These statements and requirements of the Priests’ Code are all the more surprising, as there can be no doubt that the Ark perished in the de- struction of the temple in B.c. 586.* This agrees with the cireumstance that Ezekiel, in his sketch of the new order of the theocracy, has no mention of the Ark, and the Holy of Holies of the second temple was, according to unimpeachable Jewish tradition, completely empty. Hence those ex- pressions in the Priests’ Code which take the Ark for granted must have emanated from priestly circles which looked upon its restoration as neces- sary, but did not succeed in carrying out this aim. To the eagerness with which at one time the restoration or non-restoration of the Ark was dis- cussed we have an instructive witness in Jer 31° (which is a later insertion in the Book of Jeremiah), Here we have the heart’s desire of a man of the prophetic spirit ; and it is to the effect that, when the exiles are brought home again and tended by shepherds after God’s own heart, when Jerusalem has become a place of true worship even for the heathen, there shall be no need of an outward sign of the presence of Jahweh, and thus no need even of the Ark.
iii. THE ESSENTIAL CHARACTER OF JAHWISM AS THE RELIGION OF ISRAEL.—1., Ever since Josephus | defined the constitution of Israel as a
* No importance attaches, of course, to the statements of 2 Mac 25! about Jeremiah’s concealing of the Tabernacle (!), the Ark, and the Altar of Incense in a cave of Mt. Nebo.
+c. Apion. ii. 16 [Niese, #2. Josephi Opera, v. p. 75, § 164f.]: ‘Some entrusted the government of the State to a single person, others to a few, others to the whole body of the people ; whereas our lawgiver turned his thoughts to none of those methods, but, if we might use a somewhat bold expression, drew up a politi- cal constitution in the form of a theocracy, assigning the rule and power to God.’ The whole manner of expression adopted by Josephus shows that in using the word ‘theocracy’ he is conscious of having coined a new term. See also art. THE- OCRACY, above, p. 337.
a
630 RELIGION OF ISRAEL
RELIGION OF ISRAEL
‘theocracy,’ or ‘rule by God,’ this term has been repeated over and over, and its use has been ex- tended even to the political and religious system introduced by Moses. As a ‘theocracy’ the re- ligion founded by him has been represented as distinguished from all others; that is to say, the constitution was so arranged that all the organs of government were without any independent powers, and had simply to announce and to execute the will of God as declared by priests and prophets or reduced to writing as a code of Laws. This ideal was illustrated by the action of Gideon when (Jg 8%) he refused the monarchical dignity for himself and his son on the ground that ‘Jahweh shall rule over you.’ On the other hand, accord- ing to the view represented in 1 S 81. 17# and ch. 12, the people wickedly ignored the idea of the theocracy when they demanded a king from Samuel: ‘It is not thee that they have rejected,’ says God to Samuel (1S 87), ‘but they have re- jected me, that I should no longer be king over them.’ Is there not here a perfectly serious claim put forward on behalf of the theocracy, and is not this form of government put forward as the only legitimate one? That is so. But this does not represent the view taken in the earlier monarchical period,—which sees in the monarchy a beneficent institution for the deliverance of the people (1S 916),—but that of the later centuries, after people had had unhappy experiences of the monarchy, and especially after they had come to lay upon it the blame for the religious and moral degeneration of the nation, even for the destruction of the State. But for the time of Moses the conception ‘theo- cracy’ cannot be taken account of, for the sufficient reason that at that time it is impossible to speak of any constitution at all as in existence. All through the period of the Judges, and in part even under Saul, the tribes lived each their own life; it was at mest only for the settling of processes of law that they needed a kind of supreme authority, and this latter function was discharged by the heads of clans and families—of course not, however, upon the basis of written laws, but of usage and custom. It is true that common pressure by foes had at times the effect of bringing about a coalition, not perhaps of all, but of a number of tribes; but even then human leaders could not be dispensed with. That in all this an important réle was played by religion we shall see presently (see p. 635° f.). But for a ‘theocracy’ in the form defined by Josephus there is no room here. Scope was found for it only when, after the loss of political independence, national interests receded into the background and the interests of the cultus assumed on that account all the more prominence. So it was in the programme for the future sketched by Ezekiel (chs. 40-48), where the partition of the soil of the country is moulded upon the sacredness of the temple and its surround- ings, and where the ‘prince’ (nds¢; not ‘ king’) has scarcely any more important duty than to make careful provision for the public sacrifices. The complete realization of the ‘theocracy’ was next undertaken by the Priests’ Code. Here everything, even civil and criminal law, is looked at from the religious standpoint. The outward sway is in the hands of the foreigner, but what is left of the ancient national life presents itself in the form of a priestly State; the insignia of royalty—diadem and purple—are now assigned to the spiritual head, the high priest.