01 - Chapter 01

’WHAT THE HISTORICAL INTERPRETATION OF THE BIBLE IS, AND THE NEED FOR IT.’

IT is, perhaps, only just to myself to say that the work I intend to do in these six lectures will be of a quite elementary kind. I do not expect to say anything which is not already familiar to all who have made a moderate acquaintance with the subject, my purpose being to introduce to some intelligent use and knowledge of the Bible those who have not yet begun, or scarcely begun, to look at it in the light of modern research. One essential condition of a successful study is that we should allow no theory to precede the facts; if you have any theory at all concerning the Bible in general, either traditional or new, I ask you to lay that theory aside and come merely to ask and honestly to find out what is in the Bible what are the contents of these books. A student once complained to his Professor that the Professor’s way of teaching the Bible destroyed his reverence for it. The Professor reminded him that the only portion of the Bible they had yet studied together was the Law of Holiness (Lev 17 - 26), and he asked the student whether he had ever read that portion before. The student admitted he had not! He had great reverence for it until he began to find out what it was! Such reverence is unreal, and stands in the way of a candid investigation it is reverence for a mere theory. Noble character cannot be built without reverence, but true reverence is reverence for truth. If we found, e.g., that David did not write the Psalms, or Solomon the Proverbs, or Isaiah the whole book that bears his name, true reverence would call upon us to abandon the traditional theory and abide by the facts. This, then, is the one preliminary demand that I make upon you as a class, viz., that you should come with open, candid minds to ask, What is true? What are the facts? And I may as well say at once that if anyone comes here simply for the sake of defending some theory, without a proper care to base the theory on facts, I have no time to waste upon him. I am not here in the interest of any theory or any school of criticism, new or old, as such and for its own sake; I am here only to inquire as to the truth concerning the Bible.

Now, let us suppose that we are standing within the precincts of some ancient abbey. The abbey is at once an historical monument and a place of worship. A devout spirit can worship God in it without knowing anything about its history, and it is true that when the old abbey helps a man to realize the presence of God in his life, that is a more important thing than any knowledge of the history of the abbey could be. Nevertheless, we should all maintain that the historical knowledge has an importance of its own, and for many laudable purposes it is absolutely necessary.

We go a step farther, and say that this historical knowledge as to how the old buildings were erected, when, and by whom, ought not to lessen their value as a place of worship, that it ought even to increase it, by giving us a larger fellowship with men who built for God. You might, in these remarks, substitute the Bible for the abbey. The poor African woman, who said of the old Book, ’ This is the oil that makes my lamp to burn,’ spoke truth from the depth of her soul. She knew nothing of the Higher Criticism or any other criticism. What she knew was that the Bible had helped her to find God; helped her to realize that He was with her every day, and that sustained her life.

It is like the poor uneducated man who can worship in the old abbey. It is possible for a man to be spiritually fed by old words of the Bible, whose original meaning he does not know. He may say, * Salvation is of the Lord,’ or, ’ I know that my Redeemer liveth,’ and get help from it, though he does not mean at all what those meant who wrote the words. But in the case of the Bible as in that of the abbey, the fact that this good can be got without the kind of knowledge we are now seeking is no argument for not seeking the knowledge. Nor, if we preserve a right spirit, should inquiry and investigation, and analysis and critical judgment, destroy or impair the worshipful spirit. John Ruskin analyzed Nature minutely, and remained a fervent worshipper all his life. The greatest lovers of our ancient buildings are often the most caref al investigators of all the facts concerning them. It is equally true that some of the greatest lovers of the Bible, some of those who value it most, spare no research into its natural history, and they discriminate most carefully between its different parts.

Moreover, it must be remembered that there is a traditional way of interpreting the Bible; there is a common prevailing view, and the teacher especially must interpret somehow, and the question is, how? Now, my contention is that the only proper method is the historical method. What is that? Come back again to the old abbey. I will select parts of a description of Furness Abbey, given by Mr. Brooke Herford, for illustration. The abbey was founded by the Cistercian monks. They were a hard, plain, puritanic sect. They allowed no ornaments, no traceried windows, no images of saints, no sculpture of the human figure, no painted windows, no high, massive towers; everything must be stern, simple, and unadorned. How comes it, then, that you find all these forbidden things in Furness Abbey? By carefully studying the ruins you are able to read the story. You can trace there the old plan, simple and unadorned as the monks themselves, and then you can see how it has been departed from; how later hands altered this and superimposed that. You can see the patched masonry, where traceried windows of a later style have replaced the earlier Norman windows; you can see how the little chancel has been enlarged; there is a lofty, massive tower, which you know the original builders would not have put up, and you discover that it dates only just before the Reformation. ’ All through the building you come upon traces of the gradual change.’ To find out all the history of that old building, experts have to examine every doorway, every arch and window, and all sorts of marks which the ordinary visitor would not notice. And what is that work 1 It might be called the Higher Criticism or the Historical Interpretation of Furness Abbey. That is the kind of work that is being done to-day on all old literature. The Higher Criticism did not begin with the Bible. It is sometimes spoken of by ignorant people as a sort of device of the enemy for attacking the Bible, whereas it is the universal method of studying all ancient literature. In a very true sense it may be said that the founder of the scientific method was a Yorkshireman of the seventeenth century. Richard Bentley was born at Oulton, near Wakefield, in 1662. While he was King’s librarian at Cambridge, he disputed the authorship of certain old Greek letters (148 in number), known as ’ The Epistles of Phalaris.’ Phalaris was a tyrant of Sicily, born 570 B.C. Bentley closed the controversy he had raised by a convincing array of knowledge and argument, which was the foundation of what was practically a new scientific method of treating old books. Men saw they must not take for granted that things were exactly what they appeared, and that old books bearing the name of one author might really be the work of many authors, and of different times. A hundred years later the same process was applied to the ’ Iliad,’ which, instead of being one poem by one man, is found to be the composite work of many hands.

Later still, the ancient history of Rome had to be reconstructed, and the truth found as best it could in the mass of fable and legend. It was simply impossible that the Bible should be left alone. All ancient history was undergoing fresh examination by a scientific method, with the result everywhere that many traditional notions were upset and large reconstructions necessitated. Why should the history of the Jews be exempt? Any objection to submitting these writings to the same test to which all other writings are submitted is due to a theory concerning them, but we have no right to any theory until we know the facts. Anyway, whether we object or do not object, the Bible has been, and is being, examined by the method admitted to be valid in regard to every other literature.

Criticism is judgment. Some sort of judgment you must have. The question is, Is it to be competent or incompetent? Is it to be that of a slothful mind or a diligent mind? Is it to be the very best you can reach by taking every care and trouble, or the one that will cost you least?

Historical criticism is judgment in the light of history. It insists upon going behind tradition, to inquire into the authorship, the age, the meaning, and the spirit of the ancient writing. Setting aside all preconceived theories, it asks, * What are the actual contents of this writing?’ And then it asks whether the writing is one piece or a collection of pieces; if a collection, how related. Then it seeks to determine the age of the respective pieces and their inner meaning in the light of the time to which they belong. To reach its results, it uses all sources of available information monuments, the study of language, quotations in works whose date is known, references in the document itself to known institutions or customs or persons, great differences of leading ideas in the writing, all of which could not belong to the same man and the same time, and many other criteria. The negative results are often quite certain, while the positive results are uncertain. You may be able to prove conclusively that Paul did not write the Epistle to the Hebrews, and be quite uncertain as to who did; you may prove that Moses could not have written the Pentateuch, but who did write it is quite another matter. The positive results of criticism vary from weak probability up to such a convergence of probabilities as amount to practical certainty. Just as in every other science, Biblical Criticism has had often to revise its conclusions, but the point to remember is this: that if historical criticism comes to wrong conclusions, it is only by more historical criticism these can be corrected. Geologists of long ago made mistakes. But the only remedy was more geology. Those who denounced the geologists in the name of religion were worse than useless. It is so with criticism. When criticism is wrong, what you want is more criticism, not ignorant denunciation. Among scholars of all schools this is now practically recognised. One of the best modern critics, Professor B. Wisner Bacon, in a new book (’ An Introduction to the New Testament,’ p. 24) says: ’ We should do injustice to the line of conservative scholars if we failed to recognise the splendid scholarship and industry of German critics, such as B. Weiss, aud Theo. Zahn, whom one hesitates to class as apologetic, so genuine is the purpose, especially of the former, to be free from traditional bias.’ He says that Weiss rejects the sceptical way of refusing to scrutinize the documents, and that Zahn, that ’ prince of conservative scholars,’ ’ knows no method but the universal methods of pure scientific criticism.’ * With all these differences of judgment, there is, nevertheless, to-day but one method of literary and historical criticism. The perfect balance of evidence in detailed results remains for him who shall be able to join to the amplest scholarship an impartiality of judgment, absolute, not only in intention, but in fact.’

That, I think, must suffice as to the first part of my subject what historical interpretation means. And now as to the necessity for it. An observant reading of the English Bible will raise questions at once.

If you were reading an English book purporting to be two centuries old, and came across the word ’ telegraph ’ or * telephone,’ you would know that that, at any rate, could not have been written so long ago. In the same way, if a psalm, which is called a Psalm of David, speaks of the temple at Jerusalem, you know there was no temple in David’s time, the first temple being built by Solomon. When you read in Genesis 36:31, a reference to a monarchy in Israel, you know the reference could not have been made by Moses any more than a writer of fifty years ago could have referred to boycotting. If you found the author speaking of the ’ Eternities ’ and the ’ Immensities,’ you would feel sure he was acquainted with Carlyle. If he spoke of ’the power that makes for righteousness,’ you would not place him before Arnold. One writer tells us of a painter who depicted the penitent thief on the way to the Cross receiving the last consolations from a monk! But it was too early for monks. - The picture, however, though not historical as regards the thief, is historical as regards the painter. It tells you what he thought. That is what happens again and again in the historical books of the Bible. A man writes the story of days long, long past, but he writes under the influence of the ideas of his own time, and you have constantly to be on your guard to distinguish between the event and the writer’s comment. You will find this constantly if you read Samuel and Kings and compare them with Chronicles. Chronicles was written in the Greek Age, say 300 B.C. approximate i.e., some centuries after the older histories. And you will often find things of the later time read back into the earlier, like the monk in the painting.

Hezekiah holds a passover with elaborate ritual, according to the Chronicler (2 Chronicles 29:1-36), whereas the author of Kings gives the story of Hezekiah without any passover, and introduces the passover of the book of the Covenant as a new thing in the reign of Josiah, and says no such passover as therein prescribed was held from the days of the Judges to the eighteenth year of Josiah. Then, again, why does the Chronicler speak of so many things as done by the sons of Aaron the sons of Aaron are the priests in Chronicles whereas in Kings the sons of Aaron are not mentioned? ’ Historical interpretation,’ says the writer of Kings, ’ does not mention the sons of Aaron as the priests, because the priesthood had not been confined to Aaron’s family at that time. By the Chronicler’s time they alone were the priests, and he puts them into the old story as the painter put the monk.’ But here the reader asks himself, ’ Are not Aaron’s sons made priests in the Pentateuch, which was before Kings?’ That, however, is the question: Was it before Kings? Criticism will tell you differently by-and-by. Meantime, this kind of thing shows the necessity for criticism. The Bible cannot explain itself. Suppose you ask how Israel came to have a King. You refer to the Books of Samuel, but there you find two stories. According to one it was God who wanted the people to have a King to save them from the Philistines. Samuel anointed Saul by God’s command. According to the other account, it was the people who clamoured for a King, and God granted them their desire in anger, and regarded their action as rebellion against Him. Here is a contradiction which compels us to the work of historical criticism.

If you ask who sold Joseph, you will find two answers given. According to one, his brethren sold him (Genesis 37:1-36, two accounts), but according to another, the Midianite merchants stole him out of the pit and sold him in Egypt. Joseph in prison tells the chief butler (Genesis 40:15), ’I, too, was stolen out of the land of the Hebrews ’; but later on he tells his brethren, ’ I am Joseph whom ye sold into Egypt.’ It would be dishonest to pretend that there is no contradiction, and the existence of the contradiction calls for historical interpretation. The reader who passes from Isa. 39 to 40. finds that he has changed climates; the style of writing is vastly different; the whole atmosphere of thought is different; the historical situation is different; Jerusalem, instead of being threatened by a possible invasion, is at the end of a long punishment, having received double for her sins. The question arises, Did the same man write these chapters? The answer can only be found by historical interpretation. In Jeremiah 33:14-26 you have a passage which looks upon religious ritual in a different light from that in which Jeremiah usually regards it. This at once creates suspicion, and you wonder how he could so contradict his general position. Then you find that in the Septuagint version the Greek Bible which was translated from the old Hebrew that passage does not appear at all; you think it probable, then, that the passage was not in the original Jeremiah, that it must be the work of some later editor or scribe, that it is probably like the tvacevy of the window in Furness Abbey the work of a later hand than that of the original builder. You must settle the question as best you can by historical inquiry. If you read in one of the Gospels that Judas committed suicide, and in the Acts that he died by accident, and that that was well known in Jerusalem, you have a contradiction which needs some explanation. These are only stray illustrations of the need for a critical method. For further illustration, and also for some statement of how criticism has found things, I will now ask your attention to the first six books of the Bible, called the Hexateuch. The ordinary reader who reads carefully will soon meet with strange phenomena here. In Exodus 6:1-30 the name ’ Jahweh ’ (= Jehovah, often translated ’ Lord ’ in the English Bible) is revealed to Moses for the first time, and God tells him He was not known to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob by that name. But according to Genesis He was. In Genesis 15:1, e.g., it is Jahweh who speaks to Abraham.

There are two stories of creation, each with its own order, and each with its own ideas of God. There are two different accounts of the Flood, two explanations of the origin of certain names e.g., ’ Bethel/ ’ Israel,’ and ’ Beersheba.’ Two different reasons are given for the institution of the Sabbath. In Exodus it is to be kept because God had rested on the seventh day, and so hallowed it; in Deuteronomy the command is to keep it as a memorial of the deliverance from Egypt, and it was instituted for that purpose. The reader must ask, How did these double accounts come in? In Exodus 37:1-29 you read that Bezaleel made the ark after Moses had received the new tables of the law, which tables Moses put into the ark. But in Deuteronomy 10:1-22 Moses is commanded to make the ark before he goes up to receive the tables, and he makes it himself and then puts the tables in. If we ask where the ark was kept, we should find equally conflicting accounts.

Another phenomenon that must attract notice in the Hexateuch is the different strata of legislation. On the supposition that all was the legislation of Moses, see what result you get regarding slavery, for example. In Exodus 21:1-10, the slave who has served six years and who by law is free in the seventh, may, if he so desire, go voluntarily into lifelong slavery, and make a contract that will bind him for the rest of his life. Next year, however, you find, according to Leviticus 25:39-42, that an Israelite must not sell himself to another Israelite. Israelites can serve as hired servants to the year of Jubilee, and then be free, but an Israelite is not to hold another Israelite as a bondman; he can make bondmen i.e., slaves of the heathen, but not of his own people. That would be very poor morality for us, but it was an exalted standard for Israelites so long ago. But according to Deuteronomy 15:12 i.e., thirty-eight years later Moses goes back again to the old view that an Israelite may be a slave for six years, and may voluntarily make himself a slave for ever. The law of Leviticus by this theory was designed for life in Canaan; and yet in Deuteronomy, on the eve of entering Canaan, Moses himself ignores it It is quite impossible that Moses could have been the author of all these laws. Again, according to Exodus 20:24, the people are at liberty to worship in many places; but the law of Deuteronomy 12:1-32 forbids it, and confines worship to one sanctuary only. Historical criticism maintains that these laws relate to different periods of the nation’s life. Again, there is an unmistakable difference between Leviticus and Deuteronomy, so great that, if one were Mosaic, the other could not be. To mention only one point in illustration viz., in Deuteronomy, all Levites are priests; in Leviticus only one family of Levites are priests, the sons of Aaron. Connected with this is an elaborate ritual and a priestly atmosphere in Leviticus that separates the book by a wide chasm from Deuteronomy, and it is evident upon a comparison that some theory quite other than that of unity of authorship must be found. In this way the reader comes upon signs of composite authorship, as Bentley did with the epistles of Phalaris. When the work is undertaken to disentangle these interwoven writings, it goes without saying that we have to depend a great deal upon experts, as we should have to do in any department of ancient history, whether it be the examination of books, or abbeys, or rocks; for many things we must rely upon the scholars. But what if the scholars do not agree? It would be a miracle if they did at all points. A man is hard up for an objection when he objects to Biblical criticism on the ground that the critics are not agreed. In what department of investigation do experts always agree? Doctors, e.g., have many differences in diagnosis and prescription, but we are not foolish enough to say that therefore we will have nothing to do with them. Will you tell the student of English law that his wisest plan is to leave the subject alone until the authorities are agreed on all matters of chronology and interpretation? Then why countenance so puerile an attitude regarding Jewish law? This objection is really too childish for serious treatment; I only mention it because many use it to prejudice the historical interpretation of the Bible who would never think of arguing in the same way in any other department, When you go into these matters with any thoroughness, especially in the Hexateuch, it is the measure of agreement that surprises you, not the disagreement. That so many scholars working independently should be able to agree so much as to what documents are compiled in the Hexateuch, and be able to come so near to each other in the work of separating these documents, is really amazing, and, to my mind, convincing. On a host of minute particulars there is disagreement and uncertainty, but on the main features there is no substantial disagreement, and ’as little uncertainty as you can expect in the study of anything so ancient.

Let me try to give some rough idea of how the Hexateuch is made up, omitting unavoidably all details of the analysis.

It has been found that there are four principal documents in the Hexateuch. Some of these continue into the historical books, but for the present I leave that unnoticed. These principal documents are called J., E., D., and P. i.e., Yahwist, Elohist, Deuteronomist, and Priest’s Code. Yahwist = writer who calls God Jahweh i.e., Jehovah, often ’ Lord ’ in our version. Elohist = writer who calls God Eiohim, translated ’ God ’ in the English Bible. Probably these represent, not merely different writers, but different schools of thought. Scholars have been able to separate these documents. Though they are so interwoven that you often have two documents represented in the same verse, it is possible to pick out and put together each document, and you find that each makes a story by itself, and without the double accounts and the contradictions to which I referred e.g., one story of creation belongs to P., the other belongs to J. Each document is seen to have its own distinguishing characteristics, its own leading ideas, its own institutions, and its own style. It is a great mistake to suppose that all is decided upon mere evidence of language; the language is only one part of the evidence. The evidence is of a cumulative nature; its strength and convincingness in regard to main conclusions depend upon a convergence of many lines of proof. In a single lecture it is impossible to give these proofs, and impossible to describe in detail the characteristics of the documents or their limits. As to limits, I can but say that P. is interwoven with J. and E. in Genesis and Exodus and Numbers; that it includes the whole of Leviticus, though there it incorporates older legislation called the law of Holiness, chapters 17-26; it has only a few verses in Deuteronomy, but a considerable section in Joshua. D. is practically Deuteronomy. J. and E. are found in all except Leviticus and Deuteronomy. This is in the rough. As to characteristics, I can only give one or two illustrations. Think, e.g., of the question of sacrifice. According to J. and E., sacrifice existed from the beginning; it was the natural way in which man approached God. The patriarchs in these stories build altars and offer sacrifice, and Moses, in Exodus 24:5, even sent young men to offer burnt offerings and sacrifice peace offerings to the Lord. But P. looks at these things very differently. Sacrifice, in his view, is a special Divine institution; it does not properly begin until Aaron and his sons are consecrated to do it. In J., e.g., when Noah comes out of the ark, he builds an altar and sacrifices, but in P. he does no such thing; God makes a covenant and Noah is a party to it, but there is no altar and no sacrifice. The priestly school of P., in writing ancient history, would not represent a layman as offering sacrifice. The same difference marks these documents in the case of the other patriarchs. In D. any Levite is a priest, but P. (Numbers 18:7) so confines the priesthood to Aaron and his sons that any stranger coming nigh to it shall be put to death. When D. writes the story of Moses appointing Joshua as his successor, the whole transaction takes place between the two men in the sight of God and the people; but when P. comes to tell the same story, Moses has to place Joshua before Eleazer the priest, and he must play an important part in the transaction. To the priestly school the thing would not have been valid without a priest. Again, in D. the priests have no property, and certain charitable allowances are therefore to be made for them; they are classed with the poor who have to be looked after. But in P. their revenue is greatly increased in several ways, and they are also to possess forty-eight cities, with allotments of pasture land besides. These are only very few instances; I have no time for more. Yet, by the traditional theory that all this was Mosaic legislation, all these contradictory points of view were taken by one legislator; all the very different conceptions of God, of worship, and of sacrifice were the conceptions of one and the same man; and all these conflicting regulations were issued in one lifetime for practice in Canaan. Whatever is or is not right in the conclusions of the higher criticism, one thing is absolutely beyond doubt that the old theory breaks to pieces. The old view cannot be held by any man who works candidly and honestly at the subject. Now, when the limits of these separate documents have been settled, the question arises as to their respective dates. To come to any conclusion on this point it was necessary to do two things viz., to compare the documents very carefully with each other, and then to compare them with history as best known. This was a big task, and as our knowledge of ancient history is constantly open to revision through discoveries and other investigations, conclusions of this kind must be held liable to revision too. There has been, however, and still is, practical unanimity that J. and E. are dated from the ninth to the eighth century B.C.; of these J. is the older. There has been much controversy concerning the respective dates of D. and P. I cannot even epitomize it here. The prevailing modern view is that the true order of the documents is as follows: J., E., D., P. J., E. existed, it is held, before 750; they were combined by 650. Deuteronomy is placed about 621. When it was composed is a doubtful question, but it comes definitely into the national history, and it is adopted by the people, in 621. We have a date for Josiah’s reformation. That reformation was based on a law-book found in the Temple, and the things done by the reformers are the things prescribed in Deuteronomy, not the things prescribed in Exodus or Leviticus; the inference is that that law-book was Deuteronomy, though, probably, not the whole book as we have it now. Hence the date 621. During the exile in Babylon, Deuteronomy was combined with J., E. There, too, the old histories Judges, Kings, and, perhaps, Samuel were revised and edited. And the editor of that day did not scruple to put his own comments into the text. These editors worked under the influence of Deuteronomy. That is why you find a man often condemned for conduct which evidently never struck him as wrong; the law which made it wrong did not exist in his time, but it did in the time of the editor.

It was found, however, that the Jews in Jerusalem were very negligent of worship, and that Deuteronomy was not sufficient to meet the case. It was to meet this that men of priestly interest in Babylon drew up P., the Priest’s Code, composed somewhere between 538-444. In 444, under Ezra, the people solemnly adopted either the Priest’s Code or the whole combined Pentateuch. By a study of the history of Israel, when you have learned to discount the editors’ notes, you find that Deuteronomy was not known before the seventh century e.g., you have Amos and Hosea prophesying in the eighth century, and they give you no hint of knowing Deuteronomy. They do not demand from the people what Deuteronomy demands, nor do they blame them for violating its requirements. Deuteronomy demands worship at one central sanctuary. These prophets do not, nor do they hold that there is anything wrong in having many sanctuaries, though the resort to sanctuaries is denounced because the claims of morality are neglected. So in the historical books, men have many sanctuaries and images without the least consciousness that they were breaking a law. If Deuteronomy existed, even the leaders did not seem to know anything about it. By the same kind of argument, and many others, the conclusion is reached that P. was not in existence before the captivity in Babylon. When you read the historical books, remember that Kings is coloured by a Deuteronomic editor; and Judges, though less so; and Samuel scarcely at all; that before Chronicles was written, P. had come into existence, and that is why there is a priestly colour on events which are without it in Kings.

All this, and much more, is necessary to our understanding the history of the Hebrew development. It is difficult work, but intensely interesting when you get into it, and it redeems the Bible from being a mere Divine apparatus to be adored but not read. It becomes a living book, full of human interest and of lasting worth; in many senses the most important story in the world, the story of the thought and life of that wonderful nation to which Jesus belonged, and the story, too, that leads up to and includes Him. To understand the Old Testament is the true preparation for a historical interpretation of Christianity. One conviction is borne in irresistibly upon the mind when the story of this people is properly traced viz., that ’ God marshalled them, gave them their goal.’ Their way was certainly not in themselves alone.