It is true that the above passages do not define the lim- its of the book, nor prove its absolute identity with the existing copies of the Pentafeuch. But ofher evidences will be found to supply this proof. We have already the fact that a book was wriften by Moses under the immediate authority of God, and that this book was in- tended to be of perpetual obligation. Now, supposing that the scriptural testimony of the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch had ended here, although we shall see this is not the case, yet, even so, no moral doubt could exist that this design was carried info effect, and that the books thus preserved were substantially iden- tical with those wddch have come down to us. For at this period the Jewish people suddenly take their place amid the settled nations of the world, and enter upon that grand and mysterious national life which has con- tinued till our own day. It will not be denied by any that this race was distinguished from all others by many peculiar characteristics. Some of tlicir national habits exhibited affinity iu various points of detail with the surrounding polytheism amid which they dwelt; but their whole system was sharply separated, alike by the grandeur of its religious monotheism and by its complex social and civil organization, from that of all other nations. Their code of laws was penetrating enough to affix its indelible peculiarities on the race who lived under them, and to endow it with a force and elevation, a perpetuity of national life, and a world-wide influence, to which no parallel can be found in history.
PENTATEUCH
906
PENTATEUCH
Such an effect would itself prove the existence of a cause as pcnnanent as itself, for the precise ritual ami cereuionial onactineiits of the system could never have been maintained without an authorized code of direc- tions. When we inquire into the nature of that pecul- iar polity to which it is to be attributed, wo find it in the books of Moses. The Pentateuch contains a system which explains the national life of the Jewish race, and which, in its turn, is e(iually explained by it. As we know, on the one side, tiiat the Pentateuch was reduced by Moses to a written form, and, on the other side, that the [)henomona of national Jewish life can only be ex- plained by the influence of a positive written code, it is impossible not to put the two facts together, and iden- tify the iMosaic books of the law with the code of sub- sequent times. In other words, the permanence of the effect proves the permanence of the cause. The subse- quent history of the Jewish race would have sufficed to prove that the Mosaic code must have existed in a per- manent form from that period till the present, even if no positive external proofs of the fact had existed.
From the passages adduced above it is apparent, in- deed, that the most ninnerous and direct testimonies oc- cur in Deuteronomy ; and the opinion has had learned advocates that these testimonies are to be restricted to this one book, which is tlierefore admitted to be from the pen of Moses, whereas it is alleged that there is no clear evidence as to the authorship of the other four. But he who takes up this position in good faith is likely soon to discover that Deuteronom\' presupposes the ex- istence of the others, and the general knowledge of their contents, by its incidental reference to subjects which are intelligible only when we turn to the fuller accounts given in these books: for example, the dispersion and settlement of the nations by the hand of God; the call of Abraham, that in his seed the families of the earth miglit be blessed ; the patriarchal history generally, and the result of it, the sojourn of the children of Israel in Egypt; the destruction of Sodom and the neighbor- ing cities; the rel itionship of the Edomites, Moabites, and Ammonites to I^ra^l; the laws in reference to lep- rosy; the entire rides for the sacrificial services; the consecration of Aaron's family, and of the whole tribe of Levi in a wider sense, to these services, and the method of their support; and the laws on the subject of murder and manslaughter. Besides, the age of generalizations, such as we find in Deuteronomy, must be preceded by the age of particular enactments. Hence there are scarcely any wlio have intelligently believed that Deu- teronomy is the work of Moses, who have not come to feel the necessity of acknowledging him to be (substan- tially at least) the author of the entire Pentateuch.
(2.) Pressed by these arguments, some of the scep- tical critics have resorted to the opposite conclusion that the book of Deuteronomy itself, in which these striking testimonies are so largely found, is likewise not the production of Moses. It is of importance there- fore to consider this question separately.
All allow that the Book of the Covenant in Exodus, perhaps a great part of Leviticus, anil some part of Numbers were written by Israel's greatest leader and prophet. Pjiit Deuteronomy, it is alleged, is in style and purpose so utterly unlike the genuine writings of Moses that it is quite impossible to believe that he is tiie author. But how, then, set aside the express tes- timony of the book itself? How explain the ftict that Moses is there said to have written all the words of this law, to have consigned it to the custody of the priests, and to liave charged the Levites seduloush- to preserve it by the side of the ark? Only by the bold assertion that the fiction was invented by a later writer, wlio chose to personate the great Lawgiver in order to give the more color of consistency to his work ! The author first feigns the name of JMoses that he may gain tlie greater consideration luider the shadow of his name, and then ]irocoeds to re-enact, but in a broader and more spiritual manner, and with true prophetic inspira-