THE MOSAIC AUTHORSHIP OF THE PENTATEUCH
BY PROFESSOR GEORGE FREDERICK WRIGHT, D. D., LL. D., Oberlin College,
Oberlin, Ohio
During the last quarter of a century
an influential school of critics has deluged the world with articles and
volumes attempting to prove that the Pentateuch did not originate during the
time of Moses, and that most of the laws attributed to him did not come into
existence until several centuries after his death, and many of them not till
the time of Ezekiel. By these critics the patriarchs are relegated to the realm
of myth or dim legend and the history of the Pentateuch generally is
discredited. In answering these destructive contentions and defending the
history which they discredit we can do no better than to give a brief summary
of the arguments of Mr.
Harold M. Wiener, a young orthodox
Jew, who is both a well established barrister in London, and a scholar of the
widest attainments. What he has written upon the subject during the last ten
years would fill a thousand octavo pages; while our condensation must be
limited to less than twenty. In approaching the subject it comes in place to
consider
1. THE BURDEN OF PROOF
The Mosaic authorship of the
Pentateuch has until very recent times been accepted without question by both
Jews and Christians. Such acceptance, coming down to us in unbroken line from
the earliest times of which we have any information, gives it the support of
what is called general consent, which, while perhaps not absolutely conclusive,
compels those who would discredit it to produce incontrovertible opposing
evidence. But the evidence which the critics produce in this case is wholly
circumstantial, consisting of inferences derived from a literary analysis of
the documents and from the application of a discredited evolutionary theory
concerning the development of human institutions. 34
2. FAILURE OF THE ARGUMENT FROM
LITERARY ANALYSIS
(a) Evidence of
Textual Criticism.
It is an instructive commentary upon
the scholarly pretensions of this whole school of critics that, without
adequate examination of the facts, they have based their analysis of the
Pentateuch upon the text which is found in our ordinary Hebrew Bibles. While
the students of the New Testament have expended an immense amount of effort in
the comparison of manuscripts, and versions, and quotations to determine the
original text, these Old Testament critics have done scarcely anything in that
direction. This is certainly a most unscholarly proceeding, yet it is admitted
to be the fact by a higher critic of no less eminence than Principal J. Skinner
of Cambridge, England, who has been
compelled to write: “I do not happen to know of any work which deals
exhaustively with the subject, the determination of the original Hebrew texts
from the critical standpoints.” Now the fact is that while the current Hebrew
text, known as the Massoretic, was not established until about the seventh century
A.D., we have abundant material with which to compare it and carry us back to
that current a thousand years nearer the time of the original composition of
the books.
(1) The Greek translation known as the Septuagint
was made from Hebrew manuscripts current two or three centuries before the
Christian era. It is from this version that most of the quotations in the New
Testament are made. Of the 350 quotations from the Old Testament in the New,
300, while differing more or less from the Massoretic text, do not differ
materially from the Septuagint.
(2) The Samaritans early broke away from the Jews
and began the transmission of a Hebrew text of the Pentateuch on an independent
line
which has continued down to the
present day.
(3) Besides this three other Greek versions were
made long before the establishment of the Massoretic text. The most important
of these was one by Aquila, who was so punctilious that he transliterated the
word Jehovah in the old Hebrew characters, instead of translating it by the
Greek word meaning Lord as was done in the Septuagint.
(4) Early Syriac material often provides much
information concerning the original Hebrew text.
(5) The translation into Latin known as the Vulgate
preceded the Massoretic text by some centuries, and was made by Jerome, who was
noted as a Hebrew scholar. But Augustine thought it sacrilegious not to be
content with the Septuagint.
All this material furnishes ample
ground for correcting in minor particulars the current Hebrew text; and this
can be done on well established scientific principles which largely eliminate
conjectural emendations. This argument has been elaborated by a number of
scholars, notably by Dahse, one of the most brilliant of Germany’s younger
scholars, first in the “Archiv fuer Religions-Wissenschaft” for 1903, pp.
305-319, and again in an article which will appear in the “Neue Kirchliche
Zeitschrift” for this year; and he is following up his attack on the critical
theories with an important book entitled, “Textkritische Materialien zur Hexateuchfrage,”
which will shortly be published in Germany. Although so long a time has elapsed
since the publication of his first article on the subject, and in spite of the
fact that it attracted world-wide attention and has often been referred to
since, no German critic has yet produced an answer to it. In England and
America
Dr. Redpath and Mr. Wiener have
driven home the argument. (See Wiener’s “Essays in Pentateuchal Criticism”, and
“Origin of the Pentateuch.”)
On bringing the light of this
evidence to bear upon the subject some remarkable results are brought out, the
most important of which relate to the very foundation upon which the theories
concerning the fragmentary character of the Pentateuch are based. The most
prominent clue to the documentary division
is derived from the supposed use by different writers of the two words,
“Jehovah” and “Elohim,” to designate the deity. Jehovah was translated in the
Septuagint by a word meaning “Lord”, which appears in our authorized version in
capitalized form, “LORD.” The revisers of 1880, however, have simply
transliterated the word, so that “Jehovah” usually appears in the revision
wherever “LORD” appeared in the authorized version. Elohim is everywhere
translated by the general word for deity, “God.” Now the original critical
division into documents was made on the supposition that several hundred years
later than Moses there arose two schools of writers, one of which, in Judah,
used the word “Jehovah” when they spoke of the deity, and the other, in the
Northern Kingdom, “Elohim.” And so the critics came to designate one set of
passages as belonging to the J document and the other to the E document. These
they supposed had been cut up and pieced together by a later editor so as to
make the existing continuous narrative. But when, as frequently occurred, one
of these words is found in passages where it is thought the other word should
have been used, it is supposed, wholly on theoretical grounds, that a mistake
had been made by the editor, or, as they call him, the “redactor,” and so with
no further ceremony the objection is arbitrarily removed without consulting the
direct textual evidence. But upon comparing the early texts, versions, and
quotations it appears that the words, “Jehovah” and “Elohim,” were so nearly
synonymous that there was originally little uniformity in their use. Jehovah is
the Jewish
name of the deity, and Elohim the
title. The use of the words is precisely like that of the English in referring
to their king or the Americans to their president. In ordinary usage, “George
V.”, “the king,” and “King George” are synonymous in their meaning. Similarly
“Taft,” “the president,” and “President Taft” are used by Americans during his
term of office to indicate an identical concept. So it was with the Hebrews.
“Jehovah” was the name, “Elohim” the title, and “Jehovah Elohim”
Lord God — signified nothing more.
Now on consulting the evidence, it appears that while in Genesis and the first
three chapters of Exodus (where this clue was supposed to be most decisive)
Jehovah occurs in the Hebrew text 148 times, in 118 of these places other texts
have either Elohim or Jehovah Elohim. In the same section, while Elohim alone
occurs 179 times in the Hebrew, in 49 of the passages one or the other
designation takes its place; and in the second and third chapters of Genesis
where the Hebrew text has Jehovah Elohim (LORD God) 23 times, there is only one
passage in which all the texts are unanimous on this point.
These facts, which are now amply
verified, utterly destroy the value of the clue which the higher critics have
all along ostentatiously put forward to justify their division of the
Pentateuch into conflicting E and J documents, and this the critics themselves
are now compelled to admit. The only answer which they are able to give is in
Dr. Skinner’s words that the analysis is correct even if the Clue which led to
it be false, adding “even if it were proved to be so altogether fallacious, it
would not be the first time that a wrong clue has led to true results.” On further examination, in the light
of present knowledge (as Wiener and Dahse abundantly show), legitimate
criticism removes a large number of the alleged difficulties which are put
forward by higher critics and renders of no value many of the supposed clues to
the various documents. We have space to notice but one or two of these. In the
Massoretic text of Exodus 18:6 we
read that Jethro says to Moses, “I thy father-in-law Jethro am come,” while in
the seventh verse it is said that Moses goes out to meet his father-in-law and
that they exchange greetings and then come
into the tent. But how could Jethro
speak to Moses before they had had a meeting? The critics say that this
confusion arises from the bungling patchwork of an editor who put two
discordant accounts together without attempting to cover up the discrepancy.
But scientific textual criticism completely removes the difficulty. The
Septuagint, the old Syriac version, and a copy of the Samaritan Pentateuch,
instead of “I thy father-in-law Jethro am come”, read, “And one said unto
Moses, behold thy father-in-law Jethro” comes. Here the corruption of a single
letter in the Hebrew gives us “behold” in place of “I”. When this is observed
the objection
disappears entirely. Again, in Genesis 39:20-22 Joseph is said to
have been put into the prison “where the king’s prisoners were bound. And the
keeper of the
prison” promoted him. But in Genesis
40:2-4,7 it is said that he was “in ward of the house of the captain of the
guard... and the captain of the guard” promoted Joseph. But this discrepancy
disappears as soon as an effort is made to determine the original text. In
Hebrew, “keeper of the prison” and “captain of the guard” both begin with the
same word and in the passages where the “captain of the guard” causes trouble
by its appearance, the Septuagint either omitted the phrase or read “keeper of
the prison,” in one case being supported also by the Vulgate. In many other
instances also, attention to the original text removes the difficulties which
have been manufactured from apparent discrepancies in the narrative.
(b) Delusions of
Literary Analysis.
But even on the assumption of the
practical inerrancy of the Massoretic text the arguments against the Mosaic
authorship of the Pentateuch drawn from the literary analysis are seen to be
the result of misdirected scholarship, and to be utterly fallacious. The long
lists of words adduced as characteristic of the writers to whom the various
parts of the Pentateuch are assigned are readily seen to be occasioned by the
different objects aimed at in the portions from which the lists are made.
Here, however, it is necessary to
add that besides the E and J documents the critics suppose that Deuteronomy,
which they designate “D”, is an independent literary production written in the
time of Josiah. Furthermore, the critics pretend to have discovered by their
analysis another document which they Call the Priestly Code and designate as
“P”. This provides the groundwork of most of the narrative, and comprises the
entire ceremonial portion of the law. This document, which, according to these
critics did not come into existence till the time of Ezekiel, largely consists
of special instructions to priests telling them how they were to perform the
sacrifices and public ceremonials, and how they were to determine the character
of contagious diseases and unsanitary conditions. Such instructions are
necessarily made up largely of
technical language such as is found in the libraries of lawyers and physicians,
and it is easy enough to select from such literature a long list of words which
are not to be found in contemporary literature dealing with the ordinary
affairs of life and aiming directly at elevating the tone of morality and
stimulating devotion to higher spiritual ends. Furthermore, an exhaustive
examination (made by Chancellor Lias) of the entire list of words found in this
P document
attributed to the time of Ezekiel
shows absolutely no indication of their belonging to an age later than that of
Moses. The absurdity of the claims of the higher critics to having established
the existence of different documents in the Pentateuch by a literary analysis
has been shown by a variety of examples. The late Professor C. M. Mead, the
most influential of the American revisers of the translation of the Old
Testament, in order to exhibit the fallacy of their procedure, took the Book
of Romans and arbitrarily divided it
into three parts, according as the words “Christ Jesus,” “Jesus,” or “God” were
used; and then by analysis showed that the lists of peculiar words
characteristic of these three passages were even more remarkable than those
drawn up by the destructive critics of the Pentateuch from the three leading
fragments into which they had divided it. The argument from literary analysis
after the methods of these critics would prove the composite character of the
Epistle to the Romans as fully as that of the critics would prove the composite
character of the Pentateuch. A distinguished scholar, Dr. Hayman, formerly
head-master of Rugby, by a similar analysis demonstrated the composite
character of Robert Burns’ little poem addressed to a mouse, half of which is
in the purest English and the other half in the broadest Scotch dialect. By the
same process it would be easy to prove three Macaulays and three Miltons by
selecting lists of words from the documents prepared by them when holding high
political offices and from their various prose and poetical writings.
3. MISUNDERSTANDING LEGAL FORMS AND
THE SACRIFICIAL SYSTEM
Another source of fallacious reasoning
into which these critics have fallen arises from a misunderstanding of the
sacrificial system of the Mosaic law. The destructive critics assert that there
was no central sanctuary in Palestine until several centuries after its
occupation under Joshua, and that at a later period all sacrifices by the
people were forbidden except at the central place when offered by the priests,
unless it was where there had been a special theophany. But these statements
evince an entire misunderstanding or misrepresentation of the facts. In what
the critics reckon as the oldest documents (J and E) the people were required
three times a year to present themselves with sacrifices and offerings “at the
house of the Lord” ( Exodus 34:26;
23:19). Before the building of the temple this “house of the Lord was at
Shiloh” ( Joshua 18:1; Judges18:31; 1 Samuel 2:24). The truth is that the destructive critics upon this
point make a most humiliating mistake in repeatedly substituting “sanctuaries”
for “altars,” assuming that since there was a plurality of altars in the time
of the Judges there was therefore a plurality of sanctuaries.
They have completely misunderstood
the permission given in Exodus 20:24: “An altar of earth thou shalt make unto
Me and shalt sacrifice thereon thy burnt offerings, and thy peace offerings,
thy sheep, and thine oxen; in all places, A. V.; [in every place, R. V.], where
I record My name I will come unto thee and I will bless thee. And if thou make
Me an altar of stone, thou shalt not build it of hewn stones.” In reading this
passage we are likely to be misled by the erroneous translation. Where the
revisers read in “every place” and the authorized version in “all places” the
correct translation is “in all the place” or “in the whole place.” The word is
in the singular number and has a definite article before it. The whole place
referred to is Palestine, the Holy Land, where sacrifices such as the
patriarchs had offered were always permitted to laymen, provided they made use
only of an altar of earth or unhewn stones which was kept free from the
adornments and accessories characteristic of heathen altars. These lay
sacrifices were recognized in Deuteronomy as well as in Exodus. ( Deuteronomy 16:21). But altars of
earth or unhewn stone, often used for the nonce only and having no connection
with a temple of any sort, are not houses of God and will not become such on
being called sanctuaries by critics several thousand years after they have
fallen out of use. In accordance with this command and permission the Jews have
always limited their sacrifices to the land of Palestine. When exiled to
foreign lands the Jews to this day have ceased to offer sacrifices. It is true
that an experiment was made of setting up a sacrificial system in Egypt for a
time by a certain portion of the exiles; but, this was soon abandoned.
Ultimately a synagogue system was established and worship outside of Palestine
was limited to prayer and the reading of Scriptures. But besides the lay
sacrifices which were continued from the patriarchal times and guarded against
perversion, there were two other classes of offerings established by statute;
namely, those individual offerings which were brought to the “house of God” at
the central place of worship and offered with priestly assistance, and the
national offerings described in Numbers 28ff. which were brought on behalf of
the whole people and not of an individual. A failure to distinguish clearly
between these three classes of sacrifices has led the critics into endless
confusion, and error has arisen from their inability to understand legal terms
and principles. The Pentateuch is not mere literature, but it contains a legal
code. It is a product of statesmanship consisting of three distinct elements
which have always been recognized by lawgivers; namely, the civil, the moral,
and the ceremonial, or what Wiener calls the “jural laws,” the “moral code” and
“procedure.” The jural laws are those the infractions of which can be brought
before a court, such as “Thou shalt not remove thy neighbor’s landmark.” But
“Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself” can be enforced only by public
sentiment and Divine sanctions. The Book of Deuteronomy
is largely occupied With the
presentation of exhortations and motives, aiming to secure obedience to a higher
moral code, and is in this largely followed by the prophets of the Old
Dispensation and the preachers of the present day. The moral law supplements
the civil law. The ceremonial law consists of directions to the priests for
performing the various technical duties, and were of as little interest to the
mass of people as are the legal and medical books of the present time. All
these strata of the law were naturally and necessarily in existence at the same
time. In putting them as successive Strata, with the ceremonial law last, the
critics have made an egregious and misleading blunder.
4. THE POSITIVE EVIDENCE
Before proceeding to give in
conclusion a brief summary of the circumstantial evidence supporting the
ordinary belief in the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch it is important to
define the term. By it we do not mean that Moses wrote all the Pentateuch with
his own hand, or that there were no editorial additions made after his death.
Moses was the author of the Pentateuchal Code, as Napoleon was of the code
which goes under his name. Apparently the Book of Genesis is largely made up
from existing documents, of which the history of the expedition of Amraphel in
chapter 14 is a noted specimen; while the account of Moses’ death, and a few
other passages are evidently later editorial additions. But these are not
enough to affect the general proposition. The Mosaic authorship of the
Pentateuch is supported by the following, among other weighty considerations:
1. The Mosaic era was a literary epoch in the
world’s history when such Codes were common. It would have been strange if such
a leader had not produced a code of laws. The Tel-el-Amarna tablets and the
Code of Hammurabi testify to the literary habits of the time.
2. The Pentateuch so perfectly reflects the
conditions in Egypt at the period assigned to it that it is difficult to
believe that it was a literary product of a later age.
3. Its representation of life in the wilderness is
so perfect and so many of its laws are adapted only to that life that it is
incredible that literary men a thousand years later should have imagined it.
4. The laws themselves bear indubitable marks of
adaptation to the stage of national development to which they are ascribed. It
was the study of Maine’s works on ancient law that set Mr. Wiener out upon his
re-investigation of the subject.
5. The little use that is made of the sanctions of
a future life is, as Bishop Warburton ably argued, evidence of an early date
and of a peculiar Divine effort to guard the Israelites against the
contamination of Egyptian ideas upon the subject.
6. The omission of the hen from the lists of clean
and unclean birds is incredible if these lists were made late in the nation’s
history after that domestic fowl had been introduced from India.
7. As A. C. Robinson showed in Volume VII of this
series it is incredible that there should have been no intimation in the
Pentateuch of the existence of Jerusalem, or of the use of music in the
liturgy, nor any use of the phrase, “Lord Of Hosts,” unless the compilation had
been completed before the time of David.
8. The subordination of the miraculous elements in
the Pentateuch to the critical junctures in the nation’s development is such as
could be obtained only in genuine history.
9. The whole representation conforms to the true
law of historical development. Nations do not rise by virtue of inherent
resident forces, but through the struggles of great leaders enlightened
directly from on high or by contact with others who have already been
enlightened. The defender of the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch has no
occasion to quail in presence of the critics who deny that authorship and
discredit its history. He may boldly challenge their scholarship, deny their
conclusions, resent their arrogance, and hold on to his confidence in the well
authenticated historical evidence which sufficed for those who first accepted
it. Those who now at second hand are popularizing in periodicals, Sunday School
lessons, and volumes of greater or less pretensions the errors of these critics
must answer to their consciences as best they can, but they should be made to
feel that they assume a heavy responsibility in putting themselves forward as
leaders of the blind when they themselves are not able to see.
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