a mechanical dictating of every law by the Holy Spirit to Moses, then he has simply got to correct his views of inspiration. The facts do not fit them.

The Rest of the Religious Literature.

V

As the years went on, through the Providence of God, all unconsciously men were gathering and preserving material for the Bible that was to be. The ballads and poems grew into collections like the Book of Jasher. The legends were brought together in connected cycles and put in literary form. From the School of the Prophets came the vivid story of Elijah and his compeers, and doubtless very much more of such history besides. In the various sanctuaries priests gathered their laws and oral traditions. There were historical notes by the official Recorders (2 Samuel viii. 16; I Kings iv. 3, etc.). Many of the earliest prophets were writers of books, a tantalizing list that we can never now, examine, the Books of Nathan and Gad and Jehu and Iddo the Seer and Shemaiah and the rest. Then there were the collections of Proverbs by the men of Hezekiah and others (Prov. xxv. 1). There were psalms and sacred lyrics in the First Temple,

and amongst the people. (No critic can persuade us that this poetry loving Israel reserved its songs of praise till the days of the Exile.) And last, but not least, came the Sermons of the Great Prophets, which were one day to stand out so prominently in the Bible.

Be it remembered that all this material was not yet regarded as "Bible" in our sense of the word. It was simply the religious literature of ancient Israel.

CHAPTER III

THE "BIBLES BEFORE THE BIBLE"

How Pro

Now that we have found so much of the material for the Old Testament,

phets wrote let us get on with the making.

History.

So far as we can judge this making proceeded gradually. First came written collections of the old ballads and legends, such as the Book of Jasher, the Book of the Upright, probably a book of heroic ballads about the great men of the past-and the Book of the Wars of Jehovah, a collection doubtless of warlike narratives of the brave days of old. There were probably several such collections now lost to us for ever.

Then came earnest prophets and teachers touched by the Spirit of Jehovah, teaching and illustrating from the story of the past great lessons of God and Life and Duty. They were not so much concerned with the details of the

history as with its solemn lessons. They selected what they wanted to illustrate their themes. They left out what they did not want. They would probably not be regarded in our day as scientific historians. But it might be good for us if more of their spirit were in our histories to-day.

Take for example the collection of legends of the Judges which grew up at the several centres where they lived. Then see the inspired prophet writer taking these stories and placing them in the setting suitable for his purpose. See his continually recurring formula

The Children of Israel sinned against the
Lord,

And the Lord sold them unto the hand

of...

The the Children of Israel cried unto the

Lord,

And the Lord raised up unto them a deliverer.

That is the setting or framework of his pictures. The whole story is told in a continuous cycle of sinning and suffering and repenting and deliverance and sinning again and suffering and repenting and deliverance, and behind it all is a loving