pa "p": The 17th letter of the Hebrew alphabet; transliterated in this Encyclopedia as "p" with daghesh and "ph" (= f) without. It came also to be used for the number 80. For name, etc., See ALPHABET .
pes (shalom; eirene):
Is a condition of freedom from disturbance, whether outwardly, as of a nation from war or enemies, or inwardly, within the soul. The Hebrew word is shalom (both adjective and substantive), meaning, primarily, "soundness," "health," but coming also to signify "prosperity," well-being in general, all good in relation to both man and God. In early times, to a people harassed by foes, peace was the primary blessing. In Ps 122:7, we have "peace" and "prosperity," and in 35:27; 73:3, shalom is translated "prosperity." In 2 Sam 11:7 the King James Version, David asked of Uriah "how Joab did" (margin "of the peace of Joab"), "and how the people did (the Revised Version (British and American) "fared," literally, "of the peace of the people"), and how the war prospered" (literally, "and of the peace (welfare) of the war").
(1) Shalom was the common friendly greeting, used in asking after the health of anyone; also in farewells (Gen 29:6, "Is it well with him?" ("Is there peace to him?"); 43:23, "Peace be to you"; 43:27, "He asked them of their welfare (of their peace)"; Jdg 6:23, "Yahweh said unto him, Peace be unto thee"; 18:15 (the King James Version "saluted him," margin "Hebrew asked him of peace," the Revised Version (British and American) "of his welfare"); Jdg 19:20, etc.). See also GREETING . (2) Peace from enemies (implying prosperity) was the great desire of the nation and was the gift of God to the people if they walked in His ways (Lev 26:6; Nu 6:26, "Yahweh lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace"; Ps 29:11; Isa 26:12, etc.). To "die in peace" was greatly to be desired (Gen 15:15; 1 Ki 2:6; 2 Ch 34:28, etc.). (3) Inward peace was the portion of the righteous who trusted in God (Job 22:21, "Acquaint now thyself with him, and be at peace (shalam)"; Ps 4:8; 85:8, "He will speak peace unto his people, and to his saints"; 119:165; Prov 3:2,17; Isa 26:3, "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace (Hebrew "peace, peace"), whose mind is stayed on thee; because he trusteth in thee"; Mal 2:5); also outward peace (Job 5:23,24; Prov 16:7, etc.). (4) Peace was to be sought and followed by the righteous (Ps 34:14, "Seek peace, and pursue it"; Zec 8:16,19, "Love truth and peace"). (5) Peace should be a prominent feature of the Messianic times (Isa 2:4; 9:6, "Prince of Peace"; 11:6; Ezek 34:25; Mic 4:2-4; Zec 9:10).
In the New Testament, where eirene has much the same meaning and usage as shalom (for which it is employed in the Septuagint; compare Lk 19:42, the Revised Version (British and American) "If thou hadst known .... the things which belong unto peace"), we have still the expectation of "peace" through the coming of the Christ (Lk 1:74,79; 12:51) and also its fulfillment in the higher spiritual sense.
(1) The gospel in Christ is a message of peace from God to men (Lk 2:14; Acts 10:36, "preaching .... peace by Jesus Christ"). It is "peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ," in Rom 5:1; the King James Version 10:15; peace between Jew and Gentile (Eph 2:14,15); an essential element in the spiritual kingdom of God (Rom 14:17). (2) It is to be cherished and followed by Christians. Jesus exhorted His disciples, "Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace one with another" (Mk 9:50); Paul exhorts, "Live in peace: and the God of love and peace shall be with you" (2 Cor 13:11; compare Rom 12:18; 1 Cor 7:15). (3) God is therefore "the God of peace," the Author and Giver of all good ("peace" including every blessing) very frequently (e.g. Rom 15:33; 16:20; 2 Thess 3:16, etc., "the Lord of peace"). "Peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ" is a common apostolic wish or salutation (compare 1 Cor 1:3; 2 Cor 1:2, etc.). (4) We have also "peace" as a greeting (Mt 10:13; Lk 10:5); "a son of peace" (Lk 10:6) is one worthy of it, in sympathy with it; the Lord's own greeting to His disciples was "Peace be unto you" (Lk 24:36; Jn 20:19,21,26), and ere He left them He gave them specially His blessing of "Peace" (Jn 14:27); we have also frequently "Go in peace" (Mk 5:34; Lk 7:50). In Lk 19:38, we have "peace in heaven" (in the acclamation of Jesus on His Messianic entry of Jerusalem). (5) The peace that Christ brought is primarily spiritual peace from and with God, peace in the heart, peace as the disposition or spirit. He said that He did not come "to send peace on the earth, but a sword," referring to the searching nature of His call and the divisions and clearances it would create. But, of course, the spirit of the gospel and of the Christian is one of peace, and it is a Christian duty to seek to bring war and strife everywhere to an end. This is represented as the ultimate result of the gospel and Spirit of Christ; universal and permanent peace can come only as that Spirit rules in men's hearts.
"Peace" in the sense of silence, to hold one's peace, etc., is in the Old Testament generally the translation of charash, "to be still, or silent" (Gen 24:21; 34:5; Job 11:3); also of chashah, "to hush," "to be silent" (2 Ki 2:3,5; Ps 39:2), and of other words. In Job 29:10 ("The nobles held their peace," the King James Version), it is qol, "voice."
In the New Testament we have siopao, "to be silent," "to cease speaking" (Mt 20:31; 26:63; Acts 18:9, etc.); sigao, "to be silent," "not to speak" (Lk 20:26; Acts 12:17); hesuchazo, "to be quiet" (Lk 14:4; Acts 11:18); phimoo, "to muzzle or gag" (Mk 1:25; Lk 4:35).
In Apocrypha eirene is frequent, mostly in the sense of peace from war or strife (Tobit 13:14; Judith 3:1; Ecclesiasticus 13:18; 1 Macc 5:54; 6:49; 2 Macc 14:6, eustatheia = "tranquillity").
The Revised Version (British and American) has "peace" for "tongue" (Est 7:4; Job 6:24; Am 6:10; Hab 1:13); "at peace with me" for "perfect" (Isa 42:19, margin "made perfect" or "recompensed"); "security" instead of "peaceably" and "peace" (Dan 8:25; 11:21,24); "came in peace to the city," for "came to Shalem, a city" (Gen 33:18); "it was for my peace" instead of "for peace" (Isa 38:17); "when they are in peace," for "and that which should have been for their welfare" (Ps 69:22).
W. L. Walker
See SACRIFICE .
pes'-mak-er: Occurs only in the plural (Mt 5:9, "Blessed are the peacemakers (eirenopoioi): for they shall be called sons of God" (who is "the God of peace")). We have also what seems to be a reflection of this saying in Jas 3:18, "The fruit of righteousness is sown in peace for (the Revised Version margin "by") them that make peace" (tois poiousin eirenen). In classical Greek a "peacemaker" was an ambassador sent to treat of peace. The word in Mt 5:9 would, perhaps, be better rendered "peace-workers," implying not merely making peace between those who are at variance, but working peace as that which is the will of the God of peace for men.
W. L. Walker
pe'-kok (tukkiyim (plural); Latin Pavo cristatus): A bird of the genus Pavo. Japan is the native home of the plainer peafowl; Siam, Ceylon and India produce the commonest and most gorgeous. The peacock has a bill of moderate size with an arched tip, its cheeks are bare, the eyes not large, but very luminous, a crest of 24 feathers 2 inches long, with naked shafts and broad tips of blue, glancing to green. The neck is not long but proudly arched, the breast full, prominent and of bright blue green, blue predominant. The wings are short and ineffectual, the feathers on them made up of a surprising array of colors. The tail consists of 18 short, stiff, grayish-brown feathers. Next is the lining of the train, of the same color. The glory of this glorious bird lies in its train. It begins on the back between the wings in tiny feathers not over 6 inches in length, and extends backward. The quills have thick shafts of purple and green shades, the eye at the tip of each feather from one-half to 2 inches across, of a deep peculiar blue, surrounded at the lower part by two half-moon-shaped crescents of green. Whether the train lies naturally, or is spread in full glory, each eye shows encircled by a marvel of glancing shades of green, gold, purple, blue and bronze. When this train is spread, it opens like a fan behind the head with its sparkling crest, and above the wondrous blue of the breast. The bird has the power to contract the muscles at the base of the quills and play a peculiar sort of music with them. It loves high places and cries before a storm in notes that are startling to one not familiar with them. The bird can be domesticated and will become friendly enough to take food from the hand. The peahen is smaller than the cock, her neck green, her wings gray, tan and brown--but she has not the gorgeous train. She nests on earth and breeds with difficulty when imported, the young being delicate and tender. The grown birds are hardy when acclimated, and live to old age. By some freak of nature, pure white peacocks are at times produced. Aristophanes mentioned peafowl in his Birds, II. 102, 269. Alexander claimed that he brought them into Greece from the east, but failed to prove his contention. Pliny wrote that Hortensius was the first to serve the birds for food, and that Aufidius Lurco first fattened and sold them in the markets. It was the custom to skin the bird, roast and recover it and send it to the table, the gaudy feathers showing.
The first appearance of the bird in the Bible occurs in a summing-up of the wealth and majesty of Solomon (1 Ki 10:22: "For the king had at sea a navy of Tarshish with the navy of Hiram: once every three years came the navy of Tarshish, bringing gold, and silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks"). (Here the Septuagint translates peleketoi (s.c. lithoi), = "(stones) carved with an ax.") The same statement is made in 2 Ch 9:21: "For the king had ships that went to Tarshish with the servants of Huram; once every three years came the ships of Tarshish, bringing gold and silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks" Septuagint omits). There is no question among scholars and scientists but that these statements are true, as the ships of Solomon are known to have visited the coasts of India and Ceylon, and Tarshish was on the Malabar coast of India, where the native name of the peacock was tokei, from which tukkiyim undoubtedly was derived (See GOLD , and The Expository Times, IX , 472). The historian Tennant says that the Hebrew names for "ivory" and "apes" were also the same as the Tamil. The reference to the small, ineffectual wing of the peacock which scarcely will lift the weight of the body and train, that used to be found in Job, is now applied to the ostrich, and is no doubt correct:
"The wings of the ostrich wave proudly;
But are they the pinions and plumage of love?" (Job 39:13).
While the peacock wing seems out of proportion to the size of the bird, it will sustain flight and bear the body to the treetops. The wing of the ostrich is useless for flight.
Gene Stratton-Porter
purl.
pe-kul'-yar: The Latin peculium means "private property," so that "peculiar" properly = "pertaining to the individual." In modern English the word has usually degenerated into a half-colloquial form for "extraordinary," but in Biblical English it is a thoroughly dignified term for "esp. one's own"; compare the "peculiar treasure" of the king in Eccl 2:8 (the King James Version). Hence, "peculiar people" (the King James Version Dt 14:2, etc.) means a people especially possessed by God and particularly prized by Him. The word in the Old Testament (the King James Version Ex 19:5; Dt 14:2; 26:18; Ps 135:4; Eccl 2:8) invariably represents ceghullah, "property," an obscure word which Septuagint usually rendered by the equally obscure periousios (apparently meaning "superabundant"), which in turn is quoted in Tit 2:14. In Mal 3:17, however, Septuagint has peripoiesis, quoted in 1 Pet 2:9. the English Revised Version in the New Testament substituted "own possession" in the two occurrences, but in the Old Testament kept "peculiar" and even extended its use (Dt 7:6; Mal 3:17) to cover every occurrence of ceghullah except in 1 Ch 29:3 ("treasure"). the American Standard Revised Version, on the contrary, has dropped "peculiar" altogether, using "treasure" in 1 Ch 29:3; Eccl 2:8, and "own possession" elsewhere. the King James Version also has "peculiar commandments" (idios, "particular," the Revised Version (British and American) "several") in The Wisdom of Solomon 19:6, and the Revised Version (British and American) has "peculiar" where the King James Version has "special" in The Wisdom of Solomon 3:14 for eklekte, "chosen out."
Burton Scott Easton
ped'-a-hel, pe-da'-el (pedhah'-el, "whom God redeems"): A prince of Naphtali; one of the tribal chiefs who apportioned the land of Canaan (Nu 34:28; compare 34:17).
pe-da'zur (pedhahtsur): Mentioned in Nu 1:10; 2:20; 7:54,59; 10:23 as the father of Gamaliel, head of the tribe of Manasseh, at the time of the exodus. See The Expository Times,VIII , 555 ff.
pe-da'-ya, pe-di'-a (pedhayahu, "Yah redeems"):
(1) Father of Joel, who was ruler of Western Manasseh in David's reign (1 Ch 27:20). Form pedhayah (see above).
(2) Pedaiah of Rumah (2 Ki 23:36), father of Zebudah, Jehoiakim's mother.
(3) A son of Jeconiah (1 Ch 3:18); in 1 Ch 3:19 the father of Zerubbabel. Pedaiah's brother, Shealtiel, is also called father of Zerubbabel (Ezr 3:2; but in 1 Ch 3:17 the King James Version spelled "Salathiel"). There may have been two cousins, or even different individuals may be referred to under Shealtiel and Salathiel respectively.
(4) Another who helped to repair the city wall (Neh 3:25), of the family of PAROSH (which see). Perhaps this is the man who stood by Ezra at the reading of the Law (Neh 8:4; 1 Esdras 9:44, called "Phaldeus").
(5) A "Levite," appointed one of the treasurers over the "treasuries" of the Lord's house (Neh 13:13).
(6) A Benjamite, one of the rulers residing in Jerusalem under the "return" arrangements (Neh 11:7).
Henry Wallace
ped'-es-tal (ken): In two places (1 Ki 7:29,31) the Revised Version (British and American) gives this word for the King James Version "base" (in Solomon's "Sea").
ped'-i-as, pe-di'-as (Pedias; Codex Alexandrinus Paideias; the King James Version by mistake Pelias): One of those who had taken "strange wives" (1 Esdras 9:34) = "Bedeiah" of Ezr 10:35.
ped'-i-gre (hithyalledh, "to show one's birth"): The English word "pedigree" occurs only once in the Bible, according to the concordance. In Nu 1:18, it is said: "They declared their pedigrees"; that is, they enrolled or registered themselves according to their family connections. The same idea is expressed frequently, employing a different term in the Hebrew, by the common phrase of Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah, "to reckon by genealogy," "to give genealogy," etc. (compare 1 Ch 7:5,9; Ezr 2:62 ff; Neh 7:64). These last passages indicate the importance of the registered pedigree or genealogy, especially of the priests in the post-exilic community, for the absence of the list of their pedigrees, or their genealogical records, was sufficient to cause the exclusion from the priesthood of certain enrolled priests.
Walter R. Betteridge
pel, pil: "Pill" (Gen 30:37,38; Tobit 11:13 (the Revised Version (British and American) "scaled")) and "peel" (Isa 18:2,7 (the King James Version and the Revised Version margin); Ezek 29:18 (the King James Version and the English Revised Version)) are properly two different words, meaning "to remove the hair" (pilus) and "to remove the skin" (pellis), but in Elizabethan English the two were confused. In Isa 18:2,7, the former meaning is implied, as the Hebrew word here (marat) is rendered "pluck off the hair" in Ezr 9:3; Neh 13:25; Isa 50:6. The word, however, may also mean "make smooth" (so the Revised Version margin) or "bronzed." This last, referring to the dark skins of the Ethiopians, is best here, but in any case the King James Version and the Revised Version margin are impossible. In the other cases, however, "remove the skin" (compare "scaled," Tobit 11:13 the Revised Version (British and American)) is meant. So in Gen 30:37,38, Jacob "peels" (so the Revised Version (British and American)) off portions of the bark of his rods, so as to give alternating colors (compare 30:39). And in Ezek 29:18, the point is Nebuchadrezzar's total failure in his siege of Tyre, although the soldiers had carried burdens until the skin was peeled from their shoulders (compare the American Standard Revised Version "worn").
Burton Scott Easton
pep (tsphaph; the King James Version Isa 8:19; 10:14 (the Revised Version (British and American) "chirp")): In 10:14, the word describes the sound made by a nestling bird; in 8:19, the changed (ventriloquistic?) voice of necromancers uttering sounds that purported to come from the feeble dead. The modern use of "peep" = "look" is found in Sirach 21:23, as the translation of parakupto: "A foolish man peepeth in from the door of another man's house."
pe'-ka (peqach, "opening" (of the eyes) (2 Ki 15:25-31); Phakee):
Son of Remaliah, and 18th king of Israel. Pekah murdered his predecessor, Pekahiah, and seized the reins of power (2 Ki 15:25). His usurpation of the throne is said to have taken place in the 52nd year of Uzziah, and his reign to have lasted for 20 years (2 Ki 15:27). His accession, therefore, may be placed in 748 BC (other chronologies place it later, and make the reign last only a few years).
Pekah came to the throne with the resolution of assisting in forming a league to resist the westward advance of Assyria. The memory of defeat by Assyria at the battle of Karkar in 753, more than 100 years before, had never died out.
Tiglath-pileser III was now ruler of Assyria, and in successive campaigns since 745 had proved himself a resistless conqueror. His lust for battle was not yet satisfied, and the turn of Philistia and Syria was about to come. In 735, a coalition, of which Pekah was a prominent member, was being formed to check his further advance. It comprised the princes of Comagene, Gebal, Hamath, Arvad, Ammon, Moab, Edom, Gaza, Samaria, Syria, and some minor potentates, the list being taken from a roll of the subject-princes who attended a court and paid tribute after the fall of Damascus. Ahaz likewise attended as a voluntary tributary to do homage to Tiglath-pileser (2 Ki 16:10).
While the plans of the allies were in course of formation, an obstacle was met with which proved insurmountable by the arts of diplomacy. This was the refusal of Ahaz, then on the throne of David, to join the confederacy. Arguments and threats having failed to move him, resort was had to force, and the troops of Samaria and Damascus moved on Jerusalem (2 Ki 16:5). Great alarm was felt at the news of their approach, as seen in the 7th and 8th chapters of Isa. The allies had in view to dispossess Ahaz of his crown, and give it to one of their own number, a son of Tabeel. Isaiah himself was the mainstay of the opposition to their projects. The policy he advocated, by divine direction, was that of complete neutrality. This he urged with passionate earnestness, but with only partial success. Isaiah (probably) had kept back Ahaz from joining the coalition, but could not prevent him from sending an embassy, laden with gifts to Tiglath-pileser, to secure his intervention. On the news arriving that the Assyrian was on the march, a hasty retreat was made from Jerusalem, and the blow soon thereafter fell, where Isaiah had predicted, on Rezin and Pekah, and their kingdoms.
4. Chronicles Ancillary to Kings:
The severely concise manner in which the writer of Kings deals with the later sovereigns of the Northern Kingdom is, in the case of Pekah, supplemented in Chronicles by further facts as to this campaign of the allies. The Chronicler states that "a great multitude of captives" were taken to Damascus and many others to Samaria. These would be countrymen and women from the outlying districts of Judah, which were ravaged. Those taken to Samaria were, however, returned, unhurt, to Jericho by the advice of the prophet Oded (2 Ch 28:5-15).
5. Fall of Damascus; Northern and Eastern Palestine Overrun:
The messengers sent from Jerusalem to Nineveh appear to have arrived when the army of Tiglath-pileser was already prepared to march. The movements of the Assyrians being expedited, they fell upon Damascus before the junction of the allies was accomplished. Rezin was defeated in a decisive battle, and took refuge in his capital, which was closely invested. Another part of the invading army descended on the upper districts of Syria and Samaria. Serious resistance to the veteran troops of the East could hardly be made, and city after city fell. A list of districts and cities that were overrun is given in 2 Ki 15:29. It comprises Gilead beyond Jordan--already partly depopulated (1 Ch 5:26); the tribal division of Naphtali, lying to the West of the lakes of Galilee and Merom, and all Galilee, as far South as the plain of Esdraelon and the Valley of Jezreel. Cities particularly mentioned are Ijon (now `Ayun), Abel-beth-maacah (now `Abi), Janoah (now Yanun), Kedesh (now Kados) and Hazor (now Hadireh).
6. Deportation of the Inhabitants:
These places and territories were not merely attacked and plundered. Their inhabitants were removed, with indescribable loss and suffering, to certain districts in Assyria, given as Halah, Habor, Hara, and both sides of the river Gozan, an affluent of the Euphrates. The transplantation of these tribes to a home beyond the great river was a new experiment in political geography, devised with the object of welding the whole of Western Asia into a single empire. It was work of immense difficulty and must have taxed the resources of even so great an organizer as Tiglath-pileser. The soldiers who had conquered in the field were, of course, employed to escort the many thousands of prisoners to their new locations. About two-thirds of the Samarian kingdom, comprising the districts of Samaria, the two Galilees, and the trans-Jordanic region, was thus denuded of its inhabitants.
Left with but a third of his kingdom--humbled but still defiant--Pekah was necessarily unpopular with his subjects. In this extremity--the wave of invasion from the North having spent itself--the usual solution occurred, and a plot was formed by which the assassination of Pekah should be secured, and the assassin should take his place as a satrap of Assyria. A tool was found in the person of Hoshea, whom Tiglath-pileser claims to have appointed to the throne. The Biblical narrative does not do more than record the fact that "Hoshea the son of Elah made a conspiracy against Pekah the son of Remaliah, and smote him, and slew him, and reigned in his stead" (2 Ki 15:30). The date given to this act is the 20th year of Jotham. As Jotham's reign lasted but 16 years, this number is evidently an error.
For the first time, the historian makes no reference to the religious conduct of a king of Israel. The subject was beneath notice. The second section of Isaiah's prophecies (Isa 7:1 through 10:4) belongs to the reign of Ahaz and thus to the time of Pekah, both of whom are named in it. Pekah is named in Isa 7:1, and is often, in this and the next chapter, referred to as "the son of Remaliah." His loss of the territorial divisions of Zebulun and Naphtali is referred to in 9:1, and is followed by prophecy of their future glory as the earthly home of the Son of Man. The wording of Isa 9:14 shows that it was written before the fall of Samaria, and that of Isa 10:9-11 that Damascus and Samaria had both fallen and Jerusalem was expected to follow. This section of Isaiah may thus be included in the literature of the time of Pekah.
W. Shaw Caldecott
pek-a-hi'-a, pe-ka'-ya (peqachyah, "Yah hath opened" (the eyes) (2 Ki 15:23-26); Phakesias; Codex Alexandrinus Phakeias):
Son of Menahem, and 17th king of Israel. He is said to have succeeded his father in the "50th year of Azariah" (or Uzziah), a synchronism not free from difficulty if his accession is placed in 750-749 (See MENAHEM ;UZZIAH ). Most date lower, after 738, when an Assyrian inscription makes Menahem pay tribute to Tiglath-pileser (compare 2 Ki 15:19-21).
Pekahiah came to the throne enveloped in the danger which always accompanies the successor of an exceptionally strong ruler, in a country where there is not a settled law of succession. Within two years of his accession he was murdered in a foul manner--the 7th king of Israel who had met his death by violence (the others were Nadab, Elah, Tibni, Jehoram, Zechariah and Shallum). The chief conspirator was Pekah, son of Remaliah, one of his captains, with whom, as agent in the crime, were associated 50 Gileadites. These penetrated into the palace (the Revised Version (British and American) "castle") of the king's house, and put Pekahiah to death, his bodyguards, Argob and Arieh, dying with him. The record, in its close adherence to fact, gives no reason for the king's removal, but it may reasonably be surmised that it was connected with a league which was at this time forming for opposing resistance to the power of Assyria. This league, Pekahiah, preferring his father's policy of tributary vassalage, may have refused to join. If so, the decision cost him his life. The act of treachery and violence is in accordance with all that Hosea tells us of the internal condition of Israel at this time: "They .... devour their judges; all their kings are fallen" (Hos 7:7).
The narrative of Pekahiah's short reign contains but a brief notice of his personal character. Like his predecessors, Pekahiah did not depart from the system of worship introduced by Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, "who made Israel to sin." Despite the denunciations of the prophets of the Northern Kingdom (Am 5:21-27; Hos 8:1-6), the worship of the calves remained, till the whole was swept away, a few years later, by the fall of the kingdom.
After Pekahiah's murder, the throne was seized by the regicide Pekah.
W. Shaw Caldecott
pe'-kod (peqodh): A name applied in Jer 50:21 and Ezek 23:23 to the Chaldeans. Various English Versions of the Bible (margins) in the former passage gives the meaning as "visitation."
pe-la'-ya, pe-li'-a (pela'yah):
(1) A son of Elioenai, of the royal house of Judah (1 Ch 3:24).
(2) A Levite who assisted Ezra by expounding the Law (Neh 8:7), and was one of those who sealed the covenant with Nehemiah (10:10). He is called "Phalias" in 1 Esdras 9:48 (Revised Version).
pel-a-li'-a (pelalyah, "Yahweh judges"): A priest, father of Jeroham, one of the "workers" in the Lord's house (Neh 11:12).
pel-a-ti'-a (pelatyah, "Yahweh delivers"):
(1) One who "sealed" the covenant (Neh 10:22).
(2) A descendant of Solomon, grandson of Zerubbabel (1 Ch 3:21).
(3) A Simeonite, one of the captains who cleared out the Amalekites and dwelt on the captured land (1 Ch 4:42,43).
(4) A prince of the people whom Ezekiel (in Babylon) pictures as `devising mischief' and giving `wicked counsel' in Jerusalem. He is represented as falling dead while Ezekiel prophesies (Ezek 11:1,13). His name has the "-u," ending.
pe'-leg (pelegh, "watercourse," "division"): A son of Eber, and brother of Joktan. The derivation of the name is given: "for in his days was the earth divided" (niphleghah) (Gen 10:25; compare Lk 3:35, the King James Version "Phalec"). This probably refers to the scattering of the world's population and the confounding of its language recorded in Gen 11:1-9. In Aramaic pelagh and Arabic phalaj mean "division"; in Hebrew pelegh means "watercourse." The name may really be due to the occupation by this people of some well-watered (furrowed), district (e.g. in Babylonia), for these patronymics represent races, and the derivation in Gen 10:25 is a later editor's remark.
S. F. Hunter
pe'-let (peleT, "deliverance"):
(1) Son of Iahdai (1 Ch 2:47).
(2) Son of Azmaveth, one of those who resorted to David at Ziklag while he was hiding from Saul (1 Ch 12:3).
pe'-leth (peleth, "swiftness"):
(1) Father of On, one of the rebels against Moses and Aaron (Nu 16:1); probably same as PALLU (which see).
(2) A descendant of Jerahmeel (1 Ch 2:33).
pel'-e-thits, pe'-leth-its (pelethi): A company of David's bodyguard, like the CHERETHITES (which see) (2 Sam 8:18; 15:18); probably a corrupt form of "Philistines."
pe-li'-as: the King James Version = the Revised Version (British and American) "Pedias."
pel'-kan (qa'ath; Latin Pelecanus onocrotalus Septuagint reads pelekan, in Leviticus and Psalms, but has 3 other readings, that are rather confusing, in the other places)): Any bird of the genus Pelecanus. The Hebrew qi' means "to vomit." The name was applied to the bird because it swallowed large quantities of fish and then disgorged them to its nestlings. In the performance of this act it pressed the large beak, in the white species, tipped with red, against the crop and slightly lifted the wings. In ancient times, people, seeing this, believed that the bird was puncturing its breast and feeding its young with its blood. From this idea arose the custom of using a pelican with lifted wings in heraldry or as a symbol of Christ and of charity. (See Fictitious Creatures in Art, 182-86, London, Chapman and Hall, 1906.) Palestine knew a white and a brownish-gray bird, both close to 6 ft. long and having over a 12 ft. sweep of wing. They lived around the Dead Sea, fished beside the Jordan and abounded in greatest numbers in the wildernesses of the Mediterranean shore. The brown pelicans were larger than the white. Each of them had a long beak, peculiar throat pouch and webbed feet. They built large nests, 5 and 6 ft. across, from dead twigs of bushes, and laid two or three eggs. The brown birds deposited a creamy-white egg with a rosy flush; the white, a white egg with bluish tints. The young were naked at first, then covered with down, and remained in the nest until full feathered and able to fly. This compelled the parent birds to feed them for a long time, and they carried such quantities of fish to a nest that the young could not consume all of them and many were dropped on the ground. The tropical sun soon made the location unbearable to mortals. Perching pelicans were the ugliest birds imaginable, but when their immense brown or white bodies swept in a 12 ft. spread across the land and over sea, they made an impressive picture. They are included, with good reason, in the list of abominations (See Lev 11:18; Dt 14:17). They are next mentioned in Ps 102:6:
"I am like a pelican of the wilderness;
I am become as an owl of the waste places."
Here David from the depths of affliction likened himself to a pelican as it appears when it perches in the wilderness. See Isa 34:11: "But the pelican and the porcupine shall possess it; and the owl and the raven shall dwell therein: and he will stretch over it the line of confusion, and the plummet of emptiness." Here the bird is used to complete the picture of desolation that was to prevail after the destruction of Edom. The other reference concerns the destruction of Nineveh and is found in Zeph 2:14: "And herds shall lie down in the midst of her, all the beasts of the nations: both the pelican and the porcupine shall lodge in the capitals thereof; their voice shall sing in the windows; desolation shall be in the thresholds: for he hath laid bare the cedar-work."
Gene Stratton-Porter
pel'-ish-tim, pe-lish'-tim (pelishtim (the Revised Version margin of Gen 10:14)).
See PHILISTINES .
pel'-o-nit, pe'-lo-nit, pe-lo'-nit (peloni, a place-name): Two of David's heroes are thus described: (1) "Helez the Pelonite" (1 Ch 11:27) (See PALTITE ); and (2) "Ahijah the Pelonite" (1 Ch 11:36).
(`et, cheret; kalamos): The first writing was done on clay, wax, lead or stone tablets by scratching into the material with some hard pointed instrument. For this purpose bodkins of bronze, iron, bone or ivory were used (Job 19:24; Isa 8:1; Jer 17:1). In Jer 17:1 a diamond is also mentioned as being used for the same purpose. In Jer 36 Baruch, the son of Neriah, declares that he recorded the words of the prophet with ink in the book. In Jer 36:23 it says that the king cut the roll with the penknife (literally, the scribe's knife). This whole scene can best be explained if we consider that Baruch and the king's scribes were in the habit of using reed pens. These pens are made from the hollow jointed stalks of a coarse grass growing in marshy places. The dried reed is cut diagonally with the penknife and the point thus formed is carefully shaved thin to make it flexible and the nib split as in the modern pen. The last operation is the clipping off of the very point so that it becomes a stub pen. The Arab scribe does this by resting the nib on his thumb nail while cutting, so that the cut will be clean and the pen will not scratch. The whole procedure requires considerable skill. The pupil in Hebrew or Arabic writing learns to make a pen as his first lesson. A scribe carries a sharp knife around with him for keeping his pen in good condition, hence, the name penknife. The word used in 3 Jn 1:13 is kalamos, "reed," indicating that the pen described above was used in John's time (compare qalam, the common Arabic name for pen).
Figurative: "Written with a pen of iron," i.e. indelibly (Jer 17:1). "My tongue is the pen of a ready writer" (Ps 45:1; compare Jer 36:18). As the trained writer records a speech, so the Psalmist's tongue impresses or engraves on his hearers' minds what he has conceived.
James A. Patch
pens.
See MONEY .
pen'-sil (Isa 44:13, margin "red ochre," the King James Version "line").
pen'-dant (from French from Latin pendeo, "to hang"): Not in the King James Version. Twice in the Revised Version (British and American). (1) netiphoth (the King James Version "collars"), ornaments of the Midianites captured by Gideon (Jdg 8:26). (2) netiphoth (the King James Version "chains"), an article of feminine apparel (Isa 3:19). The reference seems to be (Cheyne, "Isaiah" Polychrome Bible (HDB, III, 739)) to ear-drops, pearl or gold ornaments resembling a drop of Water, fastened, probably, to the lobe of the ear.
pe-ni'-el, pen'-i-el, pe'-ni-el (peni'el, "face of God"; Eidos theou): This is the form of the name in Gen 32:30. In the next verse and elsewhere it appears as "Penuel." The name is said to have been given to the place by Jacob after his night of wrestling by the Jabbok, because, as he said, "I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved." It was a height evidently close by the stream over which Jacob passed in the morning. Some have thought it might be a prominent cliff, the contour of which resembled a human face. Such a cliff on the seashore to the South of Tripoli was called theou prosopon, "face of God" (Strabo xvi.2,15 f). In later times a city with a strong tower stood upon it. This lay in the line of Gideon's pursuit of the Midianites. When he returned victorious, he beat down the place because of the churlishness of the inhabitants (Jdg 8:8,9,17). It was one of the towns "built" or fortified by Jeroboam (1 Ki 12:25). Merrill would identify it with Telul edh-Dhahab, "hills of gold," two hills with ruins that betoken great antiquity, and that speak of great strength, on the South of the Jabbok, about 10 miles East of Jordan (for description see Merrill, East of the Jordan, 390 if). A difficulty that seems fatal to this identification is that here the banks of the Jabbok are so precipitous as to be impassable. Conder suggests Jebel 'Osha. The site was clearly not far from Succoth; but no certainty is yet possible.
W. Ewing
pe-nin'-a (peninnah, "coral," "pearl"): Second wife of Elkanah, father of Samuel (1 Sam 1:2,4).
pen'-nif (Jer 36:23).
See PEN .
pen'-i (denarion; Latin denarius (which see)): the American Standard Revised Version (Mt 18:28; 20:2,9,10,13, etc.) renders it by "shilling" except in Mt 22:19; Mk 12:15 and Lk 20:24, where it retains the original term as it refers to a particular coin.
pen'-shun (1 Esdras 4:56, the King James Version "and he commanded to give to all that kept the city pensions and wages"; kleros, "allotted portion," usually (here certainly) of lands (the Revised Version (British and American) "lands")): Literally it means simply "payment," and the King James Version seems to have used the word in order to avoid any specialization of kleros. There is no reference to payment for past services.
See LOT .
pen'-ta-tuk:
II. AUTHORSHIP, COMPOSITION, DATE
1. The Current Critical Scheme
2. The Evidence for the Current Critical Scheme
(7) Props of the Development Hypothesis
3. The Answer to the Critical Analysis
(1) The Veto of Textual Criticism
(3) The Narrative Discrepancies and Signs of Post-Mosaic Date Examined
(4) The Argument from the Doublets Examined
(5) The Critical Argument from the Laws
(7) Perplexities of the Theory
(9) The Supposed Props of the Development Hypothesis
(3) The Legal Evidence of Genesis
(4) The Professedly Mosaic Character of the Legislation
(5) The Historical Situation Required by Pentateuch
(6) The Hierarchical Organization in Pentateuch
(7) The Legal Evidence of Pentateuch
5. The Fundamental Improbabilities of the Critical Case
(1) The Moral and Psychological Issues
(2) The Historical Improbability
(3) The Divergence between the Laws and Post-exilic Practice
(4) The Testimony of Tradition
6. The Origin and Transmission of the Pentateuch
1. Textual Criticism and History
2. Hebrew Methods of Expression
3. Personification and Genealogies
8. How Far the Pentateuch Is Trustworthy
(1) Contemporaneous Information
(2) Character of Our Informants
(3) Historical Genius of the People
(5) Nature of the Events Recorded
9. The Pentateuch as Reasoned History
V. THE CHARACTER OF THE PENTATEUCH
LITERATURE
(Torah, "law" or "teaching").--It has recently been argued that the Hebrew word is really the Babylonian tertu, "divinely revealed law" (e.g. Sayce, Churchman, 1909, 728 ff), but such passages as Lev 14:54-57; Dt 17:11 show that the legislator connected it with horah (from yarah), "to teach." Also called by the Jews chamishshah chumeshi torah, "the five-fifths of the law": ho nomos, "the Law." The word "Pentateuch" comes from pentateuchos, literally "5-volumed (book)." The Pentateuch consists of the first five books of the Bible, and forms the first division of the Jewish Canon, and the whole of the Samaritan Canon. The 5-fold division is certainly old, since it is earlier than the Septuagint or the Sam Pentateuch. How much older it may be is unknown. It has been thought that the 5-fold division of the Psalter is based on it.
The five books into which the Pentateuch is divided are respectively Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, and the separate articles should be consulted for information as to their nomenclature.
The work opens with an account of the Creation, and passes to the story of the first human couple. The narrative is carried on partly by genealogies and partly by fuller accounts to Abraham. Then comes a history of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the collateral lines of descendants being rapidly dismissed. The story of Joseph is told in detail, and Genesis closes with his death. The rest of the Pentateuch covers the oppression of the Israelites in Egypt, their exodus and wanderings, the conquest of the trans-Jordanic lands and the fortunes of the people to the death of Moses. The four concluding books contain masses of legislation mingled with the narrative (for special contents, see articles on the several books).
II. Authorship, Composition, Date.
1. The Current Critical Scheme:
The view that Moses was the author of the Pentateuch, with the exception of the concluding verses of Deuteronomy, was once held universally. It is still believed by the great mass of Jews and Christians, but in most universities of Northern Europe and North America other theories prevail. An application of what is called "higher" or "documentary criticism" (to distinguish it from lower or textual criticism) has led to the formation of a number of hypotheses. Some of these are very widely held, but unanimity has not been attained, and recent investigations have challenged even the conclusions that are most generally accepted. In the English-speaking countries the vast majority of the critics would regard Driver's, Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament and Carpenter and Harford-Battersby's Hexateuch as fairly representative of their position, but on the Continent of Europe the numerous school that holds some such position is dwindling alike in numbers and influence, while even in Great Britain and America some of the ablest critics are beginning to show signs of being shaken in their allegiance to cardinal points of the higher-critical case. However, at the time of writing, these latter critics have not put forward any fresh formulation of their views, and accordingly the general positions of the works named may be taken as representing with certain qualifications the general critical theory. Some of the chief stadia in the development of this may be mentioned.
After attention had been drawn by earlier writers to various signs of post-Mosaic date and extraordinary perplexities in the Pentateuch, the first real step toward what its advocates have, till within the last few years, called "the modern position" was taken by J. Astruc (1753). He propounded what Carpenter terms "the clue to the documents," i.e. the difference of the divine appellations in Genesis as a test of authorship. On this view the word 'Elohim ("God") is characteristic of one principal source and the Tetragrammaton, i.e. the divine name YHWH represented by the "LORD" or "GOD" of the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American), shows the presence of another. Despite occasional warnings, this clue was followed in the main for 150 years. It forms the starting-point of the whole current critical development, but the most recent investigations have successfully proved that it is unreliable (see below, 3, (2)) Astruc was followed by Eichhorn (1780), who made a more thorough examination of Genesis, indicating numerous differences of style, representation, etc.
Geddes (1792) and Vater (1802-1805) extended the method applied to Genesis to the other books of the Pentateuch.
In 1798 Ilgen distinguished two Elohists in Genesis, but this view did not find followers for some time. The next step of fundamental importance was the assignment of the bulk of Deuteronomy to the 7th century BC. This was due to De Wette (1806). Hupfeld (1853) again distinguished a second Elohist, and this has been accepted by most critics. Thus, there are four main documents at least: D (the bulk of Deuteronomy), two Elohists (P and E) and one document (Jahwist) that uses the Tetragrammaton in Genesis. From 1822 (Bleek) a series of writers maintained that the Book of Joshua was compounded from the same documents as the Pentateuch (See HEXATEUCH ).
Two other developments call for notice: (1) there has been a tendency to subdivide these documents further, regarding them as the work of schools rather than of individuals, and resolving them into different strata (P1, Secondary Priestly Writers, P3, etc., J1, Later additions to J, etc., or in the notation of other writers Jj Je, etc.); (2) a particular scheme of dating has found wide acceptance. In the first period of the critical development it was assumed that the principal Elohist (P) was the earliest document. A succession of writers of whom Reuss, Graf, Kuenen and Wellhausen are the most prominent have, however, maintained that this is not the first but the last in point of time and should be referred to the exile or later. On this view theory is in outline as follows: J and E (so called from their respective divine appellations)--on the relative dates of which opinions differ--were composed probably during the early monarchy and subsequently combined by a redactor (Rje) into a single document JE. In the 7th century D, the bulk of Deuteronomy, was composed. It was published in the 18th year of Josiah's reign. Later it was combined with JE into JED by a redactor (Rjed). P or Priestly Code the last of all (originally the first Elohist, now the Priestly Code) incorporated an earlier code of uncertain date which consists in the main of most of Lev 17-26 and is known as the Law of Holiness (H or Ph). P itself is largely postexilic. Ultimately it was joined with JED by a priestly redactor (Rp) into substantially our present Pentateuch. As already stated, theory is subject to many minor variations. Moreover, it is admitted that not all its portions are equally well supported. The division of JE into J and E is regarded as less certain than the separation of Pentateuch. Again, there are variations in the analysis, differences of opinion as to the exact dating of the documents, and so forth. Yet the view just sketched has been held by a very numerous and influential school during recent years, nor is it altogether fair to lay stress on minor divergences of opinion. It is in the abstract conceivable that the main positions might be true, and that yet the data were inadequate to enable all the minor details to be determined with certainty.
See CRITICISM OF THE BIBLE .
This theory will hereafter be discussed at length for two reasons: (1) while it is now constantly losing ground, it is still more widely held than any other; and (2) so much of the modern literature on the Old Testament has been written from this standpoint that no intelligent use can be made of the most ordinary books of reference without some acquaintance with it.
Before 1908 the conservative opposition to the dominant theory had exhibited two separate tendencies. One school of conservatives rejected the scheme in toto; the other accepted the analysis with certain modifications, but sought to throw back the dating of the documents. In both these respects it had points of contact with dissentient critics (e.g. Delitzsch, Dillmann, Baudissin, Kittel, Strack, Van Hoonacker), who sought to save for conservatism any spars they could from the general wreckage. The former school of thought was most prominently represented by the late W.H. Green, and J.
Raven's Old Testament Introduction may be regarded as a typical modern presentation of their view; the latter especially by Robertson and Orr. The scheme put forward by the last named has found many adherents. He refuses to regard J and E as two separate documents, holding that we should rather think (as in the case of the parallel Psalms) of two recensions of one document marked by the use of different divine appellations. The critical P he treats as the work of a supplemented, and thinks it never had an independent existence, while he considers the whole Pentateuch as early. He holds that the work was done by "original composers, working with a common aim, and toward a common end, in contrast with the idea of late irresponsible redactors, combining, altering, manipulating, enlarging at pleasure" (POT, 375).
While these were the views held among Old Testament critics, a separate opposition had been growing up among archaeologists. This was of course utilized to the utmost by the conservatives of both wings. In some ways archaeology undoubtedly has confirmed the traditional view as against the critical (See ARCHAEOLOGY AND CRITICISM ); but a candid survey leads to the belief that it has not yet dealt a mortal blow, and here again it must be remembered that the critics may justly plead that they must not be judged on mistakes that they made in their earlier investigations or on refutations of the more uncertain portions of their theory, but rather on the main completed result. It may indeed be said with confidence that there are certain topics to which archaeology can never supply any conclusive answer. If it be the case that the Pentateuch contains hopelessly contradictory laws, no archaeological discovery can make them anything else; if the numbers of the Israelites are original and impossible, archaeology cannot make them possible. It is fair and right to lay stress on the instances in which archaeology has confirmed the Bible as against the critics; it is neither fair nor right to speak as if archaeology had done what it never purported to do and never could effect.
The year 1908 saw the beginning of a new critical development which makes it very difficult to speak positively of modern critical views. Kuenen has been mentioned as one of the ablest and most eminent of those who brought the Graf-Wellhausen theory into prominence. In that year B.D. Eerdmans, his pupil and successor at Leyden, began the publication of a series of Old Testament studies in which he renounces his allegiance to the line of critics that had extended from Astruc to the publications of our own day, and entered on a series of investigations that were intended to set forth a new critical view. As his labors are not yet complete, it is impossible to present any account of his scheme; but the volumes already published justify certain remarks. Eerdmans has perhaps not converted any member of the Wellhausen school, but he has made many realize that their own scheme is not the only one possible. Thus while a few years ago we were constantly assured that the "main results" of Old Testament criticism were unalterably settled, recent writers adopt a very different tone: e.g. Sellin (1910) says, "We stand in a time of fermentation and transition, and in what follows we present our own opinion merely as the hypothesis which appears to us to be the best founded" (Einleitung, 18). By general consent Eerdmans' work contains a number of isolated shrewd remarks to which criticism will have to attend in the future; but it also contains many observations that are demonstrably unsound (for examples See BS , 1909, 744-48; 1910, 549-51). His own reconstruction is in many respects so faulty and blurred that it does not seem likely that it will ever secure a large following in its present form. On the other hand he appears to have succeeded in inducing a large number of students in various parts of the world to think along new lines and in this way may exercise a very potent influence on the future course of Old Testament study. His arguments show increasingly numerous signs of his having been influenced by the publications of conservative writers, and it seems certain that criticism will ultimately be driven to recognize the essential soundness of the conservative position. In 1912 Dahse (TMH, I) began the publication of a series of volumes attacking the Wellhausen school on textual grounds and propounding a new pericope hypothesis. In his view many phenomena are due to the influence of the pericopes of the synagogue service or the form of the text and not to the causes generally assigned.
2. The Evidence for the Current Critical Scheme:
The examination of the Graf-Wellhausen theory must now be undertaken, and attention must first be directed to the evidence which is adduced in its support. Why should it be held that the Pentateuch is composed mainly of excerpts from certain documents designated as J and E and P and D? Why is it believed that these documents are of very late date, in one case subsequent to the exile?
It has been said above that Astruc propounded the use of the divine appellations in Genesis as a clue to the dissection of that book. This is based on Ex 6:3, `And I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, as 'El Shadday (God Almighty); but by my name YHWH I was not known to them.' In numerous passages of Genesis this name is represented as known, e.g. 4:26, where we read of men beginning to call on it in the days of Enosh. The discrepancy here is very obvious, and in the view of the Astruc school can be satisfactorily removed by postulating different sources. This clue, of course, fails after Ex 6:3, but other difficulties are found, and moreover the sources already distinguished in Genesis are, it is claimed, marked by separate styles and other characteristics which enable them to be identified when they occur in the narrative of the later books.
See CRITICISM OF THE BIBLE .
(2) Signs of Post-Mosaic Date.
Close inspection of the Pentateuch shows that it contains a number of passages which, it is alleged, could not have proceeded from the pen of Moses in their present form. Probably the most familiar instance is the account of the death of Moses (Dt 34). Other examples are to be found in seeming allusions to post-Mosaic events, e.g. in Gen 22 we hear of the Mount of the Lord in the land of Moriah; this apparently refers to the Temple Hill, which, however, would not have been so designated before Solomon. So too the list of kings who reigned over Edom "before there reigned any king over the children of Israel" (36:31) presumes the existence of the monarchy. The Canaanites who are referred to as being "then in the land" (Gen 12:6; 13:7) did not disappear till the time of Solomon, and, accordingly, if this expression means "then still" it cannot antedate his reign. Dt 3:11 (Og's bedstead) comes unnaturally from one who had vanquished Og but a few weeks previously, while Nu 21:14 (the King James Version) contains a reference to "the book of the Wars of the Lord" which would hardly have been quoted in this way by a contemporary. Ex 16:35 refers to the cessation of the manna after the death of Moses. These passages, and more like them, are cited to disprove Mosaic authorship; but the main weight of the critical argument does not rest on them.
While the divine appellations form the starting-point, they do not even in Genesis constitute the sole test of different documents. On the contrary, there are other narrative discrepancies, antinomies, differences of style, duplicate narratives, etc., adduced to support the critical theory. We must now glance at some of these.
In Gen 21:14 f Ishmael is a boy who can be carried on his mother's shoulder, but from a comparison of 16:3,16; 17, it appears that he must have been 14 when Isaac was born, and, since weaning sometimes occurs at the age of 3 in the East, may have been even as old as 17 when this incident happened. Again, "We all remember the scene (Gen 27) in which Isaac in extreme old age blesses his sons; we picture him as lying on his deathbed. Do we, however, all realize that according to the chronology of the Book of Genesis he must have been thus lying on his deathbed for eighty years (compare 25:26; 26:34; 35:28)? Yet we can only diminish this period by extending proportionately the interval between Esau marrying his Hittite wives (26:34) and Rebekah's suggestion to Isaac to send Jacob away, lest he should follow his brother's example (27:46); which, from the nature of the case, will not admit of any but slight extension. Keil, however, does so extend it, reducing the period of Isaac's final illness by 43 years, and is conscious of no incongruity in supposing that Rebekah, 30 years after Esau had taken his Hittite wives, should express her fear that Jacob, then aged 77, will do the same" (Driver, Contemporary Review, LVII, 221).
An important instance occurs in Numbers. According to 33:38, Aaron died on the 1st day of the 5th month. From Dt 1:3 it appears that 6 months later Moses delivered his speech in the plains of Moab. Into those 6 months are compressed one month's mourning for Aaron, the Arad campaign, the wandering round by the Red Sea, the campaigns against Sihon and Og, the missions to Balaam and the whole episode of his prophecies, the painful occurrences of Nu 25, the second census, the appointment of Joshua, the expedition against Midian, besides other events. It is clearly impossible to fit all these into the time.
Other discrepancies are of the most formidable character. Aaron dies now at Mt. Hor (Nu 20:28; 33:38), now at Moserah (Dt 10:6). According to Dt 1; 2:1,14, the children of Israel left Kadesh-barnea in the 3rd year and never subsequently returned to it, while in Nu they apparently remain there till the journey to Mt. Hor, where Aaron dies in the 40th year. The Tent of Meeting perhaps
provides some of the most perplexing of the discrepancies, for while according to the well-known scheme of Ex 25 ff and many other passages, it was a large and heavy erection standing in the midst of the camp, Ex 33:7-11 provides us with another Tent of Meeting that stood outside the camp at a distance and could be carried by Moses alone. The verbs used are frequentative, denoting a regular practice, and it is impossible to suppose that after receiving the commands for the Tent of Meeting Moses could have instituted a quite different tent of the same name. Joseph again is sold, now by Ishmaelites (Gen 37:27,28b; 39:1), anon by Midianites (31:28a,36). Sometimes he is imprisoned in one place, sometimes apparently in another. The story of Korah, Dathan and Abiram in Nu 16 is equally full of difficulty. The enormous numbers of the Israelites given in Nu 1 through 4, etc., are in conflict with passages that regard them as very few.
Another portion of the critical argument is provided by doublets or duplicate narratives of the same event, e.g. Gen 16 and 21. These are particularly numerous in Genesis, but are not confined to that book. "Twice do quails appear in connection with the daily manna (Nu 11:4-6,31 ff; Ex 16:13). Twice does Moses draw water from the rock, when the strife of Israel begets the name Meribah (`strife') (Ex 17:1-7; Nu 20:1-13)" (Carpenter, Hexateuch, I, 30).
Most stress is laid on the argument from the laws and their supposed historical setting. By far the most important portions of this are examined in SANCTUARY and PRIESTS AND LEVITES. These subjects form the two main pillars of the Graf-Wellhausen theory, and accordingly the articles in question must be read as supplementing the present article. An illustration may be taken from the slavery laws. It is claimed that Ex 21:1-6; Dt 15:12 ff permit a Hebrew to contract for life slavery after 6 years' service, but that Lev 25:39-42 takes no notice of this law and enacts the totally different provision that Hebrews may remain in slavery only till the Year of Jubilee. While these different enactments might proceed from the same hand if properly coordinated, it is contended that this is not the case and that the legislator in Lev ignores the legislator in Exodus and is in turn ignored by the legislator in Deuteronomy, who only knows the law of Exodus.
The argument from style is less easy to exemplify shortly, since it depends so largely on an immense mass of details. It is said that each of the sources has certain characteristic phrases which either occur nowhere else or only with very much less frequency. For instance in Gen 1, where 'Elohim is used throughout, we find the word "create," but this is not employed in 2:4b ff, where the Tetragrammaton occurs. Hence, it is argued that this word is peculiarly characteristic of P as contrasted with the other documents, and may be used to prove his presence in e.g. 5:1 f.
(7) Props of the Development Hypothesis.
While the main supports of the Graf-Wellhausen theory must be sought in the articles to which reference has been made, it is necessary to mention briefly some other phenomena to which some weight is attached. Jeremiah displays many close resemblances to Deuteronomy, and the framework of Kings is written in a style that has marked similarities to the same book. Ezekiel again has notable points of contact with P and especially with H; either he was acquainted with these portions of the Pentateuch or else he must have exercised considerable influence on those who composed them. Lastly the Chronicler is obviously acquainted with the completed Pentateuch. Accordingly, it is claimed that the literature provides a sort of external standard that confirms the historical stages which the different Pentateuchal sources are said to mark. Deuteronomy influences Jeremiah and the subsequent literature. It is argued that it would equally have influenced the earlier books, had it then existed. So too the completed Pentateuch should have influenced Kings as it did Chronicles, if it had been in existence when the earlier history was composed.
3. Answer to the Critical Analysis:
(1) The Veto of Textual Criticism.
The first great objection that may be made to the higher criticism is that it starts from the Massoretic text (MT) without investigation. This is not the only text that has come down to us, and in some instances it can be shown that alternative readings that have been preserved are superior to those of the Massoretic Text. A convincing example occurs in Ex 18. According to the Hebrew, Jethro comes to Moses and says "I, thy father-in-law .... am come," and subsequently Moses goes out to meet his father-in-law. The critics here postulate different sources, but some of the best authorities have preserved a reading which (allowing for ancient differences of orthography) supposes an alteration of a single letter. According to this reading the text told how one (or they) came to Moses and said "Behold thy father-in-law .... is come." As the result of this Moses went out and met Jethro. The vast improvement in the sense is self-evident. But in weighing the change other considerations must be borne in mind. Since this is the reading of some of the most ancient authorities, only two views are possible. Either the Massoretic Text has undergone a corruption of a single letter, or else a redactor made a most improbable cento of two documents which gave a narrative of the most doubtful sense. Fortunately this was followed by textual corruption of so happy a character as to remove the difficulty by the change of a single letter; and this corruption was so widespread that it was accepted as the genuine text by some of our best authorities. There can be little doubt which of these two cases is the more credible, and with the recognition of the textual solution the particular bit of the analysis that depends on this corruption falls to the ground. This instance illustrates one branch of textual criticism; there are others. Sometimes the narrative shows with certainty that in the transmission of the text transpositions have taken place; e.g. the identification of Kadesh shows that it was South of Hormah. Consequently, a march to compass Edom by way of the Red Sea would not bring the Israelites to Hormah. Here there is no reason to doubt that the events narrated are historically true, but there is grave reason to doubt that they happened in the present order of the narrative. Further, Deuteronomy gives an account that is parallel to certain passages of Numbers; and it confirms those passages, but places the events in a different order. Such difficulties may often be solved by simple transpositions, and when transpositions in the text of Nu are made under the guidance of Deuteronomy they have a very different probability from guesses that enjoy no such sanction. Another department of textual criticism deals with the removal of glosses, i.e. notes that have crept into the text. Here the ancient versions often help us, one or other omitting some words which may be proved from other sources to be a later addition. Thus in Ex 17:7 the Vulgate (Jerome's Latin Bible, 390-405 A.D.) did not know the expression, "and Meribah" (one word in Hebrew), and calls the place "Massah" simply. This is confirmed by the fact that Deuteronomy habitually calls the place Massah (6:16; 9:22; 33:8). The true Meribah was Kadesh (Nu 20) and a glossator has here added this by mistake (see further (4) below). Thus we can say that a scientific textual criticism often opposes a real veto to the higher critical analysis by showing that the arguments rest on late corruptions and by explaining the true origin of the difficulties on which the critics rely.
Astruc's clue must next be examined. The critical case breaks down with extraordinary frequency. No clean division can be effected, i.e. there are cases where the Massoretic Text of Genesis makes P or E use the Tetragrammaton (YHWH) or J Yahweh (Yahweh). In some of these cases the critics can suggest no reason; in others they are compelled to assume that the Massoretic Text is corrupt for no better reason than that it is in conflict with their theory. Again the exigencies of the theory frequently force the analyst to sunder verses or phrases that cannot be understood apart from their present contexts, e.g. in Gen 28:21 Carpenter assigns the words "and Yahweh will be my God" to J while giving the beginning and end of the verse to E; in Genesis 31, verse 3 goes to a redactor, though E actually refers to the statement of 31:3 in verse 5; in Genesis 32, verse 30 is torn from a J-context and given to E, thus leaving 32:31 (Jahwist) unintelligible. When textual criticism is applied, startling facts that entirely shatter the higher critical argument are suddenly revealed. The variants to the divine appellations in Genesis are very numerous, and in some instances the new readings are clearly superior to the Massoretic Text, even when they substitute 'Elohim for the Tetragrammaton. Thus, in 16:11, the explanation of the name Ishmael requires the word 'Elohim, as the name would otherwise have been Ishmayah, and one Hebrew MS, a recension of the Septuagint and the Old Latin do in fact preserve the reading 'Elohim. The full facts and arguments cannot be given here, but Professor Schlogl has made an exhaustive examination of the various texts from Gen 1:1 to Ex 3:12. Out of a total of 347 occurrences of one or both words in the Massoretic Text of that passage, there are variants in 196 instances. A very important and detailed discussion, too long to be summarized here will now be found in TMH, I. Wellhausen himself has admitted that the textual evidence constitutes a sore point of the documentary theory (Expository Times, XX, 563). Again in Ex 6:3, many of the best authorities read "I was not made known" instead of "I was not known" a difference of a single letter in Hebrew. But if this be right, there is comparative evidence to suggest that to the early mind a revelation of his name by a deity meant a great deal more than a mere knowledge of the name, and involved rather a pledge of his power. Lastly the analysis may be tested in yet another way by inquiring whether it fits in with the other data, and when it is discovered (see below 4, (1)) that it involves ascribing, e.g. a passage that cannot be later than the time of Abraham to the period of the kingdom, it becomes certain that the clue and the method are alike misleading (see further EPC , chapter i; Expository Times, XX , 378 f, 473-75, 563; TMH , I; PS , 49-142; BS , 1913, 145-74; A. Troelstra, The Name of God, NKZ, XXIV (1913), 119-48; The Expositor, 1913).
(3) The Narrative Discrepancies and Signs of Post-Mosaic Date Examined.
Septuagintal manuscripts are providing very illuminating material for dealing with the chronological difficulties. It is well known that the Septuagint became corrupt and passed through various recensions (See SEPTUAGINT ). The original text has not yet been reconstructed, but as the result of the great variety of recensions it happens that our various manuscripts present a wealth of alternative readings. Some of these show an intrinsic superiority to the corresponding readings of the Massoretic Text. Take the case of Ishmael's age. We have seen (above, 2, (3)) that although in Gen 21:14 f he is a boy who can be carried by his mother even after the weaning of Isaac, his father, according to 16:3,16, was 86 years old at the time of his birth, and, according to Genesis 17, 100 years old when Isaac was born. In 17:25 we find that Ishmael is already 13 a year before Isaac's birth. Now we are familiar with marginal notes that set forth a system of chronology in many printed English Bibles. In this case the Septuagintal variants suggest that something similar is responsible for the difficulty of our Hebrew. Two manuscripts, apparently representing a recension, omit the words, "after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan" in 16:3, and again, 16:16, while in 17:25 there is a variant making Ishmael only 3 years old. If these readings are correct it is easy to see how the difficulty arose. The narrative originally contained mere round numbers, like 100 years old, and these were not intended to be taken literally. A commentator constructed a scheme of chronology which was embodied in marginal notes. Then these crept into the text and such numbers as were in conflict with them were thought to be corrupt and underwent alteration. Thus the 3-year-old Ishmael became 13.
The same manuscripts that present us with the variants in Gen 16 have also preserved a suggestive reading in 35:28, one of the passages that are responsible for the inference that according to the text of Genesis Isaac lay on his deathbed for 80 years (see above, 2, (3)). According to this Isaac was not 180, but 150 years old when he died. It is easy to see that this is a round number, not to be taken literally, but this is not the only source of the difficulty. In 27:41, Esau, according to English Versions of the Bible, states "The days of mourning for my father are at hand; then will I slay my brother Jacob." This is a perfectly possible rendering of the Hebrew, but the Septuagint translated the text differently, and its rendering, while grammatically correct, has the double advantage of avoiding Isaac's long lingering on a deathbed and of presenting Esau's hatred and ferocity far more vividly. It renders, "May the days of mourning for my father approach that I may slay my brother Jacob." Subsequent translators preferred the milder version, but doubtless the Septuagint has truly apprehended the real sense of the narrative. If we read the chapter with this modification, we see Isaac as an old man, not knowing when he may die, performing the equivalent of making his will. It puts no strain on our credulity to suppose that he may have lived 20 or 30 years longer. Such episodes occur constantly in everyday experience. As to the calculations based on Gen 25:26 and 26:34, the numbers used are 60 and 40, which, as is well known, were frequently employed by the ancient Hebrews, not as mathematical expressions, but simply to denote unknown or unspecified periods.
See NUMBER .
The other chronological difficulty cited above (namely, that there is not room between the date of Aaron's death and the address by Moses in the plains of Moab for all the events assigned to this period by Numbers) is met partly by a reading preserved by the Peshitta and partly by a series of transpositions. In Nu 33:38 Peshitta reads "first" for "fifth" as the month of Aaron's death, thus recognizing a longer period for the subsequent events. The transpositions, however, which are largely due to the evidence of Deuteronomy, solve the most formidable and varied difficulties; e.g. a southerly march from Kadesh no longer conducts the Israelites to Arad in the north, the name Hormah is no longer used (Nu 14:45) before it is explained (Nu 21:3), there is no longer an account directly contradicting Dt and making the Israelites spend 38 years at Kadesh immediately after receiving a divine command to turn "tomorrow" (Nu 14:25). A full discussion is impossible here and will be found in EPC, 114-38. The order of the narrative that emerges as probably original is as follows: Nu 12; 20:1,14-21; 21:1-3; 13; 14; 16 through 18; 20:2-13,12a; 21:4b-9, then some missing vs, bringing the Israelites to the head of the Gulf of Akabah and narrating the turn northward from Elath and Ezion-geber, then 20:22b-29; 21:4a, and some lost words telling of the arrival at the station before Oboth. In Nu 33:40 is a gloss that is missing in Lagarde's Septuagint, and 33:36b-37a should probably come earlier in the chapter than they do at present.
Another example of transposition is afforded by Ex 33:7-11, the passage relating to the Tent of Meeting which is at present out of place (see above 2, (3)). It is supposed that this is E's idea of the Tabernacle, but that, unlike the Priestly Code (P), he places it outside the camp and makes Joshua its priest. This latter view is discussed and refuted in PRIESTS AND LEVITES, sec. 3, where it is shown that Ex 33:7 should be rendered "And Moses used to take a (or, the) tent and pitch it for himself," etc. As to theory that this is E's account of the Tabernacle, Ex 18 has been overlooked. This chapter belongs to the same E but refers to the end of the period spent at Horeb, i.e. it is later than 33:7-11. In 18:13-16 we find Moses sitting with all the people standing about him because they came to require of God; i.e. the business which according to Ex 33 was transacted in solitude outside the camp was performed within the camp in the midst of the people at a later period. This agrees with the Priestly Code (P), e.g. Nu 27. If now we look at the other available clues, it appears that Ex 33:11 seems to introduce Joshua for the first time. The passage should therefore precede 17:8-15; 24:13; 32:17, where he is already known. Again, if Ex 18 refers to the closing scenes at Horeb (as it clearly does), Ex 24:14 providing for the temporary transaction of judicial business reads very strangely. It ought to be preceded by some statement of the ordinary course in normal times when Moses was not absent from the camp. Ex 33:7 ff provides such a statement. The only earlier place to which it can be assigned is after 13:22, but there it fits the context marvelously, for the statements as to the pillar of cloud in 33:9 f attach naturally to those in 13:21 f. With this change all the difficulties disappear. Immediately after leaving Egypt Moses began the practice of carrying a tent outside the camp and trying cases there. This lasted till the construction of the Tabernacle. "And there I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee" (Ex 25:22). After its erection the earlier tent was disused, and the court sat at the door of the Tabernacle in the center of the camp (see, further, EPC, 93-102, 106 f) .
Some other points must be indicated more briefly. In Nu 16 important Septuagintal variants remove the main difficulties by substituting "company of Korah" for "dwelling of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram" in two verses (See EPC , 143-46). Similarly in the Joseph-story the perplexities have arisen through corruptions of verses which may still be corrected by the versional evidence (PS, 29-48). There is evidence to show that the numbers of the Israelites are probably due to textual corruption (EPC, 155-69). Further, there are numerous passages where careful examination has led critics themselves to hold that particular verses are later notes. In this way they dispose of Dt 10:6 f (Aaron's death, etc.), the references to the Israelirish kingdom (Gen 36:31) and the Canaanites as being "then" in the land (Gen 12:6; 13:7), the bedstead of Og (Dt 3:11) and other passages. In Gen 22, "the land of Moriah" is unknown to the versions which present the most diverse readings, of which "the land of the Amorite" is perhaps the most probable; while in 22:14 the Septuagint, reading the same Hebrew consonants as Massoretic Text, translates "In the Mount the Lord was seen." This probably refers to a view that God manifested Himself especially in the mountains (compare 1 Ki 20:23,28) and has no reference whatever to the Temple Hill. The Massoretic pointing is presumably due to a desire to avoid what seemed to be an anthropomorphism (see further PS , 19-21) . Again, in Nu 21:14, the Septuagint knows nothing of "a book of the Wars of Yahweh" (see Field, Hexapla, at the place). It is difficult to tell what the original reading was, especially as the succeeding words are corrupt in the Hebrew, but it appears that no genitive followed wars" and it is doubtful if there was any reference to a "book of wars."
(4) The Argument from the Doublets Examined.
The foregoing sections show that the documentary theory often depends on phenomena that were absent from the original Pentateuch. We are now to examine arguments that rest on other foundations. The doublets have been cited, but when we examine the instances more carefully, some curious facts emerge. Gen 16 and 21 are, to all appearance, narratives of different events; so are Ex 17:1-7 and Nu 20:1-13 (the drawing of water from rocks). In the latter case the critics after rejecting this divide the passages into 5 different stories, two going to J, two to E and one to Pentateuch. If the latter also had a Rephidimnarrative (compare Nu 33:14 P), there were 6 tales. In any case both J and E tell two stories each. It is impossible to assign any cogency to the argument that the author of the Pentateuch could not have told two such narratives, if not merely the redactor of the Pentateuch but also J and E could do so. The facts as to the manna stories are similar. As to the flights of quails, it is known that these do in fact occur every year, and the Pentateuch places them at almost exactly a year's interval (See EPC , 104 f, 109 f).
(5) The Critical Argument from the Laws.
The legal arguments are due to a variety of misconceptions, the washing out of the historical background and the state of the text. Reference must be made to the separate articles (especially SANCTUARY; PRIESTS AND LEVITES). As the slave laws were cited, it may be explained that in ancient Israel as in other communities slavery could arise or slaves be acquired in many ways: e.g. birth, purchase (Gen 14:14; 17:12, etc.), gift (Gen 20:14), capture in war (Gen 14:21; 34:29), kidnapping (Joseph). The law of Exodus and Deuteronomy applies only to Hebrew slaves acquired by purchase, not to slaves acquired in any other way, and least of all to those who in the eye of the law were not true slaves. Lev 25 has nothing to do with Hebrew slaves. It is concerned merely with free Israelites who become insolvent. "If thy brother be waxed poor with thee, and sell himself" it begins (25:39). Nobody who was already a slave could wax poor and sell himself. The law then provides that these insolvent freemen were not to be treated as slaves. In fact, they were a class of free bondsmen, i.e. they were full citizens who were compelled to perform certain duties. A similar class of free bondsmen existed in ancient Rome and were called nexi. The Egyptians who sold themselves to Pharaoh and became serfs afford another though less apt parallel In all ancient societies insolvency led to some limitations of freedom, but while in some full slavery ensued, in others a sharp distinction was drawn between the slave and the insolvent freeman (see further SBL , 5-11 ).
Just as this argument is too detailed to be set out in a work like the present, so the answer cannot be given with any degree of fullness. It may be said generally that the argument too frequently neglects differences of subject-matter and other sufficient reasons (such as considerations of euphony and slight variations of meaning) which often provide far more natural reasons for the phenomena observed. Again, the versions suggest that the Biblical text has been heavily glossed. Thus in many passages where the frequent recurrence of certain words and phrases is supposed to attest the presence of the Priestly Code (P), versional evidence seems to show that the expressions in question have been introduced by glossators, and when they are removed the narrative remains unaffected in meaning, but terser and more vigorous and greatly improved as a vehicle of expression. To take a simple instance in Gen 23:1, "And the life of Sarah was a hundred and seven and twenty years: .... the years of the fife of Sarah," the italicized words were missing in the Septuagint. When they are removed the meaning is unaltered, but the form of expression is far superior. They are obviously mere marginal note. Again the critical method is perpetually breaking down. It constantly occurs that redactors have to be called in to remove from a passage attributed to some source expressions that are supposed to be characteristic of another source, and this is habitually done on no other ground than that theory requires it. One instance muse be given. It is claimed that the word "create" is a P-word. It occurs several times in Gen 1:1 through 2:4a and 3 times in Gen 5:1,2, but in 6:7 it is found in a J-passage, and some critics therefore assign it to a redactor. Yet J undoubtedly uses the word in Nu 16:30 and D in Dt 4:82. On the other hand, P does not use the word exclusively, even in Gen 1 through 2:4, the word "make" being employed in 1:7,25,26,31; 2:2, while in 2:3 both words are combined. Yet all these passages are given unhesitatingly to P.
(7) Perplexities of the Theory.
The perplexities of the critical hypothesis are very striking, but a detailed discussion is impossible here. Much material will, however, be found in POT and Eerd. A few general statements may be made. The critical analysis repeatedly divides a straightforward narrative into two sets of fragments, neither of which will make sense without the other. A man will go to sleep in one document and wake in another, or a subject will belong to one source and the predicate to another. No intelligible account can be given of the proceedings of the redactors who one moment slavishly preserve their sources and at another cut them about without any necessity, who now rewrite their material and now leave it untouched. Even in the ranks of the Wellhausen critics chapters will be assigned by one writer to the post-exilic period and by another to the earliest sources (e.g. Gen 14, pre-Mosaic in the main according to Sellin (1910), post-exilic according to others), and the advent of Eerdmans and Dahse has greatly increased the perplexity. Clue after clue, both stylistic and material, is put forward, to be abandoned silently at some later stage. Circular arguments are extremely common: it is first alleged that some phenomenon is characteristic of a particular source; then passages are referred to that source for no other reason than the presence of that phenomenon; lastly these passages are cited to prove that the phenomenon in question distinguishes the source. Again theory is compelled to feed on itself; for J, E, the Priestly Code (P), etc., we have schools of J's, E's, etc., subsisting side by side for centuries, using the same material, employing the same ideas, yet remaining separate in minute stylistic points. This becomes impossible when viewed in the light of the evidences of pre-Mosaic date in parts of Genesis (see below 4, (1) to (3)).
It is often possible to produce very convincing internal evidence of the unity of what the critics sunder. A strong instance of this is to be found when one considers the characters portrayed. The character of Abraham or Laban, Jacob or Moses is essentially unitary. There is but one Abraham, and this would not be so if we really had a cento of different documents representing the results of the labor of various schools during different centuries. Again, there are sometimes literary marks of unity, e.g. in Nu 16, the effect of rising anger is given to the dialogue by the repetition of "Ye take too much upon you" (16:3,7), followed by the repetition of "Is it a small thing that" (16:9,13). This must be the work of a single literary artist (see further SBL , 37 f).
(9) The Supposed Props of the Development Hypothesis.
When we turn to the supposed props of the development hypothesis we see that there is nothing conclusive in the critical argument. Jeremiah and the subsequent literature certainly exhibit the influence of Deuteronomy, but a Book of the Law was admittedly found in Josiah's reign and had lain unread for at any rate some considerable time. Some of its requirements had been in actual operation, e.g. in Naboth's case, while others had become a dead letter. The circumstances of its discovery, the belief in its undoubted Mosaic authenticity and the subsequent course of history led to its greatly influencing contemporary and later writers, but that really proves nothing. Ezekiel again was steeped in priestly ideas, but it is shown in PRIESTS AND LEVITES, sec. 5b, how this may be explained. Lastly, Chronicles certainly knows the whole Pentateuch, but as certainly misinterprets it (See PRIESTS AND LEVITES ). On the other hand the Pentateuch itself always represents portions of the legislation as being intended to reach the people only through the priestly teaching, and this fully accounts for P's lack of influence on the earlier literature. As to the differences of style within the Pentateuch itself, something is said in III, below. Hence, this branch of the critical argument really proves nothing, for the phenomena are susceptible of more than one explanation.
Entirely different lines of argument are provided by the abundant internal evidences of date. In Gen 10:19, we read the phrase "as thou goest toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and Admah and Zeboiim" in a definition of boundary. Such language could only have originated when the places named actually existed. One does not define boundaries by reference to towns that are purely mythical or have been overthrown many centuries previously. The consistent tradition is that these towns were destroyed in the lifetime of Abraham, and the passage therefore cannot be later than his age. But the critics assign it to a late stratum of J, i.e. to a period at least 1,000 years too late. This suggests several comments. First, it may reasonably be asked whether much reliance can be placed on a method which after a century and a half of the closest investigation does not permit its exponents to arrive at results that are correct to within 1,000 years. Secondly, it shows clearly that in the composition of the Pentateuch very old materials were incorporated in their original language. Of the historical importance of this fact more will be said in IV; in this connection we must observe that it throws fresh light on expressions that point to the presence, in Genesis of sources composed in Palestine, e.g. "the sea" for "the West" indicates the probability of a Palestinian source, but once it is proved that we have materials as old as the time of Abraham such expressions do not argue post-Mosaic, but rather pre-Mosaic authorship. Thirdly, the passage demolishes theory of schools of J's, etc. It cannot seriously be maintained that there was a school of J's writing a particular style marked by the most delicate and subjective criteria subsisting continuously for some 10 or 12 centuries from the time of Abraham onward, side by side with other writers with whom its members never exchanged terms of even such common occurrence as "handmaid."
Gen 10:19 is not the only passage of this kind. In 2:14 we read of the Hiddekel (Tigris) as flowing East of Assur, though there is an alternative reading "in front of." If the translation "east" be correct, the passage must antedate the 13th century BC, for Assur, the ancient capital, which was on the west bank of the Tigris, was abandoned at about that date for Kalkhi on the East.
Closely connected with the foregoing are cases where Genesis has preserved information that is true of a very early time only. Thus in 10:22 Elam figures as a son of Shem. The historical Elam was, however, an Aryan people. Recently inscriptions have been discovered which show that in very early times Elam really was inhabited by Semites. "The fact," writes Driver, at the place, "is not one which the writer of this verse is likely to have known." This contention falls to the ground when we find that only three verses off we have material that goes back at least as far as the time of Abraham. After all, the presumption is that the writer stated the fact because he knew it, not in spite of his not knowing it; and that knowledge must be due to the same cause as the noteworthy language of Gen 10:19, i.e. to early date.
This is merely one example of the confirmations of little touches in Genesis that are constantly being provided by archaeology. For the detailed facts see the separate articles, e.g. AMRAPHEL; JERUSALEM, and compare IV , below.
From the point of view of the critical question we note (a) that such accuracy is a natural mark of authentic early documents, and (b) that in view of the arguments already adduced and of the legal evidence to be considered, the most reasonable explanation is to be found in a theory of contemporary authorship.
(3) The Legal Evidence of Genesis.
The legal evidence is perhaps more convincing, for here no theory of late authorship can be devised to evade the natural inference. Correct information as to early names, geography, etc., might be the result of researches by an exilic writer in a Babylonian library; but early customs that are confirmed by the universal experience of primitive societies, and that point to a stage of development which had long been passed in the Babylonia even of Abraham's day, can be due to but one cause--genuine early sources. The narratives of Genesis are certainly not the work of comparative sociologists. Two instances may be cited. The law of homicide shows us two stages that are known to be earlier than the stage attested by Ex 21:12 ff. In the story of Cain we have one stage; in Gen 9:6, which does not yet recognize any distinction between murder and other forms of homicide, we have the other.
Our other example shall be the unlimited power of life and death possessed by the head of the family (Gen 38:24; 42:37, etc.), which has not yet been limited in any way by the jurisdiction of the courts as in Exodus-Deuteronomy. In both cases comparative historical jurisprudence confirms the Bible account against the critical, which would make e.g. Gen 9:6 post-exilic, while assigning Ex 21 to a much earlier period. (On the whole subject see further OP , 135 ff.)
(4) The Professedly Mosaic Character of the Legislation.
Coming now to the four concluding books of the Pentateuch, we must first observe that the legislation everywhere professes to be Mosaic. Perhaps this is not always fully realized. In critical editions of the text the rubrics and an occasional phrase are sometimes assigned to redactors, but the representation of Mosaic date is far too closely interwoven with the matter to be removed by such devices. If e.g. we take such a section as Dt 12, we shall find it full of such phrases as "for ye are not as yet come to the rest and to the inheritance" etc.; "When ye go over Jordan," "the place which the Lord shall choose" (the King James Version), etc. It is important to bear this in mind throughout the succeeding discussion.
(5) The Historical Situation required by Pentateuch.
What do we find if we ignore the Mosaic dress and seek to fit P into any other set of conditions, particularly those of the post-exilic period? The general historical situation gives a clear answer. The Israelites are represented as being so closely concentrated that they will always be able to keep the three pilgrimage festivals. One exception only is contemplated, namely, that ritual uncleanness or a journey may prevent an Israelite from keeping the Passover. Note that in that case he is most certainly to keep it one month later (Nu 9:10 f). How could this law have been enacted when the great majority of the people were in Babylonia, Egypt, etc., so that attendance at the temple was impossible for them on any occasion whatever? With this exception the entire Priestly Code always supposes that the whole people are at all times dwelling within easy reach of the religious center. How strongly this view is embedded in the code may be seen especially from Lev 17, which provides that all domestic animals to be slaughtered for food must be brought to the door of the Tent of Meeting. Are we to suppose that somebody deliberately intended such legislation to apply when the Jews were scattered all over the civilized world, or even all over Canaan? If so, it means a total prohibition of animal food for all save the inhabitants of the capital.
In post-exilic days there was no more pressing danger for the religious leaders to combat than intermarriage, but this code, which is supposed to have been written for the express purpose of bringing about their action, goes out of its way to give a fictitious account of a war and incidentally to legalize some such unions (Nu 31:18). And this chapter also contains a law of booty. What could be more unsuitable? How and where were the Jews to make conquests and capture booty in the days of Ezra?
"Or again, pass to the last chapter of Nu and consider the historical setting. What is the complaint urged by the deputation that waits upon Moses? It is this: If heiresses `be married to any of the sons of the other tribes of the children of Israel, then shall their inheritance be taken away from the inheritance of our fathers, and shall be added to the inheritance of the tribe whereunto they shall belong.' What a pressing grievance for a legislator to consider and redress when tribes and tribal lots had long since ceased to exist for ever!" (OP, 121 f).
Perhaps the most informing of all the discrepancies between P and the post-exilic age is one that explains the freedom of the earlier prophets from its literary influence. According to the constant testimony of the Pentateuch, including the Priestly Code (P), portions of the law were to reach the people only through priestly teaching (Lev 10:11; Dt 24:8; 33:10, etc.). Ezra on the other hand read portions of P to the whole people.
(6) The Hierarchical Organization in Pentateuch.
Much of what falls under this head is treated in PRIESTS AND LEVITES, sec. 2, (a), (b), and need not be repeated here. The following may be added: "Urim and Thummim were not used after the Exile. In lieu of the simple conditions--a small number of priests and a body of Levites--we find a developed hierarchy, priests, Levites, singers, porters, Nethinim, sons of Solomon's servants. The code that ex hypothesi was forged to deal with this state of affairs has no acquaintance with them. The musical services of the temple are as much beyond its line of vision as the worship of the synagogue. Even such an organization as that betrayed by the reference in 1 Sam 2:36 to the appointment by the high priest to positions carrying pecuniary emoluments is far beyond the primitive simplicity of P" (OP, 122).
(7) The Legal Evidence of the Pentateuch.
As this subject is technical we can only indicate the line of reasoning. Legal rules may be such as to enable the historical inquirer to say definitely that they belong to an early stage of society. Thus if we find elementary rules relating to the inheritance of a farmer who dies without leaving sons, we know that they cannot be long subsequent to the introduction of individual property in land, unless of course the law has been deliberately altered. It is an everyday occurrence for men to die without leaving sons, and the question What is to happen to their land in such cases must from the nature of the case be raised and settled before very long. When therefore we find such rules in Nu 27, etc., we know that they are either very old or else represent a deliberate change in the law. The latter is really out of the question, and we are driven back to their antiquity (see further OP , 124 ff). Again in Nu 35 we find an elaborate struggle to express a general principle which shall distinguish between two kinds of homicide. The earlier law had regarded all homicide as on the same level (Gen 9). Now, the human mind only reaches general principles through concrete cases, and other ancient legislations (e.g. the Icelandic) bear witness to the primitive character of the rules of Numbers. Thus, an expert like Dareate can say confidently that such rules as these are extremely archaic (see furtherSBL and OP , passim).
(8) The Evidence of Deuteronomist.
The following may be quoted: "Laws are never issued to regulate a state of things which has passed away ages before, and can by no possibility be revived. What are we to think, then, of a hypothesis which assigns the code of Deuteronomy to the reign of Josiah, or shortly before it, when its injunctions to exterminate the Canaanites (20:16-18) and the Amalekites (25:17-19), who had long since disappeared, would be as utterly out of date as a law in New Jersey at the present time offering a bounty for killing wolves and bears, or a royal proclamation in Great Britain ordering the expulsion of the Danes? A law contemplating foreign conquests (20:10-15) would have been absurd when the urgent question was whether Judah could maintain its own existence against the encroachments of Babylon and Egypt. A law discriminating against Ammon and Moab (23:3,4), in favor of Edom (23:7,8), had its warrant in the Mosaic period, but not in the time of the later kings. Jeremiah discriminates precisely the other way, promising a future restoration to Moab (48:47) and Ammon (49:6), which he denies to Edom (49:17,18), who is also to Joel (3:19), Obadiah, and Isaiah (63:1-6), the representative foe of the people of God. .... The allusions to Egypt imply familiarity with and recent residence in that land .... And how can a code belong to the time of Josiah, which, while it contemplates the possible selection of a king in the future (Dt 17:14 ff), nowhere implies an actual regal government, but vests the supreme central authority in a judge and the priesthood (Dt 17:8-12; 19:17); which lays special stress on the requirements that the king must be a native and not a foreigner (Dt 17:15), when the undisputed line of succession had for ages been fixed in the family of David, and that he must not `cause the people to return to Egypt.' (Dt 17:16), as they seemed ready to do on every grievance in the days of Moses (Nu 14:4), but which no one ever dreamed of doing after they were fairly established in Canaan?" (Green, Moses and the Prophets, 63 f). This too may be supplemented by legal evidence (e.g. Dt 22:26 testifies to the undeveloped intellectual condition of the people). Of JE it is unnecessary to speak, for Ex 21 f are now widely regarded as Mosaic in critical circles. Wellhausen (Prolegomena (6), 392, note) now regards their main elements as pre-Mosaic Canaanitish law.
These are of two kinds. Sometimes we have references to the laws, in other cases we find evidence that they were in operation. (a) By postulating redactors evidence can be banished from the Biblical text. Accordingly, reference will only be made to some passages where this procedure is not followed. Ezek 22:26 clearly knows of a law that dealt with the subjects of the Priestly Code (P), used its very language (compare Lev 10:10 f), and like P was to be taught to the people by the priests. Hos 4:6 also knows of some priestly teaching, which, however, is moral and may therefore be Lev 19; but in 8:11-13 he speaks of 10,000 written precepts, and here the context points to ritual. The number and the subject-matter of these precepts alike make it certain that he knew a bulky written law which was not merely identical with Ex 21 through 23, and this passage cannot be met by Wellhausen who resorts to the device of translating it with the omission of the important word "write." (b) Again, in dealing with institutions the references can often be evaded. It is possible to say, "Yes, this passage knows such and such a law, but this law does not really come into existence with D or the Priestly Code (P), but was an older law incorporated in these documents." That argument would apply, e.g. to the necessity for two witnesses in the case of Naboth. That is a law of D, but those who assign Deuteronomy to the reign of Josiah would assert that it is here merely incorporating older material. Again the allusions sometimes show something that differs in some way from the Pentateuch, and it is often impossible to prove that this was a development. The critics in such cases claim that it represents an earlier stage, and it frequently happens that the data are insufficient either to support or refute this view. "But fortunately there are in P certain institutions of which the critics definitely assert that they are late. Accordingly, references that prove the earlier existence of such institutions have a very different probative value. Thus it is alleged that before the exile there was but one national burnt offering and one national meal offering each day: whereas Nu 28 demands two. Now in 1 Ki 18:29,36, we find references to the offering of the evening oblation, but 2 Ki 3:20 speaks of `the time of offering the oblation' in connection with the morning. Therefore these two oblations were actually in existence centuries before the date assigned to P--who, on the critical theory, first introduced them. So 2 Ki 16:15 speaks of `the morning burnt-offering, and the evening meal-offering .... with the burnt-offering of all the people of the land, and their meal-offering.' This again gives us the two burnt offerings, though, on the hypothesis, they were unknown to pre-exilic custom. Similarly in other cases: Jer 32 shows us the land laws in actual operation; Ezekiel is familiar with the Jubilee laws--though, on the critical hypothesis, these did not yet exist. Jeroboam was acquainted with P's date for Tabernacles, though the critics allege that the date was first fixed in the Exile" (OP, 132 f) .
We can only mention certain other branches of evidence. There is stylistic evidence of early date (see e.g. Lias, BS, 1910, 20-46, 299-334). Further, the minute accuracy of the narrative of Ex-Nu to local conditions, etc. (noticed below, IV, 8, (6)), affords valuable testimony. It may be said generally that the whole work--laws and narrative--mirrors early conditions, whether we regard intellectual, economic or purely legal development (see further below,IV , and OP , passim).
5. The Fundamental Improbabilities of the Critical Case:
(1) Moral and Psychological Issues.
The great fundamental improbabilities of the critical view have hitherto been kept out of sight in order that the arguments for and against the detailed case might not be prejudiced by other considerations. We must now glance at some of the broader issues. The first that occurs is the moral and psychological incredibility. On theory two great frauds were perpetrated--in each case by men of the loftiest ethical principles. Deuteronomy was deliberately written in the form of Mosaic speeches by some person or persons who well knew that their work was not Mosaic. P is a make-up--nothing more. All its references to the wilderness, the camp, the Tent of Meeting, the approaching occupation of Canaan, etc., are so many touches introduced for the purpose of deceiving. There can be no talk of literary convention, for no such convention existed in Israel. The prophets all spoke in their own names, not in the dress of Moses. David introduced a new law of booty in his own name; the Chronicler repeatedly refers temple ordinances to David and Solomon; Samuel introduced a law of the kingdom in his own name. Yet we are asked to believe that these gigantic forgeries were perpetrated without reason or precedent. Is it credible? Consider the principles inculcated, e.g. the Deuteronomic denunciations of false prophets, the prohibition of adding aught to the law, the passionate injunctions to teach children. Can it be believed that men of such principles would have been guilty of such conduct? Nemo repente fit turpissimus, says the old maxim; can we suppose that the denunciations of those who prophesy falsely in the name of the Lord proceed from the pen of one who was himself forging in that name? Or can it be that the great majority of Bible readers know so little of truth when they meet it that they cannot detect the ring of unquestionable sincerity in the references of the Deuteronomist to the historical situation? Or can we really believe that documents that originated in such a fashion could have exercised the enormous force for righteousness in the world that these documents have exercised? Ex nihilo nihil. Are literary forgeries a suitable parentage for Gen 1 or Leviticus or Deuteronomy? Are the great monotheistic ethical religions of the world, with all they have meant, really rooted in nothing better than folly and fraud?
(2) The Historical Improbability.
A second fundamental consideration is the extraordinary historical improbability that these frauds could have been successfully perpetrated. The narrative in Kings undoubtedly relates the finding of what was regarded as an authentic work. King and people, priests and prophets must have been entirely deceived if the critical theory be true. It is surely possible that Huldah and Jeremiah were better judges than modern critics. Similarly in the case of the Priestly Code (P), if e.g. there had been no Levitical cities or no such laws as to tithes and firstlings as were here contemplated, but entirely different provisions on the subjects, how came the people to accept these forgeries so readily? (See furtherPOT , 257 f, 294-97.) It is of course quite easy to carry this argument too far. It cannot be doubted that the exile had meant a considerable break in the historical continuity of the national development; but yet once the two views are understood the choice cannot be difficult. On the critical theory elaborate literary forgeries were accepted as genuine ancient laws; on the conservative theory laws were accepted because they were in fact genuine, and interpreted as far as possible to meet the entirely different requirements of the period. This explains both the action of the people and the divergence between preexilic and post-exilic practice. The laws were the same but the interpretation was different.
(3) The Divergence between the Laws and Post-exilic Practice.
Thirdly, the entire perversion of the true meaning of the laws in post-exilic times makes the critical theory incredible. Examples have been given (see above, 4, (5), (6), andPRIESTS AND LEVITES , passim). It must now suffice to take just one instance to make the argument clear. We must suppose that the author of P deliberately provided that if Levites approached the altar both they and the priests should die (Nu 18:3), because he really desired that they should approach the altar and perform certain services there. We must further suppose that Ezra and the people on reading these pro