adapted to form the secure starting-point of historical inquiry, constituting as does at first only an obscure prob lem, the solution of which, so far as any solution possible, can only be approached from other ascertained facts. If our
historically clearly known (with the 8th century in Hebrew history, the time of the first prophets that left written records). The prophetic authorities for the history of this period directly supply only the conception of Israel's prehistoric life which was entertained in prophetic circles, they contain the national heroic legends as interpreted by the prophetic consciousness of the 8th century. Only by taking account of the alter ations in the form of the legend made by this later time, either by addition or subtraction, can the historical kernel be ap
proximately extracted from the legendary husk, its probability being greater in proportion to the extent to which serves
contemporary
of the earliest times to be more than an arbi
conception
trary hypothesis, to produce the impression of a well- considered conviction, we must first lay its grounds before the reader but since from the nature of the case these can only consist of inferences from later well-attested facts, we must begin with an account of the latter. Hence follows that the proper method to start from some period that
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is
is
;
if it is
it
is
it, is
? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS. 26 1
to explain the later development. This method combines the most careful analysis and criticism of the sources with a secure synthesis of the results, thus analytically obtained, in the positive construction of the historical process of evolution. This splendid method of historical research was, so far as I am aware, first applied to the religion of Israel by Kuenen ; it however, exactly parallel to Baur's method of investigat ing the history of primitive Christianity. Baur started with the Apostle Paul, and used the indications as to the conditions of the apostolic age, as supplied by Paul, to explain the historical books produced in those conditions, and then only argued back to the state of Christianity before Paul and in exactly the same way Kuenen starts with the first literary prophets, seeks from the conditions of their time to explain and estimate the his torical books belonging to and thence draws inferences with regard to the previous period, which must be conceived such way as to account for the state of things in the pro phetic age as the natural development from This exact similarity of method in different departments the more
as there no doubt that Kuenen was uninflu enced by Baur's precedent, but worked out his method quite independently, led by his own sound historical instinct. Of the rareness of this fine historical instinct, and of the difficulty most people find in even following an inquiry into intricate questions in this way, we have evidence every day have myself been censured on all hands for beginning my account of Primitive Christianity with Paul and not with Jesus, who, everybody knows, preceded him But Abraham and Moses preceded Amos and Isaiah, and yet Kuenen had good reason to begin with the latter instead of the former. Real historical insight seems as rare as philosophical, and perhaps they are one and the same --an eye for the reality behind phenomena.
was not until after Kuenen and Wellhausen that the early teacher of Biblical criticism and originator of this new movement, Eduard Reuss, gave publicity to the results of half a century's labours in two extensive works, the one in
French (being the third part of his great undertaking, La Bible), Lhistoire sainte et la loi, and the other German, his Geschichte der heiligen Schriften Alten Testaments 88
In the preface to the latter he states that the idea and plan of the work were determined on at the time of his first course of lectures on the subject 1834, but only the shape of an
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? 262 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
intuition, for which he could not at the time produce sufficient arguments. " Those who remember the literature of that period, not the conservative merely, but particularly the criti cal, will be able to understand my unwillingness at once to challenge the learned world to look upon the Prophets as older than the Law, and the Psalms as later than both. For these propositions, which were the main pillars of my concep tion of Hebrew history, were as yet rather a distant vision than a solid fabric. " He tells us he hit upon this idea in his study of the legislation of Israel in hope of finding the thread of Ariadne, which might guide him out of the labyrinth of the current hypotheses into the daylight of a psychologically possible process of development of the people of Israel. While in his youth much effort was wasted in explaining miracles as natural occurrences, the most unnatural miracles were left unexplained, viz. the commencement of Israel's reli gious education with the developed Levitical ritual ; the
? unacquaintance with it displayed by the greatest prophets, such as Samuel and Elijah ; the censure pronounced by the Books of Kings on what those prophets approved by their example, and so on. Such difficulties as these, felt by Reuss when quite a young man, but which were overlooked by others, or explained away, led him to the bold solution which overthrew the whole mass of current hypotheses, and opened fresh channels for Old Testament criticism. On the other hand, he himself confesses that he was at first guilty of the same want of thoroughness as Graf (see above, p. 258), and that it was the works of others, especially of Kayser and Kuenen, which helped him logically to work out his present theory. The grounds of thisLtheory are most fully given in
the introduction to his book,
histoire sainte et la loi
(1879). He shows first negatively, by a thorough literary and historical
examination, the impossibility of regarding the Mosaic tradi tions as historical truth ; he then tries to find a secure starting-point for positive criticism, and discovers it in Deuter onomy. This book, discovered under Josiah, and no doubt composed not long before, is unacquainted with the most important regulations of the priestly (Sinaitic) legislation, and must therefore be earlier in date ; on the other hand, it shows an acquaintance with the Decalogue and the Book of Cove nants (Exod. xx. -xxiii. ), as well as with the Jahvistic historical narrative. This "national epic of Israel" is therefore the
? ? ? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS! 263
earliest portion of the Pentateuch, dating from the ninth cen tury B. C. With this was united, shortly before the Exile, the only book of laws then in existence, the so-called Deuter onomy, by the insertion of the introductory and closing chap ters. It was not till after the Exile that the priestly legislation was produced, by following out the indications given by Ezekiel ; it was codified by Ezra in Palestine, and at first promulgated as an independent book of laws. Finally, in Ezra's school, it was incorporated in the pre-exilic Deuteronomic work, and now forms the larger portion of the middle books of the Pentateuch. On the basis of this criti cism of the literature, Reuss has, in his Geschichte des Alien
Testaments, described the evolution of the religious and political life of the people of Israel, from its historical com mencement to the destruction of Jerusalem, in four sections, viz. the ages of the Heroes, the Prophets, the Priests, and the Scribes.
In order to give the reader a general idea of the history of Israel as it takes shape under these critical principles, it seems most suitable to take as my basis Wellhausen's short sketch,
first contributed to the Encyclopedia Britannica, and then published by him in a somewhat enlarged German edition (1884) in the first number of his Skizzen und Vorarbeiten. It seems to me to contain a good summary of the conclusions as to which critics of the school of Reuss and Graf are agreed, and which may now perhaps be regarded as the certain result of the most recent critical labours ; this of course does not exclude uncertainty on many questions of detail, and difference of opinion among critics even of this same school. This, however, rather affects unimportant questions, the solution of which may be interesting to specialists, but does not deeply concern the history of theology.
Long before the Hebrew tribes were united into one politi cal community, Wellhausen tells us, they had a certain internal unity, going back to the time of Moses, and apparently due to Moses himself. The basis on which Israel's sense of national unity at all times rested was the belief that Jahve was the God of Israel, and Israel the people of Jahve. Moses did not invent this belief, but he succeeded in making it the foun dation of the nation and its history. Necessity compelled a number of related families to quit their ordinary mode of life, and this gave him his opportunity. He undertook to lead
Jahvistic-
? ? ? ? 264 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
them ; he had faith in the result, and the result justified him. But the success of the undertaking, of which he was the
moving spirit, was no merit of his. A tremendous occurrence, independent of him, and not even capable of being foreseen in the darkness of the future, concurred in a startling manner with his purpose ; One whom wind and sea obey placed His power at his command. Behind him there stood a higher Power, whose spirit worked in him, and whose arm acted for him -- not for his own good, but for that of the people. It was Jahve. Jahve was the moving, provident force in the history which the elements of the nation, collected by neces sity, passed through together, and in which they gained the beginning of a real national consciousness. Moses was instru mental in producing this consciousness ; he also succeeded further in keeping it alive and developing The extra ordinary circumstances which had given the first impulse to the formation of the new nation still continued, and under their pressure the creation of Israel went on. The authority Moses had gained by his deeds naturally gave him the posi tion of the judge of the people. By giving his judicial sentences in the name of Jahve, and connecting this function with his sanctuary, he established fixed centre for traditions of justice,
? and began a thora Israel, which imparted to the sense of nationality and to the idea of God positive ideal content. Jahve was now not simply the God of Israel, but as such also the God of law and righteousness, the basis, motive, and unexpressed content of the national conscience. From that time forth Jahve continued to raise up men who were moved by the spirit to place themselves at the people's head them his own leadership took bodily shape. He marched among the warriors of the levy, and their enthusiasm marked his presence. Finally Jahve decided from heaven the strug gle carried on on earth. He was always on the side of Israel
his interest was limited to Israel, although his power--being God--extended far beyond its borders. Thus Jahve was truth a living God, but the tokens of his activity in the great crises of the history were separated by long pauses. His mode of working bore some resemblance to thunder was more suitable for extraordinary occasions than for daily domestic use. Still even in the intervals of quiet did not altogether cease. As human leaders do not altogether lose in peace the influence gained in war, so was with Jahve.
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? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS. 265
The ark of the covenant, an idol intended primarily for the life of soldiers in camps and on marches, continued also in peace, as the sign of Jahve's presence, to be the centre of his worship. And with the ritual was closely connected, both in the time of Moses and later, the sacred administration of justice, the thora. In all difficult cases inquiry was made of the mouth of Jahve, counsel being sought of the priests, who gave sentence in the name of Jahve,--either according to their own knowledge of his will, or according to a decision of the
lot, --and possessed simply moral authority. The priestly thora was an institution wholly unconnected with and prior to political arrangements ; it existed before the State, and con stituted one of its invisible fundamental pillars. War and law were religion before they were changed into compulsion and civil order; this is the real meaning of the so-called theocracy. A regular state, with specific sanctity, was by no means built up by Moses on the principle, "Jahve the God of Israel;" and after him the old patriarchal constitution of families and clans, the elders of which were leaders in war and judges in
? peace, continued to exist. Only when the whole nation had some great special work to perform was an appeal made to Jahve as the last and extraordinary resource. The theocracy may be said to have arisen to supply the defects of anarchy. Out of the religious consciousness of nationality grew the State, the sanctity of which depended precisely on the fact that it arose as an ideal of religion, to be realized in conflict with indolence and selfishness. "Jahve the God of Israel" accordingly meant that national duties, both internal and external, were conceived as sacred. It did not mean at all that the almighty Creator of heaven and earth had first made a covenant only with this single people, that they might know and worship him. Jahve was not at first the God of the whole world, who then became the God of Israel ; but he was
the God of Israel, and then became much later the God of the world. In an enlightened idea of God,
Moses would have given the Israelites a stone instead of bread ; most probably he left them to think as their fathers had thought about the nature of Jahve in itself, irrespective of his relation to men. With speculative truths, for which there was then no demand whatever, he did not concern himself, but only with practical questions, definitely and necessarily brought before him by the time. The religious starting-point
originally simply
? ? ? 266 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
of the history of Israel is distinguished, not by its marked novelty, but by its normal character. In all ancient nations we find the gods brought into relation with national officers, and religion used as a motive power of law and custom ; but in none with such purity and force as in the case of the
Israelites. Whatever Jahve's real nature may have been -- the God of thunder, or whatever he was, --it retreated more and more into the background as something secret and tran scendent, and no questions were asked concerning The whole emphasis was laid on his action in the world of men, whose aims he made his own. Religion did not call men to participate the life of God, but, on the contrary, God in the life of men but in this did not really fetter but free human life. The so-called particularism of the idea of God, the limitation of Jahve's interest to the affairs of Israel, was the real strength of this religion liberated from the fruitless play of mythology, and facilitated its application to moral duties, which are always first presented and fulfilled only in definite circles. As the God of the nation, Jahve became the God of law and righteousness, and as such grew to be the highest, and finally the sole power in heaven and earth. --After the settlement of the Hebrews in Canaan, the higher civiliza tion of settled life was accompanied by a gradual weakening of their national and religious consciousness. In proportion as Israel coalesced with the conquered country, the gods of the two nations coalesced also, and then arose a syncretism of Jahve with Baal, which lasted on into the time of the prophet
Hosea. But the course of national history fanned the smoul dering coals into blaze. The Philistines aroused Israel and Jahve from their slumber. In the struggle against them was founded Saul's kingdom and his more fortunate successor,
same time deepened the sense of its peculiarity. His intro duction of Phoenician and Egyptian institutions into the worship of Jahve might offend the true old Israelites of his time, but his temple became afterwards of great importance
? David, became the founder of the united Israelite
kingdom, whose military power remained always the proudest memory of the nation. Later Jewish tradition, however, was wrong in making him Levitical saint and pious psalmist. Under Solomon the floodgates were opened to Oriental culture in the wider and higher sense closer intercourse with foreign lands widened the people's intellectual horizon, and at the
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to the religion. The division of the kingdom under Reho- boam was caused both by the discontent at the innovations and strict discipline of Solomon's government, and also by the jealousy of the tribe of Joseph, which had always been the natural rival of the tribe of Judah favoured by David.
Religion was at that time no obstacle to the separation, as the temple services in Jerusalem had not yet become exclusive, the worship instituted by Jeroboam at Bethel and Dan being equally legitimate ; there were images in both places, and indeed wherever there was a sanctuary. There was in general no difference in the religious and spiritual life of the two kingdoms, save that religious movements generally first originated in Israel. A new stage in the history of religion began with the appearance of the prophet Elijah, the most
striking heroic figure in the Bible, towering solitary above his time, and whose memory was preserved by legend and not
against the syncretism between Baal and Jahve, from which very few in Israel had kept free. For Elijah there were not several Powers with equal claims and equally worthy of worship, but everywhere only one holy and mighty Being, revealed, not like Baal in the life of nature, but like Jahve in the ethical demands of the spirit ; the idea of God began in individual men to rise above national limitation. -- In the flour ishing period of the Northern kingdom, under Jeroboam II. , Hebrew literature began. The religious lyrics, telling of the mighty deeds of God through and for Israel, which were
originally handed down by word of mouth, were now com mitted to writing and collected ; thus arose the " Book of the Wars of Jahve" and the " Book of the Upright," the oldest
Hebrew histories. The next step was to write history in prose, making use of documents or family recollections. The books of Judges, Samuel, and Kings contain a considerable part of these ancient historical writings. At the same time certain collections of judicial maxims and decisions of the priests were written down, of which we have an example in
? When Jahve had thus founded the nation and
by history.
kingdom, primarily by its struggle with external foes, he commenced an attack, within the nation and in the spiritual sphere, upon the foreign elements which had been hitherto admitted without much opposition. Ahab's erection of a temple for the Tyrian Baal in Samaria was the occasion of Elijah's contention against the Baal cultus generally, and
? ? ? 268 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
the so-called " Book of the Covenants " (Exod. xxi. , xxii. ). A little later, perhaps, were recorded the legends of the Patriarchs and of the earliest times, which cannot have had a very early origin. When in this way a literary age had arisen, the pro phets also began to write down their speeches. --With the growth of civilization and national prosperity, worship also became more stately than in the simple times of antiquity. This was also the channel by which heathenism could, and did again and again, make its way into the worship of Jahve ; especially was this the case with the private sanctuaries, so that kings and prophets emphatically insisted on the publicity of worship, which provided a corrective for the worst excesses. The priests, moreover, did not merely offer sacrifices, but were also the advisers and instructors of the people, although these more important duties were neglected in comparison with the more lucrative ones connected with the sacrifices. The belief of the nation was the simplest possible : Jahve is the God of
Israel, Israel's helper in need, the judge to secure him justice against his enemies. But Jahve's work was seen, not in the fate of individuals, but in that of clans and nations. Rarely has history so powerfully touched the chords of a nation's heart ; rarely has it been to this extent regarded as the effect of the divine action, to which human action can only inquir ingly adapt itself, or prayerfully submit. Events were mira cles and signs, chance the pointing finger of a higher hand. This way of looking at history was preserved from triviality because the history of a people, not of individuals, was the object of attention. The faith of men thus gained an emotional vividness, the conception of God a magnificent reality. Seers and prophets saw by second sight what Jahve
did, but there was no theology which coolly speculated about him. Men did not seek to know his principles of action, but his immediate intention, in order to act accordingly. The living proof of actual experience was compatible with great freedom of expression ; the reality of experience did not fear even contradictions. Jahve had incalculable moods ; he caused his face to shine, and he was wroth, it was not known why ; he created good and evil, punished sin and tempted to sin. Satan had not then robbed him of some of his attributes. In spite of all this, Israel did not doubt him. On the whole, times had hitherto been prosperous ; the disharmony between external experience and faith had not become so painful as to
? ? ? ? Ch. II] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS. 269
demand a reconciliation. The case was different when the great Assyrian power began to stretch out its arms towards Israel. -- In anticipation of the coming troubles, the prophet Amos made his appearance, the first and purest representative of a new phase of prophecy. While all the minor nations trembled before the approach of the eastern conqueror, the Israelite prophets alone were neither surprised nor dismayed, but in advance solved the terrible problem history presented. They enlarged religion so as to embrace the conception of the world, which had proved fatal to other religions, before it had
really become part of the profane consciousness of the people. Where others saw the ruin of what was most holy, they saw the triumph of Jahve over appearances and vain beliefs. Whatever might fall, what was valuable remained firm. The very time they lived in became for them the unfolding story of a divine drama, the course of which they watched with prophetic foresight and intelligence. Everywhere the same laws, everywhere the same goal of development. The nations are the actors, Israel the hero, and Jahve the poet of the tragedy. The prophets, of the line of whom Amos was the first, did not proclaim a new God, but they preached that the God of Israel was primarily and above all the God of righteousness, and Israel's God only in so far as Israel satisfied his righteous demands. They therefore reversed the traditional order of the two fundamental articles of faith. This delivered Jahve from the danger of coming into collision with the world, and suffering shipwreck ; the sovereignty of right extended further than the might of the Assyrians. Thus an historical contingency enabled moral convictions to
break through the limitations of the narrow faith in which they had grown to maturity, and so to bring about an advance in the knowledge of God. This is the so-called ethical monotheism of the prophets ; they believed in the moral order of the world, in the unfailing validity of righteous ness as the supreme law for the whole world. From this point of view Israel's prerogative seems to be annulled, and Amos, who states the new doctrine with the greatest abrupt ness and regardlessness of consequences, sometimes verges upon the denial of it ; he calls Jahve the God of hosts, i. e. of the world, but not the God of Israel. Still, the special relation of Jahve to Israel was not doubted by the prophets; they only made its condition a moral instead of a physical one. They
? ? ? ? 27O BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
emphasised the idea -- not as yet the name -- of the Covenant and the corresponding idea of the Law, and made these the basis of religion. Nevertheless, their attention was directed, not as yet to the righteousness of the individual and the heart, but to national uprightness and social action. The negative result of their ethical monotheism was their attack on ritual, so far as it was regarded as a means of purchasing the favour of God without moral worth. Above all, the prophets at tacked the sensuous rites connected with worship as a heathenish service of Baal. The prophets were taught by history to know the awful severity of the righteousness of Jahve ; they are the founders of the religion of the Law. This is what constitutes their importance, not their being the forerunners of the gospel. Least of all are they the latter on account of their Messianic prophecies. In them they really fall back upon the patriotic but illusive hopes of the common people, and the " false prophets," whom they on other grounds assail. This was the proof of the insufficiency of their princi ple. In view of the facts and necessities of history, the posi tion of the prophets inevitably led them to transcend the limits of their nation and the world. It was due to the prophets that the fall of Samaria did not injure but strengthened the religion of Jahve ; they saved the faith by destroying the illusion ; they also immortalised Israel by not involving Jahve in the ruin of the nation. --After the fall of Samaria, the king
dom of Judah, which had hitherto politically and religiously followed in the wake of the northern kingdom, succeeded to its position. The prophet Isaiah was the means of saving it from immediately sharing the fate of the northern kingdom, by being involved in the foreign politics of the time, and of securing for it a century of quiet and prosperous development. He despised politics, and yet understood them better than the short-sighted, practical politicians of his day ; he took in at a glance the confusion of the time, for he stood outside and above it. A magnificent faith in the victorious, universal sovereignty of Jahve gave him courage and discretion amid the storms of the time. While the great military powers of the world threatened to stamp out Jerusalem, he beheld in spirit the time when the great nations should come to pay homage in the city of Jahve, and truth go forth from Zion. Truth never expressed its confidence in itself with greater
assurance of victory. But this joyful confidence was mingled
? ? ? ? Ch. II. ] OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM AND EXEGESIS.
271
with tragic resignation. Isaiah recognised the inevitableness of heavy judgments, to which the greater part of the nation would succumb, and only a small remnant be spared as a sacred seed for the future. And to prepare this remnant to realise the ideal of a people of God, first on a small scale, he considered to be the most pressing duty of the age. The
prophets thus entered on the path of practical reform, begin ning with the purification of worship. Isaiah energetically resumed the attack on the worship of images, which Hosea had previously derided, and obtained its actual abolition under King Hezekiah. But the popular religion offered so stout a resistance to this reform that Hezekiah's son Manasseh had to comply with it in the restitution of ritualistic superstitions, and even permit its increase by the adoption of all kinds of heathen rites and forms. The counter-reformation aped in bloody fanaticism the sacred zeal of the prophets, children were sacri ficed in honour of J ah ve- Moloch in the valley of Gehenna. This period, in which the antithesis between ritualistic bigotry and pure morality reached its acutest form, witnessed the
origin of the powerful warnings of the prophet Micah, and perhaps also the commands of the Decalogue, which con cerned ritual only negatively by the command to abstain from idols, and constituted moral goodness the sole content of the divine Will, quite on the lines of Micah vi. 6-8. -- A short but very fruitful triumph was obtained by the prophetic efforts at reform under King Josiah. One of their results was the Book of Deuteronomy, supplementing the Decalogue by an actual national code of laws, based chiefly on a modification of ancient legal maxims. It was the first book of Law and Covenant, the comprehensive programme of a reorganisa tion of the theocracy according to the ideals of the prophets. Here is shown more plainly than anywhere else that Prophets
and Law are not opposed to each other, but are identical and
related as cause and effect. Nowhere is the fundamental
thought of the prophets expressed more clearly than in Deuteronomy, that Jahve demands nothing for himself, but regards and demands justice between man and man as the true religion, and that his Will is not hidden high above us or far off from us, but is to be found in the sphere of moral con
duct known and understood by all. The most important
? ritual in this code was the centralisation of the worship of Jahve in Jerusalem, and the abolition of all
regulation regarding
? ? ? 272 BIBLICAL AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGY. [Bk. III.
other sanctuaries. The motive of this radical innovation was the consistent carrying out of the pure monotheistic religion, and opposition to the heathenish naturalism, which had taken such firm root in the idolatry of the high-places that it could only be exterminated by the abolition of the latter. The limitation of the worship of Jahve to Jerusalem was the popu lar and practical form of the prophetic monotheism ; but the subsidiary consequence of this measure, and one not intended by the legislator, was to strengthen the hierarchy at Jeru salem. Thus the first practical consequence of the prophetic efforts at reform contained the germ of the subsequent de generation of their work.
