See generally Buddei Hist. V. T. i, 939 sq. ; Zeltner, De adolescentia reip. Israel. (Altorf, 169G); Bauer, Heb. Oesch. ii, 34 sq. ; Hess, Gesch. Josiia's v. d. Heerjuhrer (ZUr. 1779), ii ; Paulus, Theol.-exeget. Conservator, ii, 180 sq. ; Doring, Das Zeitalfer der Eichter (Freibiurg, 1883) ; Ewald, Isr. Gesch. ii, 3G2 sq. ; Stanley, Eist. of Jewish Church, lect. xiii.
III. The Judicial Office in later Periods amonfj the He- brews.— The magisterial functions of the priesthood be-
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ing, it may be presumed, in abeyance during the period of the judges, seem to have merged in the monarchy. The kingdom of Saul suffered too severely from exter- nal foes to allow civil matters much prominence. Hence of his only two recorded judicial acts, the one (1 Sam. xi, 13) wa's the mere remission of a penalty popularly demanded; the other the pronouncing of a sentence (ib. xiv, 44, 45), which, if it was sincerely intended, was over- ruled in turn by the right sense of the people. In Da- vid's reign it was evidently the rule for the kuig to hear causes in person, and not merely be passively, or even by deputy (though this might also be included), the "fountain of justice" to his jieople. For this purpose, perhaps, it was prospectively ordained that the king should '-write him a copy of the law," and "read there- in all the days of his Ufe" (Deut. xvii, 18, 19). The same class of cases which were reserved ibr IMoses would probably fall to his lot, and the high-priest was, of course, ready to assist the monarch. This is further presumable from the fact that no officer analogous to a chief justice ever appears under the kings. It has been supposed that the subjection of all Israel to David's sway caused an influx of such cases, and that advantage was artfully taken of this by Absalom (2 Sam. xv, 1-4) ; but the rate at which cases were disposed of can hardly have been slower among the ten tribes after David had become their king, than it was during the previous an- arch}-. It is more probable that during David's imi- formly successful wars wealth and population increased rapidly, and civil cases multiplied fastsr than the king, occupied with war, could attend to them, especially when the summarj- process customarj" in the East is consid- ered. Perhaps the arrangements mentioned in 1 Chron. xxiii, 4 ; xxvi, 29 (compare v, 32, " rulers" probably in- cluding judges), of the 6000 Levites acting as "officers and judges," and amongst them specially "Chenaniah and his sons," with others, for the trans-Jordanic tribes, may have been made to meet the need of suitors. In Solomon's character, whose reign of peace would surely be fertile in civil questions, the "wisdom to judge" was the fitting first quality (1 Kings iii, 9; comp. Psa. Ixxii, 1^). As a judge Solomon shines "in all his glory" (1 Kings iii, IG, etc.). No criminal was too powerful for his justice, as some had been for his father's (2 Sam. iii. 39, 1 Kuigs ii, 5, 6, 33, 34). The examples of direct royal exercise of judicial authority are 2 Sam. i, 15; iv, 9-12, where sentence is summarily executed, and the Buiiposed case of 2 Sam. xiv, 1-21. The denunciation of 2 Sam. xii, 5, 6, though not formally judicial, is yet in the same spirit. Solomon similarly proceeded in the cases of Joab and Shimei (1 Kings ii, 34, 4G; compare 2 Kings xiv, 5, G). It is likely that royalty in Israel was ultimately unfavorable to the local independence con- nected with the judicature of the " princes" and " eld- ers" in the territory and cities of each tribe. The ten- dency of the monarchy was doubtless to centralize, and we read of large numbers of king's officers appointed to tliis and cognate duties (1 Chron. xxiii, 4 ; xxvi, 29-32). If the general machinery of justice had been, as is rea- sonable to think, tleranged or retarded during a period of anarchy, the Levites affi)rdcd the fittest materials for its rcconstitution. Being to some extent detached, both locally, and by special duties, exemptions, etc., from the mass of the population, they were more easily brought to the steady routine which justice requires, and, what is no less important, were, in case of neglect of duty, more at the mercy of the king (as shown in the case of the priests at Nob, 1 Sam. xxii, 17). Hence it is prob- able that the Levites generally superseded the local eld- ers m the administration of justice. But subsequentlv, when the Levites withdrew from the kinjrdom of the ten tribes, judicial el.l.^rs probably again filled the t;ap. Thus they conducte.l the mock trial of Xaboth (1 Kings XXI, 8-13). There is in 2 Chron. xix, 5, etc., a special notice of a reappointment of judges by Jehoshaphat, and of a distinct court, of appeal, perhaps, at Jerusalem, com- posed of Levitical and of lav elements. In tlic same
place (as also in a previous one, 1 Chron. xxvi, 32) oc- curs a mention of " the king's matters" as a branch of jurisprudence. The rights of the prerogative having a constant tendency to encroach, and needing continual regulation, these may have grown probably into a de- partment somewhat like the English Exchequer.