A.C. 1491. and the son of thy handmaid, and the stranger, may be re c Deut. xvi. 16. d Ch. xiii. 6. & xxxiv. 18. freshed. 13 And in all things that I have said unto you be circumspect and make no mention of the name of other gods, neither let it be heard out of thy mouth. с 14 Three times thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year. d 15 Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread : (thou shalt eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time appointed of the month Abib; for e Deut. xvi. in it thou camest out from Egypt: and none shall before me empty :) 16 Ecclus. XXXV. 4. appear 16 And the feast of harvest, the firstfruits of thy labours, which thou hast sown in thy field: and the feast of ingathering, which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field. 17 Three times in the year all thy males shall appear before the LORD God. 18 Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with *Or, feast. leavened bread; neither shall the fat of my * sacrifice remain until the morning. + Or, will ufflict them that afflict thee. 2. 11. 19 The first of the firstfruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk. 20 ¶h Behold, I send an Angel before thee, to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared. 21 Beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not; for he will not pardon your transgressions: for my name is in him. 22 But if thou shalt indeed obey his voice, and do all that I speak; then I will be an enemy unto thine enemies, and an adversary unto thine adversaries. i 23 For mine Angel shall go before thee, and bring thee Ch. xxxiii. in unto the Amorites, and the Hittites, and the Perizzites, Josh. xxiv. and the Canaanites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites: and I will cut them off. 1 Deut. vii. 25. m Deut. vii 14. 24 Thou shalt not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do after their works: 'but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and quite break down their images. 25 And ye shall serve the LORD your God, and he shall bless thy bread, and thy water; and I will take sickness away from the midst of thee. m 26 There shall nothing cast their young, nor be barren, in thy land: the number of thy days I will fulfil. 27 I will send my fear before thee, and will destroy all the people to whom thou shalt come, and I will make all A.C. 1491. thine enemies turn their backs unto thee. 28 And "I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite, from before thee. 29 I will not drive them out from before thee in one year; lest the land become desolate, and the beast of the field multiply against thee. 30 By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land. 31 And I will set thy bounds from the Red sea even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert unto the river: for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand; and thou shalt drive them out before thee. n Josh. xxiv. * Heb. neck. 12. 32 Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor with o Ch. xxxiv. their gods. 15. Deut. vii, 2. Deut 33 They shall not dwell in thy land, lest they make thee sin against me: for if thou serve their gods, Pit will surely Post xxiii. be a snare unto thee. Moses goes up into the Mountain. EXODUS XXIV. 4 Moses 1 Moses is called up into the mountain. 3 The people promise obedience. 1 And he said unto Moses, Come up unto the LORD, thou, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel; and worship ye afar off. 2 And Moses alone shall come near the LORD: but they shall not come nigh; neither shall the people go up with him. 3¶ And Moses came and told the people all the words of the LORD, and all the judgments and all the people answered with one voice, and said, ¶ All the words which the LORD hath said will we do. 4 And Moses wrote all the words of the LORD, and rose up early in the morning, and builded an altar under the hill, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel. 5 And he sent young men of the children of Israel, which offered burnt offerings, and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen unto the LORD. 6 And Moses took half of the blood, and put it in basons; and half of the blood he sprinkled on the altar. 7 And he took the book of the covenant, and read in the 13. Judg. ii. 3. A.C. 1491. audience of the people: and they said, All that the LORD hath said will we do, and be obedient. r Ver. 3. S 8 And Moses took the blood, and sprinkled it on the s Heb. ix. 20. people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant, which the LORD hath made with you concerning all these words. 1 Pet. i. 2. 9¶Then went up Moses, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel: 10 And they saw the God of Israel: and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of heaven in his clearness. 11 And upon the nobles of the children of Israel he laid not his hand: also they saw God, and did eat and drink. 12 And the LORD said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount, and be there: and I will give thee tables of stone, and a law, and commandments which I have written; that thou mayest teach them. 13 And Moses rose up, and his minister Joshua: and Moses went up into the mount of God. 14 And he said unto the elders, Tarry ye here for us, until we come again unto you: and, behold, Aaron and Hur are with you if any man have any matters to do, let him come unto them. 15 And Moses went up into the mount, and a cloud covered the mount. 16 And the glory of the LORD abode upon mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days: and the seventh day he called unto Moses out of the midst of the cloud. 17 And the sight of the glory of the LORD was like devouring fire on the top of the mount in the eyes of the children of Israel. 18 And Moses went into the midst of the cloud, and gat Ch. xxxiv. him up into the mount: and Moses was in the mount forty 28. Deut. ix. 9. days and forty nights. Promulgation of the Ceremonial Law 20; Structure of the Tabernacle. EXODUS XXV. 1 What the Israelites must offer for the making of the tabernacle. 10 The form of the ark. 17 The mercy seat, with the cherubims. 23 The table, with the furniture thereof. 31 The candlestick, with the instruments thereof. 1 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 20 The institutions of the levitical law closely resemble, in many particulars, the religious ceremonial in use among the Gentiles. The numerous coincidences mentioned by Spencer, in his treatise De Legibus Hebræorum, shew that this resemblance is not accidental, but arbitrary and systematic. * 2 Speak unto the children of Israel, that they bring me A.C. 1491. an 3 And this is the offering which ye shall take of them; gold, and silver, and brass, 4 And blue, and purple, and scarlet, and ‡ fine linen, and goats' hair, 5 And rams' skins dyed red, and badgers' skins, and shittim wood, 6 Oil for the light, spices for anointing oil, and for sweet incense, X *Heb. take for me. + Or, heave u Ch. xxxv. 5. 4. ring. Or, silk. 7 Onyx stones, and stones to be set in the ephod, and x Ch. xxviii. in the breastplate. 8 And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them. 9 According to all that I shew thee, after the pattern of the tabernacle, and the pattern of all the instruments thereof, even so shall ye make it. y Ch. xxviii. 15. 10 And they shall make an ark of shittim wood: two z Ch. xxxVÍL cubits and a half shall be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof, and a cubit and a half the height thereof. 11 And thou shalt overlay it with pure gold, within and This apparent identity has been accounted for in three ways. The first theory is, that the religion of the Jews was borrowed from that of the Gentiles: this hypothesis was maintained by Maimonides, Marsham, Spencer, and Warburton; and is strenuously opposed by Witsius, in his Egyptiaca. The second theory is, that the ceremonial of the Gentiles was borrowed from that of the Jews; an opinion supported by Gale in his Court of the Gentiles, by Dickenson in his DelThe third phi Phenicizantes, by Stillingfleet in his Origines Sacræ, and others. is, that the ancient ceremonial of the pagans, and the levitical law of the Jews, were both derived in great measure from the early patriarchal ritual, which at The heathen nations one period was common to all the descendants of Noah. perverted it to idolatry and superstition, the Jews received it in a new form and with more solemn sanctions from Moses; who was divinely inspired to alter, reform, add to, or take away from it, as was most suitable to the genius of the people, the object of Providence, the customs of the surrounding nations, or the accomplishment of his various designs, as the legislator and judge of Israel. This theory, which is espoused by Calmet, and strenuously defended by Faber, (Orig. of Pagan Idol. vol. iii. p. 630, &c.) appears to be by far the most consistent and correct; and it solves nearly all the phenomena. Many of the laws, and customs of the Hindoos, who are the most ancient nation on earth, except perhaps the Jews and Chinese, are the same which prevailed among the family of Abraham, before the institution of the levitical law; and they coincide with several arbitrary enactments of the law of Moses, which were derived from that source. Vide, in addition to the above authorities, Calmet, art. Ceremonies, and Fragments, No. 85; Ward on the Hindoos; Michaelis' Comment. vol. i. p. 9, &c. 1. A.C. 1491. without shalt thou overlay it, and shalt make upon it a crown of gold round about. 12 And thou shalt cast four rings of gold for it, and put them in the four corners thereof; and two rings shall be in the one side of it, and two rings in the other side of it. 13 And thou shalt make staves of shittim wood, and overlay them with gold. 14 And thou shalt put the staves into the rings by the sides of the ark, that the ark may be borne with them. 15 The staves shall be in the rings of the ark: they shall not be taken from it. 16 And thou shalt put into the ark the testimony which I shall give thee. 17 And thou shalt make a mercy seat of pure gold: two cubits and a half shall be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof. 18 And thou shalt make two cherubims of gold, of beaten work shalt thou make them, in the two ends of the mercy seat. 19 And make one cherub on the one end, and the other Or, of the cherub on the other end: even *of the mercy seat shall make the cherubims on the two ends thereof. matter of the mercy scat. a Num. vii. 89. b Ch. xxxvii. 10. ye 20 And the cherubims shall stretch forth their wings on high, covering the mercy seat with their wings, and their faces shall look one to another; toward the mercy seat shall the faces of the cherubims be. 21 And thou shalt put the mercy seat above upon the ark; and in the ark thou shalt put the testimony that I shall give thee. 22 And there I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee from above the mercy seat, from a between the two cherubims which are upon the ark of the testimony, of all things which I will give thee in commandment unto the children of Israel. 23 Thou shalt also make a table of shittim wood: two ¶ cubits shall be the length thereof, and a cubit the breadth thereof, and a cubit and a half the height thereof. 24 And thou shalt overlay it with pure gold, and make thereto a crown of gold round about. 25 And thou shalt make unto it a border of an hand breadth round about, and thou shalt make a golden crown to the border thereof round about. 26 And thou shalt make for it four rings of gold, and put the rings in the four corners that are on the four feet thereof. 27 Over against the border shall the rings be for places of the staves to bear the table. |