SECTION IV. HOW BOTH SIDES WERE SUPPLEMENTED IN THE COURSE THE ANTIQUITIES OF ISRAEL. INTRODUCTION. THE LAWS AND CUSTOMS OF THE THEOCRACY IN ITS AT the peaceful and elevated centre of the whole history, we purpose making a considerable pause, to learn more closely how the highest life of the ancient nation gradually found a way into all its lower springs of action, and how it sought to establish itself permanently in a variety of legal institutions. To understand this thoroughly and firmly is absolutely indispensable for a correct apprehension of the complete history; and the present opportunity is in every respect the most suitable for explaining it. 1. For it was not till the peaceful elevation of the last years of David, and of the succeeding rule of Solomon was attained, that the laws and institutions of the Theocracy could expand to their full extent. Not till then could they entwine themselves so closely with the whole national life as we find was the case in the next centuries, and which in essentials lasted unaltered during all their subsequent course. Only in those periods of a nation's life which are blessed with peace will its better customs and usages assume the most permanent forms, when the germs have had a long time, stormy and violent though it may have been, to strike deep into the soil. What would have resulted from all the institutions and customs of the Mosaic Theocracy if the storms of the period of the Judges had 2 not been followed by the sunny days of David and Solomon? Ancient Israel was now for the first time firmly established in the country, and the finer manifestations of its life under the Theocracy, now also first assumed the forms which they ever after essentially retained. This fact is confirmed by their literature. The important remains of the Book of Origins, dating from just this exalted period, supply us with the most complete and vivid descriptions of the laws of the Theocracy which we possess. The more strongly a greatly altered age tended to introduce modifications, the more scrupulously did the author of this Book seek to preserve the remembrance of the laws of the Theocracy as they had existed and been developed from the august days of Moses. He was of course primarily not a legislator, but a writer of history; but his anxiety is evident to contribute all he can to save and establish the genuine old theocratic laws, so that his work is imbued with the true legislative spirit. For this purpose he strictly limited himself to the laws of the ancient Theocracy, without regarding those of the Monarchy, which was as yet too new to become the object of historical explanation and lengthy description. Moreover, to preserve by its side as much as possible of the old customs and principles of the Theocracy, and establish them for all future times, appeared a sufficiently important aim. It was still not too late to make a more complete collection of these ancient laws and legal germs, and to give an explanation of them; and no one has done this more satisfactorily than our author. Nor can there be anything at once more foolish and more unjust than to suppose that the laws and regulations of the Theocracy described in this book had no genuine historical basis, or did not in the main come down from Moses as their ultimate source. We have indeed no guarantee that each little section of the usages here described as legal came in that exact form direct from Moses. 3 Many details may have been more fully worked out in the time of Joshua or later still, and would appear so sacred that the author would now never think of separating them from the rest. In what cases this has occurred will be explained more fully below. But to deny their historical basis, and their ultimate origin in Moses, is nothing less than completely to misunderstand, on the one side, the soul of ancient literature, and on the other, both the inmost essence and the grand connection of the most important laws.2 1 Hist. i. p. 82. many from twenty to forty, nay, even ten 2 As, alas, was very common in Ger- years ago. The best refutation of such Accordingly we proceed everywhere on the broad and secure foundation furnished by the Book of Origins, composed at this very period. Nothing can give us such vivid representations of details, nothing can promise us so trustworthy a historical starting-point, as the precious relics of this book. But we shall always compare with them the remaining earlier and later sources; tracing back the origin and meaning of the usages to the earliest days of the community, or still further into the remotest primitive times; and also directing our glance forwards to the later, especially the Deuteronomic, development. If the usages prevalent in the brightest periods of the whole history are understood, as well as the way in which their ancient origin is to be regarded, it will be easy to survey the comparatively trifling changes which they underwent in the later days towards the end of this history; and this in most cases can be touched upon in no more suitable place than is afforded by the present work. On the other hand, the entirely new developments of later centuries, from the origin of the human monarchy in Israel and subsequently, can only be discussed when we come to those periods, and are explained in detail at the proper places in the third volume, from page 204 onwards, and in the succeeding volumes of the history. 2. If it were necessary to describe here the condition of 4 the ancient nation in every respect, this discussion would have to be tolerably minute. But useful as it may be to know, amongst other things, how the ancient Israelites were dressed, or what sort of dwellings they had, yet we find that just in these matters of ordinary human life, the nation had few or no peculiarities, and still less set an example in them to other races. The ordinary clothing and manner of living of the men and women of Israel were, with trifling exceptions, of which some are mentioned below, the same as those of the nations then dwelling in that part of the world, and as still exist there very little altered. On this account in the Bible, too, very little comparatively is said on these matters, and the starting-point for all discussion in this province is a knowledge of the present condition of these lands and nations. There is much besides of what was peculiar to the people of misunderstandings is given in the whole discussion which follows.-I leave this remark from the first edition still standing (1866). Apart from the scholars of our days who do not go on historical principles, the earliest general doubt of De Wette, Gramberg, Bohlen, and others, has been now revived in a somewhat moro serious fashion only by K. H. Graf in his treatise Die geschichtlichen Bücher des Alten Testaments, Leipsic, 1866. How little foundation there is for this is shown in the criticism of it in the Göttingen. Gelehrten Anzeigen, 1866. |