If we do not hold that everything in Genesis came originally from the pen of Moses, much less do we mean to claim for him the last portion of Deuteronomy. The closely consecutive manner in which the thread of the history runs makes it difficult to hit the precise point where Moses ends and the next writer begins. It may be at the beginning of xxxiv. Deut., or xxxiii., or perhaps even earlier, as well as at the first verse of Joshua. The incongruity of Moses describing historically his own death has induced all critics at the present day to assign chap. xxxiv. to some other hand than his; and the designation of Moses as the man of God,' verse 1, makes it probable that chap. xxxiii. belongs to the same pen. But wherever the line is to be drawn, the description of the last words and moments of the great lawgiver forms a suitable appendix to his own work, and as such is naturally thrown in at the close of Deuteronomy. In this way it connects together the work of Moses and of Joshua.

Whether there be any interpolation in the body of the Pentateuch, is a question which cannot at all affect the main issue. It would be strange if there were none. No work of antiquity is entirely free from them; and neither the Old Testament nor the New has been exempted from careless or fraudulent transcription. But such parasitical growths only serve to show that the trunk around which they cling had already existed antecedently. Thus, no one doubts the genuineness of St. Matthew's gospel merely because in most of the Greek manuscripts the Lord's prayer ends with a doxology derived from some Greek Liturgy, or because c. v. 44 is largely interpolated

1 Gen. Introd. to the Sac. Scrip. by the Rev. J. Dixon, D.D. (now Primate of All Ireland) vol. i. pp. 266-269; Home's Introd. to the H. Scrip. vol. iv. p. 59, ed. 11th.

from Luke vi. 27, 28. In the Pentateuch many critics admit occasional excrescences of the same kind. But it may well be doubted whether they have really made good a single case. At all events, the result cannot affect the question of general authorship.

1 Horne's Introd. vol. iv. p. 56.

PART I.-POSITIVE CRITICISM.

THAT Moses was the author of the Pentateuch in the sense explained, we now proceed to establish on positive grounds, whether of external or of internal evidence. It cannot be expected, indeed, that the conclusions of criticism can ever come out as clear as first principles or mathematical axioms. But it may safely be asserted, that the authorship of no work of antiquity has been made out with anything like the evidence which goes to prove the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch.

BOOK I.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE IN FAVOUR OF MOSAIC
AUTHORSHIP.

CHAPTER I.

EVIDENCE FROM THE NEW TESTAMENT.

FOR enlightenment on such a subject, the Christian naturally turns first of all to the New Testament, to see if on the point he can catch any hint from Him who is the very Truth. To this course the ablest of our English opponents decidedly objects; and he enters his protest against the authority of the New Testament being brought

to bear on the issue at all, until we have already set the question at rest. The true method of proceeding,' he says, 'is to determine the authorship of the Old Testament Books irrespectively of the New Testament, in the first instance. The higher criticism must decide the question independently.' Were it here question of the mere order in which the various evidences should successively pass in review, one might not feel disposed to quarrel with the method thus sketched out, although it is unsafe. But surely it is highly uncritical to determine the authorship irrespectively, and decide the question independently, of that book, which of all others, owing to the divine authority which there touches on the point, is the most entitled to be heard on the subject. True criticism never determines and decides till it has gone through a searching examination of everything that can throw light on the problem; least of all will it close its ears to the words of Him who admittedly is the most competent to pronounce a judgment. It has been reserved for the higher criticism' to shut out the sun, in order that it may enjoy the luxury of groping and stumbling by the light of a hazy moon.

SECT. I.-Testimony of Christ in itself.

I. In answer to an objection of the Sadducees Christ says: 'Have ye not read in the book of Moses how in the bush God spake unto him saying: I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob?' (Mark xii. 26). The same incident is related (Luke xx. 37), where our Lord says: Now that the dead are raised even Moses shewed (μývvore) at the bush, when he calleth the Lord the God of Abraham,' &c.

1 Davidson. Introd. vol. i. P. 126.

The book of Moses is an expression here coextensive with the word Pentateuch. In those days no part of the work was more than another ascribed to Moses, and no distinction was drawn between parts such as would entitle one section to be called preeminently the book of Moses. Taking it, therefore, for granted that the book of Moses in the context is equivalent to the Pentateuch, our whole business here is to find out the relation which Christ asserts to exist between Moses and the book.

As far as our present purpose goes, the book of Moses may mean one of three things, viz. the book entitled Moses, the book relating to Moses, or the book written by Moses. It cannot mean the book entitled Moses. For the Pentateuch never had such a title. That has always been the simple one of Joshua's day, the Law, or 90

in

ning the book of the law, or the Rabbinical one, nzino 'wpin nyo the five fifths of the law; but never Moses.

It cannot mean the book relating to Moses, as Davidson thinks it might. For such a designation is an anomaly in literature. We say, indeed, the book of Judith, and the book of Ruth, and the books of Samuel, not because the books relate to them, but because Judith and Ruth and Samuel are the headings and recognised titles. But one would never dream of calling the Eneid the Book of Eneas, nor Xenophon's Cyropædia the Book of Cyrus, nor Thiers's History of the Consulate and Empire' the Book of Napoleon the Great.

There remains, therefore, but one meaning which the phrase can have, and that is, the book written by Moses. Davidson himself admits this to be the natural explanation'2; and acknowledges besides that an impartial expositor seeks for the obvious interpretation.'3 What, if p. 15.

1 Ib.

125. p.

2 Ib.

3 Ib.