mand immediately preceding: And they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices unto the devils after whom they have gone a whoring. This shall be a statute for ever,' &c.

XIII.

'The priests, whom history proves to have long been powerless and needy, appear in the Levitical law as men. of influence and wealth; indeed, even the book of Deuteronomy represents their position as so little secured that it never ceases to make the most pathetic appeals on their behalf, and recommends their helplessness to the benevolence and charity of the other tribes. Their ascendancy was gradual but steady; it is impossible to believe that they would have renounced any of the privileges once obtained.'

In this third argument of Kalisch, the appointment of the law is once more confounded with its actual carrying out. The object of the legislator was to fix the social and civil status of the priests; and that was one, undoubtedly, of influence and wealth. Hence, if it were true that history proves them to have long been powerless and needy,' it would only prove at the same time, not that the law had never been passed, but that, like many others, it had been but negligently obeyed. It was one of the grand conceptions of Moses, that the tribe, set apart to teach religion and to perform its services, should have its temporal interests and worldly position essentially bound up with the people's fidelity to Jehovah. The Levites had, therefore, little property of their own; they were scattered through all the other tribes, and for their subsistence were made dependent on the sacrifices and tithes and other offerings of their fellow-citizens. It was a

peculiarity of constitution against all precedent, and, above all, contrary to the practice of Egypt, where the priests were the greatest proprietors of the country. On this very account it must, of necessity, have originated with Moses before the conquest. Had the Levites been installed in Canaan originally on an equal land-footing with the other tribes, they would not surely have thrown up this certain means of living for the precarious contributions of voluntary offerers. For Kalisch justly remarks: it is impossible to believe that they would have renounced any of the privileges once obtained.' We see from this how naturally Moses in Deuteronomy makes such frequent and 'pathetic appeals' in favour of the Levite. For having made him dependent entirely on the other tribes for subsistence, it was the duty of the lawgiver, not only to make legal provision for him, but to command and conjure the people to contribute to his support as generously as their means allowed. As the actual condition, therefore, of the Levite depended upon the people's obedience to the law, it is clear how the legal status may easily have been the reverse of the historical

one.

A second source of confusion is introduced into the argument by identifying the Levites with the priests. It should be observed: 1. That the Deuteronomist does not recommend to the people the priests, as Kalisch says, but the Levites. 2. That history perhaps represents the Levites as 'powerless and needy,' but not the priests, especially at the beginning. For down to Solomon they appear invariably in positions of influence and wealth. It is only after that that the descendants of Eli are, for a special reason, reduced to indigence (1 Sam. ii. 36; 1 Kings ii. 27), and only as one approaches the captivity that the general tone of the priesthood is lowered.

Near the time of Moses the status is precisely that contemplated by the law.

XIV.

'The Deuteronomist is more lenient and less authoritative in some of the Levitical injunctions.' 1

Here

The legislation of Deuteronomy has to be compared with that of the other books in our next volume. we need do no more than remark, that the same lawgiver may change his tone according to time and place. In the desert it was enjoined that no animal could be killed for food (if it belonged to the sacrificial class), unless it were first brought to the door of the tabernacle. But this law was repealed by the Deuteronomist, as Israel was about to enter Canaan. For there it could not be carried out. The difficulty can exist only for those who make two legislators instead of one, and consider the Levitical lawgiver posterior to the Deuteronomist.

XV.

The book of Leviticus manifests a decided progress in the depth and purity of religious notions, and in the spiritual character of public worship, especially with regard to the expiatory offerings, not even mentioned in Deuteronomy: it bespeaks a very matured stage in the internal history of the nation.' 2

It has been already proved that the laws of Israel neither did nor could take their rise from the course of national development. The tendency of the nation was constantly to develope into idolatry, instead of into purer notions on religion. As for the expiatory offerings, sup2 Ib. p. 44.

1 Kalisch, ib. p. 44.

posed by Kalisch to represent the highest spiritual worship ever attained in the Hebrew ceremonial, we have seen their existence laid down as the very basis of Eli's remonstrance with his sons (pp. 164, 165), as early as the times of the Judges-a period when barbarism, both in religion and in manners, is supposed to have been the order of the day. It would be strange, therefore, if they were unknown to an author writing, as our adversaries maintain, so late as the seventh century (B.c.). The silence of the Deuteronomist on these offerings needs no other explanation than this, that he could not mention everything in his synoptical commentary on the law, and that having given full instructions to the priests on the subject he understood that they were to instruct the people in this, as well as in the other regulations of Leviticus (Deut. xxiv. 8). The identity of lawgiver both in Leviticus and in Deuteronomy is the only hypothesis that explains all the difficulties of the question.

XVI.

The other two reasons, advanced by Kalisch in proof of his peculiar thesis, need but one word of notice. For we grant that the minuteness of the sacrificial ritual laid down in Leviticus accords perfectly with the spirit of post-Babylonian times, and finds a faithful reflex in the thoroughly Levitical Books of Chronicles.'1 But we maintain that it finds a still better explanation in the historical account of the Pentateuch itself, that the ritual proceeded directly from Moses.

And when he concludes with the assertion that, The Book of Leviticus, as a whole, cannot be placed before the sixth century, from various intrinsic reasons, among

1 Ib. p.
44.

which are, the exact description of the Babylonian exile, and the allusion to the return of the captives;' he confounds prophecy with history, and mistakes a general resemblance for exact description.'

§ 5.-Linguistic Difficulties.

The language of the Pentateuch is said to be cast in too modern a mould for the Mosaic age. There is no important difference,' it is maintained, 'between the language of the Pentateuch and that of the other books written shortly before the return of the Israelites from captivity in Babylon. But if, as Gesenius remarks, "There was an interval of nearly a thousand years between these writings, as there must have been on the supposition that Moses was the author of the Pentateuch, a phenomenon would be presented to which nothing in the whole history of language is parallel, namely, that the living language of a people and the circle of their ideas should remain unaltered for so long a time." Nay, more, if Moses wrote the whole Pentateuch, he must have created the historicalepic, the prophetic, and the rhetorical styles, which are all perceptible.'2

I.

There is a vagueness about this way of putting the argument, that makes it loom threateningly through the mist, and swells the pigmy reality into the giant dimensions of the spectre of the Brocken. Let us try, therefore, to throw more definiteness into our conceptions :—

1. And first of all, settle more accurately the interval lying between the two proposed limits.

1 Ib. p.

44.

2 Davidson, ib. p. 103.