the feast is for the first time employed, and yet the description of the feast agrees (only being fuller) with the older. The truth is, as any fair-minded person may see, this laborious attempt to foist in the historical reference at a late date breaks down just because the historical reference was present from the first. The fundamental fallacy of this whole argument is the assumption that "in the land and through the land it is that Israel first becomes the people of Jehovah." For this assertion there is not a scrap of evidence, whereas the concurrent testimony of all Israelite antiquity is, that it was because He had chosen this people, and after he had signalised His choice, that He brought them into a goodly land. And the conclusion of the matter is, that as there was a formal system of law at a much earlier time than the critical theory postulates, so also there was an earlier reference in their worship and ceremonial to the events in the nation's religious history which marked them out as Jahaveh's people.

CHAPTER XV.

THE THREE CODES.

The legislative elements in the Pentateuch a subject of difficulty-The traditional theory makes it unnecessarily difficult, while the critical theory raises greater difficulties-The three positions of the modern theory as to the Codes: I. there are three Codes; II. far apart in time; and III. inconsistent with one another-As to I. there is nothing inconsistent with Biblical theory or nature of the case in variation or progression of Codes-Law is modified even after it is codified-II. But the critical position is that the Codes belong to times far apart-How this conclusion is reached--The evidence of dates is inferential - Argument examined-The book of the Covenant-No satisfactory account given of introduction of this Code at the alleged time, and why codification, once begun, should have stopped for two centuries-What happened in the intervals of the Codes?- Wellhausen's position, legem non habentes, &c. -The two points involved in this position: (1) argument from silence and non-observance; (2) praxis and programme—III. Alleged inconsistency of the Codes, particularly as to the centralisation of worship—The argument examined.

THE legislative parts of the books of the Pentateuch, in their form and setting no less than in their contents, present many difficulties. The laws are found, not collected together and systematised, but scattered over several books. Not only is there a repetition in one collection of what may be found in another, but the same laws may be repeated with little or no alteration in the same.

collection. And then there are discrepancies in the regulations found in different places on the same subject; and laws relating to subjects apparently the most diverse are brought into strange juxtaposition, as also are laws bearing upon what seem very different conditions of life and states of society. We should have expected a writer, if he were the author of all the legislation, to work more systematically whether he was early and looked forward to the future, or late and looked back upon the past, we should have expected a better arrangement of details, a more completed whole. On what is called the traditional theory, that Moses not only gave the law, but wrote substantially the books in which it is contained, the literary difficulties are very great indeed, and the expedients that have been resorted to in order to remove them are very often artificial and hazardous. The modern critical theory, on the other hand, starting with a good motive, gets involved in what I consider a vicious method, and ends by raising greater difficulties than those which it attempts to remove. Advocates of the traditional theory burden themselves with an unnecessary difficulty by assuming that the books of the Pentateuch were written by Moses; for the books do not say so of themselves, and even the older Jewish tradition that Ezra "restored" the law, pointed to redaction as a probable solution of many of the difficulties. Too much praise cannot be given to those who have laboured in the field of Pentateuch criticism, for the minute examination they have made of details, in the endeavour to sift and distinguish the sources; and as a literary feat, the labour may be pronounced on the whole successful, although it will hardly be asserted that the

1 Compare Num. xv. 1-16 with Levit. i.-vii.; Num. v. 5-10 with Levit. v. 5 ff., vi. 5 ff.; Num. xv. 22-28 with Levit. iv. 13 ff.

The Codes distinguished.

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last word on the subject has yet been spoken.1 At the same time, it seems to me that the difficulties of the critical theory increase at every step when the attempt is made to determine the origin of the Codes, and their relation to one another and to the history. The three leading positions of the modern critical theory are: I. That there are three distinct Codes of Law. II. That these belong to three different periods far separate. III. That on essential points the Codes differ. How these positions are established, and what consequences are drawn from them, will be seen as we proceed.

I. By a process of critical analysis, into which we do not here enter at length, the legislation contained in the Pentateuch is divided into various Codes, distinguished by certain literary and material characteristics. (1.) The Code contained in Deuteronomy stands by itself, marked by a certain hortatory tone, and by the absence of the minute ritual prescriptions and distinctions found particularly in the book of Leviticus. (2.) There is also distinguished a book of the Covenant attached to the Jehovistic historical portion of the Pentateuch, and embraced in Exod. xx.-xxiii.; closely related to which, and usually classed along with it, is chap. xxxiv. of the same book, sometimes called the Law of the Two Tables. (3.) Then, in the remaining parts of Exodus, in the whole of Leviticus, and in some chapters of Numbers, are found a number of laws, moral, civil, and ceremonial, which are all classed together as the Levitical Code or Priestly Code, so named from the prevalence of the ritual element in its contents. A portion of this Code, contained in Levit. xvii.xxvi., is sometimes spoken of as a code or collection by itself, the "law of holiness," and supposed to have a 1 See Note XXVI.

special history of its own. Moreover, there is a collection of regulations, mostly ritual, found in Ezekiel (from chap. xl. onwards) which it is customary to take into account in the critical history of the Codes. So far as the legislation of the Pentateuch, however, is concerned, we have to deal with the three collections-the Jehovistic book of the Covenant (with related chapter), the Deuteronomic Code, and the Priestly Code; and it is maintained that they are to be historically arranged in the order in which they have just been mentioned.

So far there is nothing in the modern theory essentially incompatible with the Biblical account of the matter, except the order of the Codes. The Biblical order is: Book of the Covenant, Levitical Code, Deuteronomic Code; but they are ascribed to different times, although these periods all fall within the lifetime of Moses. There is nothing unreasonable in itself in the supposition that laws or codes of laws were promulgated at different times; and different sets of laws, so given, for special purposes or on special occasions, might run severally their respec tive literary courses. Nor is it difficult to conceive how such several collections might overlap one another, and after a time have certain features of inconsistency. The law-books themselves give us to understand that, as the situation of the people changed, the law had a varying reference, and even that a law on a certain subject might be abrogated or modified to suit altered circumstances. So that, even in the Biblical theory, not to speak of what is known of the course of law generally, it is possible for law to undergo modification even after it is codified. We find, for example, within the compass of one book, a modification in the age at which the Levites were to serve at