CRITICAL REMARKS.

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slightest degree the credit of the earlier history. In a Levitical author, and one so devoted to the interests of his order, the assertion that an entire people had at once gone over to a purer faith must not be interpreted too strictly. Besides it is not denied, that even at the present day the most important laws might be generally known without the existence of any written code. But are we to suppose that even an idolatrous prince, who had admitted many gods into his temple, in addition to the worship of Jehovah, could not or would not repair that building when it actually required it? Or are we to suppose that Jehovah, the Deity of the nation, could not or would not obtain his offering of incense, as well as the idol Astarte or any other image that might happen to be peaceably installed in his temple? Lastly, let Movers prove that Josiah ascended the throne so precisely at the commencement of the new year, that the eighteenth year of his reign must have reached exactly from one Passover to the other. Those who are familiar with the general want of precision in the biblical writers, will find little difficulty in the phrase (verse 33) “and the king commanded the whole people," which is commonly employed as a connective: the narrator, in fact, merely mentioned the Passover incidentally, while the great religious reform was the grand object that engrossed his attention.

Some critics (as Bertholdt and Sack) speak of the recovery of the law, while others have suggested that it was found by the builders and perhaps at the side of the moneychest which Jehoiada the priest had placed at the entrance of the temple. All this however is mere supposition, and is opposed to the text, according to which Hilkiah is said to have found in the temple the book of THE (definite article)

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BOOK OF THE LAW.

law (sapher hatorah); so that the nature and extent of this book are the only points that are left undetermined. Bertholdt' assumes that what was found was the whole of the Pentateuch, because the principal laws concerning the celebration of the passover are contained in Exodus2. We are told, however, that "all the words of the book" were read, first to the king, and afterwards to the assembled people3; and we consider it more reasonable to suppose, with Vater, that a short abstract of the laws, or at most that the fifth book of the Pentateuch, is here referred to. The book of Deuteronomy is the first which appears in quotations (in 2 Kings, 2 Chronicles, Nehemiah and Daniel4), and in these too (which is never the case with the other books) it is expressly ascribed to Moses,-a circumstance which has led Eichhorn to the arbitrary assumption of a separate national code. Deuteronomy also varies in not a few cases from the other books of the law, and does not venture as yet to speak of the firstlings or of the tithes of the priests5. It contains moreover directions for the celebration of the Passover, and a chapter of threats and curses, well suited to alarm king Josiah, which are particularly deserving of notice. In no other

1 Program. Erlang. 1817.

2 Chapter xii. Comp. Numbers xxviii. 16, &c. 3" And the king went up into the house of the Lord, and all the men of Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem with him, and the priests, and the prophets, and all the people, both small and great: and he read in their ears all the words of the book of the covenant which was found in the house of the Lord."-2 Kings xxiii. 2.

Compare 2 Kings xiv. 6. Jos. viii. 31. 2 Chron. xxv. 4. with Deut. xxiv. 16; Nehem. xiii. 1, with Deut. xxiii. 3; Dan. ix. 13. with Deut. xxviii.

5

Compare Deut. xviii. 1, with Numb. xviii. 11, &c., especially Vater, Comment. p. 573.

6 Deut. xvi. 1-12.

7 Deut. chap. xxvii.

part of the Pentateuch is it announced in such express terms, that Jehovah would drive the king into exile1, and according to the Talmud, and the parallel passage in the Chronicles, these were the chapters of Deuteronomy3 which were read before the king.

There is, however, something peculiar in the manner in which the discovery of the book [of the law] is related, and importance is evidently attached to the fact of this discovery, since it is placed at the very commencement of the reign of Josiah, who had been purposely referred to in a previous chapter as the destroyer of idolatry4. Under these circumstances, the doubting critic may perhaps be allowed to inquire, what proof there is that Hilkiah the priest had really found this manuscript, and had not himself placed it in the spot where he afterwards discovered it? The manuscript lay in the Temple, and probably the Holy of Holies would have been the most appropriate place

1 "The Lord shall bring thee, and thy king which thou shalt set over thee, unto a nation which neither thou nor thy fathers have known; and there shalt thou serve other gods, wood and stone......And the Lord shall scatter thee among all people, from the one end of the earth even unto the other; and there thou shalt serve other gods, which neither thou nor thy fathers have known, even wood and stone."-Deut. xxviii. 36, 64.

2 Tract. Joma, c. 5.

3 ["All the curses that are written in the book which they have read before the king of Judah."-2 Chron. xxxiv. 24. These curses are contained in Deut. xxviii. 15-68, and are referred to nearly in the same words as in the Chronicles in the next chapter of Deuteronomy. "The anger of the Lord was kindled against this land, to bring upon it all the curses that are written in this book."-Deut. xxix. 27.]

4.66 'And he cried against the altar in the word of the Lord, and said, O altar, altar, thus saith the Lord; Behold, a child shall be born unto the house of David, Josiah by name; and upon thee shall he offer the priests of the high places that burn incense upon thee, and men's bones shall be burnt upon thee."-1 Kings xiii. 2.

for it; but from the time of Solomon downwards, the whole sanctuary had been so frequently employed as a temple for various gods, that the well-known enactment of the law, which allowed the high-priest alone to enter its precincts, could not have been put in force until the whole system of the priesthood of Jehovah had become fully established, and indeed this exclusive privilege of the high-priest rested originally on the Pentateuch.

In the holy of holies was placed the ark of the covenant, but it is admitted that there was nothing in it except the two tables of stone1; and, even supposing that the roll of the law had been found in the ark, this circumstance would not assist in proving the authenticity of the manuscript. The ark itself was at one time in the hands of the Philistines, and during a considerable period was even lost sight of entirely by the Israelites. In the course of centuries, it must have stood in need of being renewed, and even those who can believe that after the lapse of a thousand years it still remained uninjured, which no one has ventured to do, must be content, with Jahn, Eichhorn and Vitringa2, to assign the same age to the Mosaic roll, since no proof can be adduced down to this time of the existence of the Pentateuch. But in the trying climate of Palestine this book would have been injured, if not reduced to ashes, of whatever material it may be imagined that it was made; and its very name [sapher] proves it to have been written either on parchment or skin. The character in which it was

1 66

'There was nothing in the ark save the two tables of stone, which Moses put there at Horeb, when the Lord made a covenant with the children of Israel, when they came out of the land of Egypt.”—1 Kings viii. 9.

2 De Synagog. Vet. p. 395.

THE MANUSCRIPT.

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written is a difficulty which Eichhorn dismisses briefly, and yet this character must have been perfectly obsolete and unintelligible [in the reign of Josiah], but Shaphan the scribe reads it with as much ease as if he himself had engrossed it. Finally, it is worthy of remark, that the book of Deuteronomy itself provides1 that the book of the law shall be placed by the side of the ark, and not in it; and this may have been inserted in order to increase the probability of an early discovery.

All these various doubts, which force themselves on our notice on the first and most cursory view of this transaction, will be found, on a closer examination, to assume a more serious character. Hilkiah produces the manuscript as a book which, until that time, had been unknown; and it is the Chronicles, possibly feeling the suspicion which might have attached itself to the high-priest, which first ascribe it to Moses2. This assertion of its origin is also repeated by Josephus. But, it may be asked, why did not Hilkiah himself, in the general narrative, ascribe a source to the book which would have added so much weight to its authority? And if the laws had been ever heard of, why should the discovery of this book excite such great astonishment? None of the older critics can assign any other reason for this sensation than that which is implied in the text, which leaves us to infer that neither the high-priest nor the king had any previous knowledge of the book4.

1 Deut. xxxi. 26. "In the side of the ark."

2 "And when they brought out the money that was brought into the house of the Lord, Hilkiah the priest found a book of the law of the Lord given by Moses."-2 Chron. xxxiv. 14.

3 Archæol. 10, 4, 2.

4 Comp. Capellus Diatribe, p. 159: "There must have been very few