For the truth mentioned above, that the whole conception of Shé’%l lies outside genuine Jah- wism, and was at all times a part, indeed, of the popular faith, but not of religion proper, there is evidence not only in the stern rejection of necro- mancy (as the appendage of another, heathen, religion), but, above all, in the denial of any relation between the inhabitants of Shé’ol and the objects and arrangements of the upper world —in particular, those of the theocracy. Only the living are members of the latter, and have a share in its blessings; at death every connecting link with itis broken. In Shé’dl there is no more giving of thanks or praise to God (Ps 6°) 30” 115”, Is 3818*)_nay, God Himself does not remember the * So esp. Schwally, Leben nach dem Tode, p. 7 ff. (founding upon nephesh méth of Ly 2111 and Nu 6°, which Schwally renders by ‘Totenseele’), also in Archiv fiir Relig.-Wissensch.
iv. 2, p. 181 ff.; Willy Staerk, art. ‘Nephesh hajja und nephesh mét’ in SK, 1903, p. 156f. (‘The nephesh does not die, but
changes its form of existence’).
shades any more, or work wonders for those that dwell in ‘the land of forgetfulness’ (Ps 88% "%-). The fortunes of their children do not concern them (Job 14% 2171), ‘for there is no work nor device nor knowledge nor wisdom in Shé@’6l, whither thou goest’ (Ec 9').* There is no contradiction be- tween all this and the way in which, according to Pr 15" and Job 26°, the omniscience, nay, accord- ing to Ps 1398, even the omnipresence of God, is extended even to Sh@ol. This is the necessary consequence of the highest stage of the conception of God; but even here a direct relation of God to the inhabitants of Sh@#6l is not asserted.
In spite of its very loose connexion with genu- ine Jahwism, the conception of Shé’ol—like the Hades-belief of the Greeks and all the cognate phenomena in other religions—contains an im- portant religious feature. The tenacity with which it maintains itself all through the centuries, notwithstanding its irreconcilability with the pre- vailing anthropological presuppositions (see above), is a strong testimony to the fact that man’s natural way of thinking revolts at the notion of a com- plete annihilation of the living personality, even if it has to content itself with a sorry substitute for a real continuation of life. Even in this there are fruitful germs of a later doctrine of immor- tality, and we shall afterwards see that these were not wanting also in the soil of Jahwism.
3. To the realm of notions which we have in- cluded in the title of the present section under the general term Weltanschawung, belong, in the first place, those relating to the origin of the world. (a) Unfortunately, our only source of information on this point for the present period is the Jahwistic record contained in Gn 2, -It is very probable, however, that only a part of this (the story of the creation of men and animals) has been preserved ; while the introduction, which also must surely have contained some more detailed account of the creation of heaven and earth,+ has now been dropped, perhaps on account of its deviations from the immediately preceding cosmogony of P. But, even granting that J would have contented himself with a summary mention (in v.*») of the creation of the world by Jahweh, his narrative, with all its naiveness, remains a worthy and valuable counter- part to the preceding cosmogony. Like the latter, it avoids all intermixture of a mythological char- acter—in particular, all thought of an evolution such as is usually bound up inseparably with the cosmogonies of ancient religions. Jahweh is
always exalted above matter, ony distin- guished from it, and ruling over it. As in the
case of every truly religious Weltanschawung, our
*It may be that this conception of Sheol first arose in the later period, which was influenced by Prophetism (so Charles, Critical History, etc., see above, p. 668», note $), whereas at an earlier time an influence of the spirits of the dead upon the upper world was held to be possible. True, we have no other evidence for the latter assumption than the existence of the practice of necromancy so peremptorily forbidden (cf. Is 819) by the prophets. The further assumption of Charles, that the earlier conception grew out of Ancestor Worship, cannot, to say the least of it, be proved in face of what we have said already (p. 614 ff.). ‘The same remark applies to Beer’s theory (‘Der biblische Hades,’ p. 3ff.), that the Sh@l-belief is a sur- vival of the cult of subterranean gods and demons.
+ When Stade (ZA7'W, 1903, p. 178) argues that the belief in Jahweh as the Creator could have taken its rise only as a result of the preaching of the prophets, this is certainly correct in so far as the idea of the creation and control of the Universe is concerned. For this idea is essentially irreconcilable with the recognition of foreign national gods, and becomes possible for the first time on the basis of a consistent monotheism. But this does not exclude naive ideas about a creative activity on the part of the national god (e.g. a creation of man), as is shown by numerous analogies in popular and nature religions. Perhaps the very naiveness of the Jahwistic cosmogony supplied a motive for its suppression. Cf. the remarks of Gunkel in Schépfung wnd Chaos (Gottingen, 1895, p. 159). He considers that, in early days, people, in speaking of the creation of ‘the heavens and the earth,’ probably thought primarily of the land of Canaan and the skies of Canaan.